No. 24-1217 ___________________________

Curtis Temple

Plaintiff - Appellant

v.

Bryan Mercier, Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs, Department of Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs; Olivia M. Steve, Great Plains Regional Director, Department of Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs; Lionel Weston, Branch of Realty, Pine Ridge Agency, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Department of Interior; Gina Douville, 1 Superintendent of the Pine Ridge Agency, Department of Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs

Defendants - Appellees

Oglala Sioux Tribe; Denise Mesteth; Jolene Provost

Movants - Appellees ____________

Appeal from United States District Court for the District of South Dakota - Western ____________

Submitted: October 23, 2024 Filed: January 28, 2025 ____________ 1 Assistant Secretary Mercier of Indian Affairs, Great Plains Regional Director Steve, and Superintendent Douville of the Pine Ridge Agency are automatically substituted for their predecessors under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 43(c)(2). Before SHEPHERD, KELLY, and STRAS, Circuit Judges. ____________ SHEPHERD, Circuit Judge.

Curtis Temple appeals from a final judgment entered following a bench trial in which the district court 2 found that Temple was afforded due process prior to the impoundment of several head of his cattle found to be improperly grazing on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. He likewise appeals the denial of a motion to continue made two weeks before trial, the district court’s 3 quashing of a subpoena directed towards tribal employees, and the dismissal of claims concerning the allocation of grazing permits. Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm the judgment of the district court.

I.

Temple is a cattle rancher and member of the Oglala Sioux Indian Tribe (OST) who lives on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. The OST grants livestock grazing permits through the “tribal allocation” process, which allows the tribe to grant grazing privileges on tribal owned lands to tribal members “without competition,” i.e., without requiring members to competitively bid on the permits. See 25 C.F.R. §§ 166.217(a), 166.4. All allocations, while determined by the tribe, are subject to the approval of the Board of Indian Appeals (BIA) and grant the permit holder the right to graze his or her cattle on land “owned by a tribe or individual Indian in trust.” 25 C.F.R. §§ 166.203(a), 166.4. Essentially, an allocation leases grazing land to the designated permittee for a specific period of time. To be eligible for an allocation of grazing land under the OST grazing code, a party must send an application to the

2 The Honorable Charles B. Kornmann, United States District Judge for the District of South Dakota. 3 The Honorable Jeffrey L. Viken, United States District Judge for the District of South Dakota, now retired. -2- tribe’s allocation committee, be a member of the OST, and own no more than “three hundred animal units.” O.S.T. Ord. No. 11-05, at 6-7, § 3.

On October 31, 2012, Temple’s permits to graze his cattle on the reservation expired, and he timely re-applied for new grazing permits through the allocation process, see 25 C.F.R. § 166.200 et seq., but so did another member of the OST: Donald “Duke” Buffington. The allocation committee conducted a livestock count on both Temple’s and Buffington’s cat