A longtime Winnebago Tribe official is dead. James "Louis" LaRose died last week at the age of 81. LaRose was a former chairman of the Winnebago Tribal Council and advocated for the return of Winnebago tribal lands in Nebraska and Iowa that had been taken by the Army Corps of Engineers for a proposed recreation project.
Meanwhile, the congressional delegations from Nebraska and Iowa have thrown their support behind legislation that would return the land the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers took by eminent domain in 1970 for a recreation project that was never built. The Corps doesn't oppose the proposal, which will help clear the path for it to pass. In recent years, some other tribes have regained some of their ancestral lands as part of the Land Back movement that seeks to return lands to Indigenous people.