MVSKOKE RESERVATION – The Muscogee (Creek) Nation filed a lawsuit in federal court against Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation (ODWC) Director Wade Free and Special Prosecutor Russell Cochran. The suit alleges Cochran and Free are prosecuting Tribal citizens for hunting and fishing on the Mvskoke Reservation without ODWC-issued licenses. MCN filed the complaint on Monday, Jan. 5. This comes after the Cherokee Nation, the Chickasaw Nation, and the Choctaw Nation filed a lawsuit against Governor Kevin Stitt, Cochran, and the ODWC in November 2025.
The 46-page complaint details the MCN’s sovereign right to regulate hunting and fishing activities within the Mvskoke Reservation. According to the filing, Free directed his staff to enforce state fish and game laws against Tribal citizens who lawfully hunt and fish on the Mvskoke Reservation. It further claims that Cochran received citation referrals from the ODWC and initiated criminal legal proceedings against the aforementioned Tribal citizens. MCN claims this “infringes on tribal self-government” by regulating an act that the Tribe already regulates.
Governor Stitt and Attorney General Gentner Drummond previously made statements on the suit filed by the Cherokee Nation, the Choctaw Nation, and the Chickasaw Nation. Drummond’s legal opinion stated that the ODWC lacks jurisdiction over lands where tribes already have a wildlife agency, per New Mexico v. Mescalero Apache Tribe. In that case, the U.S. The Supreme Court argued that trust lands held by Tribes are the jurisdiction of the Tribe, not the state in which it resides.
The lawsuit also states that per the Five Tribe Reciprocity Agreement, any Tribal citizen enrolled in the Choctaw Nation, the Cherokee Nation, the Chickasaw Nation, or the Seminole Nation can hunt on the Mvskoke Reservation. The agreement, according to Article 2 section B, provides that all “hunting, fishing, trapping and/or gathering activities of any member or citizen of a signatory Nation shall be subject to and must conform with the laws of the signatory Nation on whose reservation such activities occur.”
The filing’s second and third exhibits contain emails sent from AG Drummond to Free on Thursday, November 6, 2025, and Thursday, November 13, 2025, respectively. In the first email, AG Drummond strongly advised against prosecuting Tribal citizens for hunting without an ODWC license on Tribal lands. After allegedly disregarding the directives in the first email, AG Drummond’s second email sternly warned that they were unenforceable and violated federal law.
Mvskoke Media reached out to the ODWC office for comment on the suit. ODWC said they are currently reviewing the filing and will have “further comment at the appropriate time.”
Mvskoke Media also reached out to the Executive Branch for comment on the suit. At the time of publishing, they have not provided a statement.
