BUFFALO, N.Y. — J.C. Seneca is taking over as president of the Seneca Nation of Indians after garnering more than 87% of the tribal election vote.
The business owner, philanthropist and long-time council member, who lost his previous three presidential campaigns, said the time was right.
“The message that I carried has been similar over the many years and I think this time the people really got in tune with that and realized that it’s time to move in that direction,” he said.
Seneca enters the office as the Nation continues to negotiate a new casino gaming compact with New York state. The previous compact expired late last year and the two sides have extended terms quarterly since. One of the key points of negotiation is how much revenue the gaming corporation will share with the state.
“My position is I’m a zero percent guy and I don’t think the state deserves any revenue from our nation, but again as president, I have to look at what our people want,” Seneca said.
The president-elect believes the current deal which gives the state 25% of net slot machine revenues before operating expenses is a non-starter. He said his first order of business is to hold community meetings and bring the Seneca people up to speed on the state of negotiations.
“Get some direction and some opinions and advice from our people on what they want because our people are going to have to vote in a referendum to approve this so they need to be involved in the process,” Seneca said.
He is also encouraging Gov. Kathy Hochul to negotiate with him in person. Seneca said the previous compact got done because executives from the state and Senecas met face to face.
“We’ve been going on back and forth for over two years and getting nowhere. It’s insanity when you do the same thing over and over and expect a different result,” he said.
As for the incoming federal administration, Seneca said he has not spoken yet with anybody from Donald Trump’s transition team. He said he does however, have a good relationship with Republican representatives in Congress, especially Western New York and Southern Tier Rep. Nick Langworthy.
“We would hope that the Trump administration would reach out to native nations across the country and include us in this transition period much like [Bill] Clinton did when he won back in the early 90s,” Seneca said.
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