Tribal Nations and the Rise of AI
October 10, 2025
Jeston Morris
Community Newsperson
Wiring the Rez: Tribal Leaders Explore AI and Digital Sovereignty.
PHOENIX, Ariz. – The Center for Tribal Digital Sovereignty (CTDS), the Indian Legal Program (ILP) and the American Indian Policy Institute (AIPI) hosted the 11th Annual Wiring the Rez Conference: Artificial Intelligence in Indian Country at ASU’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law (SDOCL) on Sept. 26. Tribal leaders, scholars, professors and members of the public attended the conference.
AIPI and the National Congress of American Indian (NCAI) launched the CTDS at SDOCL on Jun 4, 2024, as cited on NCAI’s website. The center is rooted in ‘digital sovereignty,’ theoretical framework and it’s an umbrella term.
The Wiring the Rez conference began with the inaugural Tribal Government E-Commerce: Innovating a New Geography of Indian Country hosted by ILP and SDOCL at Wild Horse Pass Resorts and Casinos on February 12-13, 2015. Tribal e-commerce, economic, and online gaming were the primary focus of the conference. Stacy Leads, Regents and Foundation Professor of law at SDOLC, and Traci Morris, executive director at AIPI, gave welcoming remarks. The first panel was an artificial intelligence overview followed by a panel on governance and policy: avoiding the next digital divide.
Elizabeth Reily, executive director of AI Acceleration, and Tyson Winarsky, professor of practice at SDOCL, presented an overview for tribal communities. They discussed AI tool such as Adobe Express, Firefly, Copilot, Gemini, Zoom, Notebook and ChatGPT.
“Three seconds of audio is all that’s needed for AI to produce an 85 percent voice match,” they noted. They also discussed ethical AI metric such as accuracy, robustness, fairness, bias, safety and efficiency.
The next session featured two panelist and a moderator discussing governance and policy: avoiding the next digital divide. Nelli Babayan, AI director of Federal Civilian, discussed a new moment for AI trends including Agentic AI, Generative AI, deep learning, and machine learning, and artificial intelligence.
She discussed internal impact vis-à-vis customer impact, which focused on reshaping business and reinventing customer engagement. Mari Hulbatta, director of data stewardship at the Chickasaw Nation, discussed data sovereignty, governance and stewardship. “Who are the data stewards in each department, and do they know their role and responsibilities?” Hulbatta asked.
Gary Marchant, regents and foundation professor at SDOCL gave a keynote after lunch.
He discussed narrow AI, artificial general intelligence and super-intelligence. He mentioned the two pessimistic metaphors: the AI bubble and what if AI hits the wall. He concluded his keynote with a question: “Why are we pursuing AI super intelligence?”
One of the breakout sessions was on AI in language and cultural practice. Morris moderated a four-member panel featuring Carrie Billy, consultant; Leonard Bruce, data analyst for the Gila River Indian Community (GRIC); AI Kusklikis, senior associate at American Indian Higher Education Consortium; and Sean Dudley, associate vice president at ASU Knowledge Enterprises.
Dudley gave a panel overview which included generative AI, material preparation for AI data, AI language and cultural learning, which included language assistant and audio preservation, cultural knowledge libraries, council, governance support and virtual language tutor.
Bruce, a GRIC Community member with a master’s degree in science and technology and he is working on his doctoral degree, responded to the question “What is the role of AI’s in tribal governance?”
“Data sovereignty and governance are, concepts grounded in tribal governance,” he said.
“Further, companies can scrape data from social media, resulting in personal data sovereignty becoming even more important. How is the story you’re telling archived in public space online? We need to think about the future of data sovereignty,” Bruce added.
“The role of tribes, particularly with language and cultural preservation in the context of AI, they ought to be in the center. The community is the protector of stories, history, culture and language. Tribes in a dire situation of losing their languages, and they need to take the lead and leverage AI,” said Billy.
Chris Dechene, executive director for National Inter-Tribal Energy Council, Cora Tso, senior research fellow at ASU and Krystalyn Kinsel, special counsel for Jenner & Block presented on AI’s impact on natural resources.
