The Tenth Circuit on Tuesday issued one published opinion and two unpublished opinions.

Published

In Nielson v. Ketchum, the Court reversed the district court’s decision. The day after giving birth, Petitioner appeared in state court in Utah to relinquish her parenting rights and consent to the adoption of her son by Respondents; the court determined that although Petitioner’s mother was a registered member of the Cherokee Nation, Petitioner was not, and consequently the court approved the adoption without applying the procedural safeguards of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). The ICWA imposes a period of ten days before a parent can consent to the termination of her parenting rights over an “Indian child.” Petitioner now claims her son was an Indian child at the time of the adoption under a tribal law, and the waiting period should have applied; the law passed by the Cherokee Nation established automatic temporary Cherokee citizenship for any newborn who is the direct descendant of a Cherokee listed on the Dawes Commission Rolls. The district court agreed, leaving the custody of the child up to the Utah state courts. However, the Court found that the tribal law is inapplicable to the ICWA; the tribe cannot expand the reach of a federal statute by a tribal provision that extends automatic citizenship to the child of a nonmember of the tribe. As such, based on the definition of “Indian child” within the ICWA, Petitioner’s child was not an “Indian child” at the time of the adoption proceedings for ICWA purposes and, therefore, the procedural safeguard waiting period did not apply to the relinquishment hearing and adoption proceedings.

Unpublished

Calloway v. Aerojet Gen. Corp.

United States v. Long