Tribal law enforcement academy, requested by South Dakota, will be located in North Dakota
Tribal police recruits in South Dakota will soon have an option for basic training through the Bureau of Indian Affairs that’s closer to home, but it won’t be as close as state officials had hoped.
Camp Grafton, a North Dakota National Guard base near Devils Lake, is currently the site of advanced law enforcement training for the BIA. It’s now set to host basic law enforcement training for BIA recruits, as well as for recruits from local tribal police departments, law enforcement communications and correctional agencies.
The news was tucked into a wider-reaching executive order from U.S. Interior Secretary and former North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum to create an Indian Country Violent Crime Task Force. A news release announced the creation of the task force Tuesday, which was the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous People.
The task force “builds on the first Trump administration’s work to bring national attention and resources to the Missing and Murdered Indigenous People crisis,” the release says, and “expands that work with a broader focus on violent crime prevention, investigations and public safety across Indian Country.”
Among other things, the task force will focus on opioid trafficking, create a “Predatory Crimes Unit” to focus on child victims of exploitation and “refocus” efforts to solve missing persons and homicide cases.
Three of South Dakota’s nine tribes rely on the BIA for local law enforcement. Six others have their own tribal police departments. Misdemeanor-level crimes on tribal land are handled in tribal courts; felony crimes that occur there are prosecuted in federal court, and are often investigated by agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The task force, the release says, will “lead a coordinated effort with federal, tribal and state partners” to address public safety in tribal areas nationwide.
Earlier efforts from Burgum to bring BIA to Camp Grafton
Burgum advocated to bring BIA basic training to Camp Grafton while serving as North Dakota governor.
During a U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs field hearing in 2019 in Bismarck, he said a Camp Grafton BIA academy would help recruit tribal officers across the region.
Tribal recruits nationwide, for local departments or the BIA, have traditionally attended basic training at a federal facility in Artesia, New Mexico.
He said tribal communities face the dual difficulties of high crime rates and a dearth of law enforcement, and that the distance between the training facility and their homes makes recruiting difficult.
“We believe that we can create a premier BIA tribal police officer training facility in North Dakota at Camp Grafton, in conjunction with the Lake Region Law Enforcement Academy in Devils Lake,” Burgum told the committee. “This is very close to Spirit Lake Nation, and not only could this help solve the problem in North Dakota, but for South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Minnesota, Wisconsin.”
The U.S. Indian Police Academy Advanced Training Center at Camp Grafton opened the following year. The facility offers higher-level training for officers who’ve already completed the 14-week basic law enforcement certification course in New Mexico.
The timeline on the “implementation of basic training” at Camp Grafton is unclear. Burgum’s Tuesday executive order directs the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs to “develop basic training curriculum” for police, corrections and communications courses at the site “beginning in the second quarter of fiscal year 2026.”
The second quarter of federal fiscal year 2026 began in January.
No contact information beyond a general email address for the Interior Department is listed on the agency’s press release about Burgum’s order.
The Interior Department did not respond to an email from South Dakota Searchlight with questions about the start of the Camp Grafton basic training program, the number of recruits it could train, and other questions.
Calls to a spokesman for Camp Grafton were not immediately returned.
Basic training for the Great Plains
Like Burgum, South Dakota’s congressional delegation and its state-level leaders have also pushed for the establishment of a BIA training academy for the Great Plains for several years, but had hoped to see it in their state.
U.S. Senator Mike Rounds and U.S. Representative Dusty Johnson have each argued for Pierre as an appropriate location, as the city already has a state-run law enforcement training academy.
South Dakota’s State Tribal Relations Committee twice endorsed a resolution urging the federal government to establish a BIA basic training academy in South Dakota. Lawmakers voted to support those resolutions.
While the executive order places the basic BIA training site in North Dakota, the discussion in South Dakota spurred state-level changes meant to ease the training burden for tribes in its borders
South Dakota’s basic law enforcement certification course for state and local officers is taught in Pierre, and the state recently began offering the course at a satellite site in Sioux Falls.
The academy has always been open to tribal recruits. The availability of the Artesia program for tribal officers, however, has typically meant that local and state officers are given priority for the limited number of slots in each course.
Former Governor Kristi Noem and Attorney General Marty Jackley partnered in April 2024 to open an additional basic training cohort that would prioritize tribal recruits. Tribal police need to complete additional coursework on Indian Country law that other state-certified officers do not, but state officials worked with their federal counterparts to include that information in an add-on unit during basic training.
The state began a second tribal-priority basic training class last year.
By the time that second course had begun, 13 tribal officers had graduated and earned certification. At least 25 tribal recruits have completed the 13-week training since 2024, Jackley spokesman Tony Mangan said, including 12 in the second tribal-priority class last year.
Johnson, who’s running for governor in South Dakota, told South Dakota Searchlight in a statement that the choice of a North Dakota site isn’t ideal, but is welcome.
“Bringing tribal law enforcement training to North Dakota is certainly better than New Mexico, but I’d like to see more of South Dakota’s tribal law enforcement officers trained even closer to home at the state academy in Pierre,” Johnson said.
Rounds had no such qualification in his statement praising Burgum’s executive order.
“I’ve long called for a tribal law enforcement training curriculum closer to home that gives more South Dakotans the opportunity to serve,” Rounds said. “I’m grateful for Secretary Burgum’s leadership on this issue.”