“The impact of AI on natural resources. First, data centers have rolls and rolls of computer servers and they have a significant impact on water resources. They also utilize a significant amount of electric energy,” said Kinsel.
According to the Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI), large data centers powering artificial intelligence can consume up to 5 million gallons of water per day. That’s roughly the same daily usage as a town of 10,000 to 50,000 people. Arizona, where water is a precious and limited resource, is expanding rapidly with these high-tech facilities, and this can raise serious concerns.
“For the State of Arizona, many tribes have unresolved water rights settlement for the Colorado River basin. Water consumption for data centers is significant because they use the same amount of water as golf courses. It’s not just any water, its freshwater,” said Tso.
“I am going to address renewable Tribal Nations in the Age of Technology and non-renewable energy, project development and the impact from the new development.
The tribal land comprises 7 percent of the U.S. land base. Tribes produce 6-8 percent of the renewable energy in United States and they hold 20 percent of the fossil fuel energy,” he said.
“The current electric grid does not meet the power demand for data centers. Therefore, coal powered plants are being re-energized. The GPT-3 training model requires 1,287 megawatt-hours of electricity. Tribes must not only have an energy policy, but it’s absolutely essential to have an energy plan.”
Morris moderated the concluding panel in the Great Hall with Gov. Stephen Roe and Geoff Blackwell, general counsel and chief of staff at NCAI.
“It’s an honor to be here. This is a significant moment moving forward. This is the first AI specific symposium for Indian Country being held here at ASU Law School. AI is an incredible technology that respects and encompasses tribal sovereignty and digital sovereignty,” said Gov. Lewis.
“I am very pleased to be here at ASU Law School along with Gov. Lewis who is the president of AIPI’s advisory board. We all have been involved with this AI movement. It started as digital divide and now its tribal digital sovereignty. It’s a pleasure to be back on O’otham land,” said Blackwell.
Morris read a paragraph from NCAI Resolution No. NC-24-008, “Digital sovereignty is the umbrella term that encompasses the exercise of sovereign authority over physical and virtual network infrastructure and the intangible virtual digital jurisdictional aspects of the acquisition, storage, transmission, access and use of data, including policy developments that impact the tribe’s digital footprint in local and virtual spaces.”
Morris discussed building a body of policy for artificial intelligence in the theoretical framework of ‘data as kin concept’ in the context of digital ecosystem and under the umbrella of digital sovereignty.
“Tribal digital sovereignty is not linked to a singular activity but rather it’s a continuum. It includes the infrastructure, telecommunication, network and data sovereignty, data governance and the flow of information. It is taking care of our kin,” Morris said.
Blackwell reflected on his early involvement in telecommunications regulations. “When I got involved in the hearings at the Gila River Indian Community in 1998 and 1999, the hearing focused on the lack of phone services in Indian Country. This situation gave an opportunity for Indian Country to have a seat at the table,” said Blackwell.
Gov. Lewis interjected and said, “Artificial intelligence is inevitable in Indian Country. As a tribal leader, I consider myself boots on the ground. AI is going to revolutionize and automate industries. The question is: How do we get our tribal members to engage with AI? As a tribal leader, I am very concerned about it. We must embrace it, but embrace it in our terms, with respect to tribal sovereignty.” He added, “At the recent United Nations meetings in New York, they discussed how AI can protect human rights and human dignity. AI is developing at a tremendous speed every day, and Indian Country can’t be left behind. If we are, we become victims rather than agents. We don’t want that. Tribal members must become active AI agents for positive, productive future,” said Gov. Lewis.
Gov. Lewis concluded with a discussion on water rights. “How are we going to protect indigenous water rights? Not only protect but also become efficient user of water. I believe AI can help tribal nations achieve this. The tribes need to be at the AI decision-making table,” said Lewis.
The Big questions is.
Who designs the algorithms? (data tracking system), Who owns the data? Who profits from it? and most importantly. Who gets a seat at the table when decisions are made?
Indian Nations need to be at the center of that conversation, not on the sidelines.