and working with senator maria cantwell right now on legislation that will

and working with senator maria cantwell right now on legislation that will fund the fighting of those fires. i also worked on a bipartisan able act. i have also worked for fairchild air force base. when it comes to the next president, i believe one of the most important, fundamental issues for us is representative government and ensuring the congress is functioning as an equal branch of government. and is functioning in a way that will hold the administration accountable, no matter who it is . exercise the power of the purse and really, on behalf of the people, make sure that the accountability is in our government. ?vonne: mr. pakootas mr. pakootas: i do have concerns with how congress is acting today and how the administration is being pushed aside at times. i highly respect the office of the president. i'm willing to work with president trump is that so happens. -- if not so happens. it is kind of scary, thinking about that and looking at that and seeing how things are being treated. especially being a person of color, and how the people of color are treated in today's day and age,

i am working alongside senator maria cantwell. i am hoping we will get legislation that will address how we prevent these fires going forward. if people understood the condition of these forests, they would be outraged. one out of three acres of the u.s. forest service is diseased, bug infested, dying trees. we need to be taking action so we do have healthy trees and that will help prevent these fires. moderator: mr. pakootas. mr. pakootas: forest fire prevention is something union tribes have been dealing with for many years. and healthy management for us deters that. the tribe has the very first integrated resource management plan in the nation. we put that together almost 15 forestso, managing our to a sustainable level. that has prevented much of our forests from being burned down. the u.s. forest service north of the reservation, there is usually a fire. by the time it hits the reservation, it has gone underground. our tempers managed properly. you will not have those devastating fires. i getting back to properly funding also