RESERVE — Shortly after the newly reconfigured Sac and Fox tribal council suspended Angie Gilpin without pay or explanation in early September, she received a flurry of text messages from Brigette Robidoux, one of the council members.

Robidoux had something to say about Victoria Ramos, a friend of Gilpin's who had been ousted from the council a few weeks earlier.

"She's a fake and a fraud," Robidoux said. "We will prove it. And everyone who helps her and doesn't wanna see the truth (will) self-destruct with her."

Gilpin, the housing authority director, is one of the casualties in a power play between Sac and Fox transplants from California and Oklahoma who launched an upheaval in tribal government. The overhaul of three out of five council seats between July and August instigated the rapid dismissal of Gilpin, the tribal police chief and other employees.

On one side, a council led by Tiauna Carnes and stacked with her relatives is supported by a grievance board and Mike McDonald, the chosen replacement for enforcing laws under the direction of Carnes.

The other side revolves around Victoria Ramos and Running Bear, a man maligned for his criminal record, a flag-burning incident and remnants of a defunct one-drop rule — the cultural practice of disregarding anyone with even a single black ancestor.

Numerous interviews, court documents, government records, letters, emails and texts reveal desperate individuals fighting for control of limited resources on a diamond-shaped reservation north of Hiawatha. Straddling the state line and covering 23 square miles of farmland, the reservation is home to fewer than 150 people whose average household income is $29,000.

“What these people are doing now is a total detriment to our tribe," said Michael Pilcher, a Sac and Fox member who is leaving for Omaha. “Leaders are supposed to provide and make things better for their people.”

The way Robidoux sees it, the trouble began in 2015 when Ramos and her boyfriend arrived in Kansas from Sacramento, Calif.

Like other current council members, she declined to be interviewed for this story.

“All I can say is it all stems around Mr. Kory Clift and his wife being on the council," Robidoux said. "It started from there, and when Mr. Clift got exposed is when the attacks started.”

In California, his name was Clift. Now, he goes by Running Bear or Anthony Stean II.

Running Bear said he and Ramos, who was about to give birth to their second child, arrived in an RV, looking for a place to stay. Shortly after, Ramos won election to the council.

"She went to work the next week, and I was daddy daycare," Running Bear said. "I've been taking care of the babies ever since."

With Gilpin’s help, the couple moved into an apartment in Reserve, a town of about 80 people.

A cursory Google search produces sketchy "patriot"-themed websites that catalogue Clift's encounters with law and scandal. When word spread, some tribal leaders wanted them evicted. Gilpin refused.

In August 2016, Ramos and Running Bear accused the tribal chairman and police chief of entering the housing administrative office after hours to retrieve confidential files on them.

Gilpin said they were looking for a reason to oust unsavory tenants. She contacted her affiliates at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and, acting on their advice, reported the incident to law enforcement outside of the reservation. The tribal chairman promptly fired her.

Ramos sought restraining orders against fellow council members. Running Bear sold land he acquired through his adoptive parents to purchase a home for his family just east of Reserve.

"I feel like this is a power play that we have kind of exposed," Running Bear said. "There's been people here that have just kind of settled into their seat with their hand in the cookie jar. And so when Victoria and I came in, Victoria got a seat on council. She began to see the inner workings of the tribe and which families benefited, which families got houses."

Enter Carnes, in 2017, whose Oklahoma home was in foreclosure. Her great aunt, Rita Bahr, was a tribal elder and member of the council. The August 2017 elections installed Carnes alongside Robidoux, who is also a niece to Bahr.

The family alliance was blunted when Robidoux suffered serious injuries in a car crash later in the year and was replaced on the council by Monique Dougherty, a confidant of Ramos who followed her from Sacramento.

The new council rehired Gilpin to oversee housing operations, a domino in the discord that would crescendo with the overthrow of Ramos, and Carnes seizing control of tribal functions.

The way Running Bear sees it, people on the reservation weren't prepared for college-educated thinkers from the west coast who "pose the threat of change."

"This place is kind of filled with country bumpkins," Running Bear said. "This isn't Topeka. This isn't Kansas City. This is not Lawrence. I've ventured to Lawrence just to see the brightness in people's eyes, whereas here, you know, everything is dulled out — like the senses are dulled, the sophistication — the intellect is just dulled out here."

A native of the Karuk tribe along California's Klamath River, Running Bear was adopted by two black doctors and grew up in the ritzy Oakland Hills neighborhoods. He played soccer, went to Disneyland every year and traveled to places like Hawaii on family vacation.

