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QUESTION PRESENTED
Whether Oklahoma may tax the income of a Muscogee (Creek) Nation citizen who lives and works within the Muscogee (Creek) Reservation that McGirt held remains Indian Country.
MAJOR TOPICS
The case raises issues of dual taxation and Tribal jurisdiction, where Oklahoma has applied its state income tax to a citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation who works for the Nation and lives within the Nation’s reservation boundaries. This case is emblematic of a broader effort by Oklahoma to push back against the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in McGirt (2020), which affirmed the continued existence of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation’s reservation boundaries and rejected state criminal jurisdiction over a Native defendant within those boundaries. As a result of Oklahoma pushback, the Supreme Court in Castro-Huerta
(2022) soon after held that Oklahoma could assert concurrent criminal jurisdiction over a non-Indian defendant accused of committing a crime against a Native person in Indian Country. Oklahoma has since seized on Castro-Huerta to attempt to further
chip away at McGirt’s protections to extend its jurisdiction to reach Indians in Indian Country, asserting courts should apply a vague balancing-of-interests analysis known as the Bracker test that typically only applies to state regulation of non-Indians.
BACKGROUND
The petitioner in this case, Alicia Stroble, filed a protest with the state tax commission in 2022, arguing she qualified for a state income tax exemption due to her status as a citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation who works for the Nation and lives within the Nation’s reservation boundaries. In July 2025, the Oklahoma Supreme Court held that Ms. Stroble did not qualify for the state income tax exemption. Applying the Bracker test to balance Tribal, state, and federal interests, the court determined that the effects of McGirt’s affirmation of the Nation’s reservation boundaries did not extend beyond the context of federal criminal law and, therefore, Ms. Stroble was subject to state income tax because she did not live in “Indian Country” for purposes of state civil/regulatory jurisdiction. Ms. Stroble filed a petition for certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court on September 29, 2025, asking the Court to reverse the state court’s decision.
TRIBAL AMICUS BRIEF
The Tribal amicus brief in which USET SPF participated seeks to educate the Court about Tribal perspectives on the collection and use of tax revenue, rooted in principles of Tribal sovereignty and self-governance, and the implications of this case in terms of dual taxation, including its potential to upset long-held principles of federal Indian law.
USET INTEREST AND INVOLVEMENT
USET SPF was connected to this case via the Tribal Supreme Court Project. We consulted on the development of the Tribal amicus brief, which was drafted by Stanford Law School’s Supreme Court Litigation Clinic. USET SPF joined the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI), the Native American Finance Officers Association (NAFOA), and the National Intertribal Tax Alliance (NITA) in signing onto the brief. USET SPF has a strong interest in uplifting Tribal sovereignty in all its forms. The Stroble case represents an attempt to erode Tribal sovereignty that has the potential to create ripple effects throughout Indian Country by justifying ever-encroaching state jurisdiction over Tribal citizens and Tribal lands. It also adds confusion and uncertainty to an already over-complicated area of federal Indian law by extending Bracker balancing to regulation (here via taxation) of Tribal citizens—rather than a bright-line rule against state regulation in that context. Additionally, it has the potential to widen the already existing issue of dual taxation.
CASE INFORMATION
Stroble v. Oklahoma Tax Commission, No. 25-382, on petition for certiorari before the U.S. Supreme Court.
For more information, please contact Liz Malerba, USET SPF Director of Policy and Legislative Affairs, Katie Klass, USET SPF General Counsel, or Taylour Boboltz, USET SPF Staff Attorney.
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