Sponsors (4)
The Act hands tribes meaningful authority, funding, and tools to restore buffalo for cultural, health, and conservation benefits while creating costs, disease and land‑use risks, administrative and legal tradeoffs, and program uncertainty because of a seven‑year sunset.
Indigenous tribal governments and tribal-lands residents gain clear legal authority and a formal federal role to manage, restore, and make decisions about buffalo and buffalo habitat on their lands, increasing tribal self-determination and governance over wildlife policy.
Indigenous tribal communities and tribal-lands residents will have improved access to culturally important buffalo meat and local processing (including mobile processing support), strengthening tribal food sovereignty, nutrition, and cultural restoration.
Tribes can receive funding, contracts, technical assistance, and surplus animals (sometimes fee‑waived), creating opportunities for tribal economic activity (meat, ecotourism, related enterprises) and reducing federal land management burdens.
Taxpayers and tribal budgets could face increased costs because establishing, transferring, and supporting tribal herds and processing facilities will require funding, federal administration, and staff capacity.
Tribal-lands residents, farmers, and rural communities face disease, biosecurity, and human-wildlife safety risks from reintroducing and moving buffalo that will require ongoing monitoring and could threaten nearby livestock or public health if not rapidly contained.
All programs and authorities will automatically expire after seven years unless Congress renews them, creating major uncertainty for tribes, partners, and agencies and deterring long-term investments or hires tied to the programs.
Based on analysis of 9 sections of legislative text.
Introduced December 15, 2025 by Martin Heinrich · Last progress December 15, 2025
Authorizes the Department of the Interior to work with Indian Tribes and qualified Tribal organizations to restore, manage, and expand tribal-owned buffalo herds and buffalo habitat by providing grants, contracts, technical assistance, and transfers of surplus buffalo from Federal land. It requires consultation with Tribes on Department initiatives affecting buffalo, protects Tribal-designated culturally sensitive or proprietary information from disclosure, affirms that treaty rights remain unchanged, and includes a seven-year sunset for all authorities.