He earned a social sciences degree in 2000 from California State University, Sacramento, then went to work as an elementary school teacher in a disadvantaged district of Sacramento.

When terrorists took down the World Trade Center, his students struggled to understand. Why are they doing this? Who's doing this? Where is this? What's happening?

"I've been through college," Running Bear said. "I consider myself to be conscious of reality. I have to face the facts. America has a checkered past. We have to be honest about it."

Watching the news coverage, his students saw images of foreign adversaries dragging a flaming U.S. flag through the streets. In some cultures, he explained, fire is a cleansing process.

"And so I had the lighter, and the flag was hanging there, and I said, so some parts of the flag need to be cleansed, and so I lifted the lighter," Running Bear said.

He said he merely singed the flag, blackening the tip, but he was accused of burning a flag in the classroom, and the incident ended his teaching career.

Later, he was blamed for a felony theft in which he said he was connected by association. He secured a deal to make the conviction a misdemeanor in exchange for staying out of trouble.

In Kansas, he wanted to become a productive member of the reservation community. In addition to tending chickens and a garden on his five acres, he looks after the children and plans meals in support of Ramos.

He likes to brag about how she landed a $180,000 grant for a fiber optics project and secured $2.5 million in tax credits for a hotel development with the tribe's casino along US-75 highway. She negotiated to get $250,000 per year through the tobacco compact for 10 years, he said.

But it was Running Bear's legal wrangling that caught the attention of Sac and Fox members who looked into his background.

"They don't want our children to eat," he said. "They don't want us to live, and they don't want us to be able to maintain out here. So if I come out as a black Indian with a felony that hasn't been reduced to a misdemeanor yet, even though I'm college educated, I'm still putting my family more at risk."

Jayna Dewitt showed up at Reserve in April.

Gilpin gave her a job with the housing maintenance crew. Dewitt said she was standing alone outside the housing office one day when Carnes drove by and flipped her off.

“A few days later I said to her, ‘Hey, I don’t know you, but I was standing outside and you flipped me off,’ ” Dewitt said, " 'and I want to know why.' And she said, ‘Oh, it wasn’t for you, it was for Angie.’ I said, ‘Well, if it wasn’t for me personally, do you think maybe you should apologize?’ She just said, ‘Well, it wasn’t for you, it was for Angie.’ ”

Dewitt said she might expect that from a middle school kid, but not an adult who was running the tribe.

A few months earlier, Gilpin had fired Carnes' son from the maintenance staff for repeatedly leaving work mid-afternoon. He thought he was untouchable, Gilpin said, because his mom ran the tribe.

Rumors seem to seethe through town about plenty of its residents. One day in February, Carnes blocked Natasha Kroeze — a clerk at the convenience store in Reserve — from leaving after work to confront her about some of the rumors.

Kroeze said Carnes "freaked out on me." Carnes wanted to know what people were saying about her son. Although Kroeze, who was seven months pregnant at the time, had her suspicions, she didn't want to talk to Carnes. Kroeze’s blood pressure spiked, sending her to the hospital.

The newly hired police chief, Ron Ridley, was taken aback by Carnes' behavior. She is loud, he said, and uses her demeanor as intimidation. He described her as disrespectful and openly hostile to him and others.

Dougherty sought a protection order against Rita Bahr, who sought a protection order against Dougherty's dad. Ramos wanted a protection order against Carnes' son over remarks she said he made about carrying a shovel and having 10 shots in his gun.

“That’s unheard of," Ridley said. "That’s ridiculous. This is supposed to be a professional government body that’s trying to work for the good of the tribal community.”

One of the council members had left the reservation last fall, and the seat remained open for months. An attempt to fill the vacancy in June with someone in the Ramos camp failed on a 2-2 vote.

A couple of weeks later, Ramos learned she was being ousted from her position. Running Bear said she was accused of stealing promotional sweatshirts that were left at the tribal office, which Ramos distributed to tribal members.

Her removal was enforced by Philip Bahr following a decision by the grievance committee. Ramos filed a lawsuit, claiming she wasn't given proper notice or her constitutional right to present a defense.

"The court is of the opinion that the constitution is being ignored," the tribal judge wrote in her July 20 ruling. "The grievance committee does not have the required number of members and from outward appearances, appears to be biased. For a relative of a tribal council member to physically remove a tribal council member from her position smacks of partiality."

