Bureau of Indian Affairs

The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) is part of the United States Department of the Interior established on March 11, 1824. The mission of this bureau is to provide services to the 566 federally recognized Native American tribes and Alaska Natives in the United States. The BIA also administers and manages over 55 million acres of land within the U.S. The BIA is one of two bureaus under the Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs, the other being the Bureau of Indian Education.

Native American groups have clashed with the BIA because they believe the agency is not doing all it can for the groups it is pledged to support. Many of these claims of neglect, mismanagement, misappropriated funds, and hypocritical bureaucratic standards and procedures have been proven in courts of law.