Ottawa County

It's been very difficult to elect females, uh, even as president of our United States.

In 2006, I actually had, uh, several men who said, "I really think I want to vote for you, but I don't know that females should be chief." After that first term, then I, I had several, and they were friends of mine, who said, "Don't have any qualms at all now about voting for you." Here in Ottawa County, we have nine federally recognized tribes.

Those nine tribes meet together monthly at what we call Inter Tribal Council meeting.

So the first time that I appeared as chief at ITC, it was eight males and one female.