The only recourse, the court ruled, would be to take the matter to the entire Sac and Fox nation for a resolution.

Ramos lost her health insurance with the position. She was eight months pregnant.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs, which isn't keen on interpreting a sovereign nation's constitution, refused to intervene. Dougherty resigned her seat in an attempt to prevent the two remaining members — Carnes and Rita Bahr — from holding a quorum.

Some tribal members wonder if a legal process was used to replenish the council. Somehow, Robidoux resumed her old position. Two new members were added, including Rita Bahr's son, Gary.

Ridley, Gilpin and Kroeze were removed from their jobs between mid-August and early September, along with the court clerk, which makes it difficult to file a lawsuit in opposition of council actions.

Carnes didn't respond to numerous attempts to reach her. The Topeka Capital-Journal made two attempts to meet with council members at their headquarters.

"We don't have nothing to say," Gary Bahr said, "so adios."

Arriving at the twilight of a 40-year career in law enforcement, Ridley wanted to broaden his horizons.

Before the council hired Ridley in September 2017, with Ramos' leading the charge, he served as police chief in Norton for two years. Before that, he was the sheriff in Hodgeman County for nine years.

His intention was to instill the philosophy that law enforcement should be "fair, firm and consistent."

“I took this job believing it was a real opportunity to make a real difference in this community," Ridley said. "What I found is this was the worst career decision I’ve made.”

Historically, the tribe has struggled with recruitment and retention, he said. Officers make less than those at area agencies and get no retirement benefits.

One of the officers he inherited, McDonald, applied for his position and had close ties to Carnes. Ridley said he and McDonald clashed almost from day one.

Ridley's relationship with Carnes began to unravel this spring, he said, when she accused him of picking sides as council quarrels intensified. Carnes' goals, he said, weren't consistent with his. She threatened to fire him.

“They wanted me to interpret the constitution," Ridley said. "I’m like, that’s not my deal, that’s judiciary. I enforce the law.”

When Ramos sought a protection order against Carnes' son, Ridley offered testimony on his behavior, convincing a judge to approve the order.

The police chief complained to the tribe's human resources department in July, saying the abuse from Carnes had become so great, he no longer could focus on "the tasks at hand as I'm constantly fighting fires to keep the police department and myself out of harm's way."

Ridley again clashed with Carnes, his direct supervisor, at the tribe's annual meeting in August.

Patricia Gutierrez — a tribal member from Sacramento who is an aunt to Ramos and Dougherty but supports Carnes and recent council actions — said Ridley disobeyed the chairwoman by refusing to remove someone who had become disruptive during the meeting.

"It was a disgrace," Gutierrez said. "Why wouldn't he do his duty?"

Two days later, Ridley submitted his letter of resignation.

"In all my years of government service," Ridley told council members, "I had never experienced the level of hostility that I have experienced here — the unprofessional attitudes, the spoken and implied threats against one's employment, and the profane, vulgar and hostile language used by members of the elected body, who are identified as the leaders of the tribal community. The environment negatively impacts productivity, interdepartmental relationships, and supervisor-employee communications."

Carnes suspended him for insubordination rather than let him serve his final 30 days, promoting McDonald to acting chief. He, in turn, dismissed the department's part-time officers.

“It’s not a good situation," Ridley said, "and I expect it’s going to deteriorate.”

Dewitt doesn't trust the new police chief. He makes her feel uncomfortable.

And when you see police officers "getting fired left and right," she said, "you worry for your safety."

She came to Reserve to get away from her husband.

“Now I feel like I have to have him here because I’m afraid somebody’s going to come for me,” Dewitt said.

Kroeze also has concerns.

She said she was fired in mid-September after missing two days of work because of illness, even though she had sick leave and a doctor's note. Her job now belongs to Carnes' son.

A few days after she was fired, her boyfriend, Raymond Herwig, went to buy a pack of cigarettes and exchanged words with her replacement.

The way she tells it, Carnes' son asked if Herwig wanted to "take it outside."

"What, bitch?" the boyfriend replied, then left.

When they got home, McDonald arrived to cite Herwig for disorderly conduct.

From McDonald's point of view, his job is to submit information to a prosecutor and let the courts sort it out. He said police got a call that day from the store manager, who was alarmed about a patron who had upset the clerk with verbal comments.

In places like Topeka, McDonald said, police may be too busy with serious crimes to worry about these kinds of incidents.

“Up here, we don’t have a lot of homicides," McDonald said, "so when we get a call, we show up.”

McDonald said he was raised in a law enforcement family. His father was a trooper, and McDonald has been with tribal police for nearly 19 years.

“I assure you the laws are being upheld and the constitution is being upheld," he said. "That’s just the way I was raised.”

He strongly denies allegations by Kroeze and Gilpin.

Kroeze said McDonald invited her to come home with him after work at night and have alcoholic drinks when she was just 18 and 19 years old.

He assured her the legality wasn't a problem, she said, but, "I was just looking for a way to get out of it."

After McDonald became acting chief, Gilpin submitted a complaint with the Kansas Commission on Peace Officers' Standards and Training about a three-year-old incident.

In June 2015, she said, when she was the occupancy clerk for the housing authority, she exchanged flirtatious texts with McDonald.

"I was at a housing unit cleaning and I heard someone walk in," she said in her complaint. "I looked up and noticed officer McDonald standing there with what appeared to be his thumb sticking out of the zipper of his pants, of which was actually his penis. At that point, I just started laughing, out of being somewhat nervous of the unwanted advance."

McDonald quickly left, she said.

Gilpin said she told her supervisor about the "awkward and uncomfortable" experience but was reluctant to do anything that would jeopardize her employment.

McDonald said the women were lying.

“I would have no problem taking a polygraph to any of that,” he said.

Gilpin is proud of her work as housing authority director.

When she returned to her job last year, she said, there were 20 empty units. Now, there are three.

She also said she secured grant funding for additional programs, but Carnes refused to provide necessary paperwork. She complained about Carnes to her contacts at HUD, as well as in a letter to council members. She said the tribe could lose its federal funding for failing to meet compliance standards.

“People are afraid they’re going to lose their homes," Gilpin said. "People are afraid they’ll lose their job.”

The tribe receives about $220,000 annually in federal funding for a dozen one-bedroom apartments and a handful of two- and three-bedroom units in Reserve. Additional housing is available on the Nebraska side, at the stateline, and in Hiawatha.

Other tribal members praised her efforts. They recalled how one of her predecessors about 15 years ago was caught embezzling more than a million dollars in HUD money, which the tribe had to repay.

“I think when this is all said and done with, we’re going to lose our credibility with HUD again," said Edward Green. "It’s just kind of hard to believe.”

Gutierrez supports the decision to suspend Gilpin without pay pending an investigation, even though nobody will tell Gilpin what she did wrong. Gutierrez didn’t like Gilpin’s proposal for switching accounting firms or a $15,000 backdated pay raise she received from Ramos, which Carnes voided.

“If it wasn’t for the new council, I can’t even imagine where we would be,” Gutierrez said.

Although she lives in California, Gutierrez makes the trek to Reserve to participate in annual meetings. She is now retired, but she wanted her offspring to appreciate their heritage and understand the importance of voting.

“I come take my children back so they see how my ancestors had to endure,” she said.

The Sac and Fox tribe was formed from the remnants of displaced Sauk and Meskwaki tribes.

This particular reservation was established in 1836 when the federal government seized land elsewhere. Today, 471 tribal members are spread across the United States.

Mike Ogden-Roubidoux, an elder in the Iowa tribe, which provided this land to the Sac and Fox, said power struggles within the nation have been “going on forever.”

“Any way to pad their pockets, to give them a better life, but not the members of the tribe,” he said. “The members of the tribe is a key issue here.”

He has seen it firsthand for the past 10 years, living in a small space on the plot where Ramos and Running Bear now live. The old regime, he said, simply didn’t like the newcomers with their progressive ideas.

Ramos and Running Bear intend to stay until next year’s elections in hopes that Ramos can reclaim her seat. They have made an investment here. If she fails, they plan to leave.

“We don't want to give up the battle because we've won,” Running Bear said. “The changes that we've made are going to have a lasting effect.”

Green has been accused of sleeping with married women and selling dope, both of which he denies. But he wonders if the gossip could serve as flimsy pretext to evict him from his small, subsidized apartment in favor of someone more closely aligned with current leadership.

As the feud unfurls, tribal members are forced to choose sides.

“It’s supposed to be a circle — the circle of life,” Dewitt said. “Everything in natives is supposed to be equal and talked about amongst everybody, and the people here just aren’t doing that anymore. They all have their own agenda and their own personal feelings. And I understand that. I truly do. Everybody has their own opinion on things. But you can’t let it overwhelm your entire life.”