The Cherokee Nation must restore full tribal citizenship to disenfranchised Cherokee Freedmen or see its relations severed with the federal government, a U.S. representative said Monday.

That is threatening 6,500 jobs in eastern Oklahoma, said Cherokee Nation spokesman Mike Miller.

U.S. Rep. Diane Watson, D-Calif., visited with more than 500 people gathering in Tulsa and Muskogee, standing pat on her efforts to have the Cherokees honor the Treaty of 1866.

Severing relations would shut off more than $300 million in federal funding to the Cherokees, Watson said. That would terminate vital services to thousands of Oklahoma Cherokees, according to Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chad Smith.

“The proposed bill would create a state social services crisis, cutting $270 million in health care, housing and child care for the neediest citizens,” Smith said.

Smith said Monday that he had been unable to convince Watson to accept an invitation to meet with him.

Watson said she doesn’t see a chance for negotiating, because the Cherokees are in violation of a federal treaty and until the tribe is in compliance, it shouldn’t get federal funding.

She said the more than $300 million in taxpayer funds that go into the Cherokee coffers come from “each and every one of you,” she told a crowd of almost 300 people Monday evening at the Muskogee Civic Center.

“We’re simply saying, if you’re going to take a group of people (Cherokee Freedmen) and put them at risk and disenfranchise them, you can’t do it with our money ... We do no pay for that with public funds.”

Tahlequah attorney Nate Young III, a Cherokee, told the crowd: “It’s not about culture — it’s about the law — the Treaty of 1866 has been interpreted by the Supreme Court that Cherokee Freedmen are citizens.

“If there’s any other remedy you could take that wouldn’t be so harsh to the young, innocent and elderly ...,” he asked.

But Miller said the Cherokee Nation does not consider that it has broken the law — that there is a federal lawsuit by the Freedmen in federal court in Washington that is trying to make a determination on that issue.

“If the federal court tells us we have broken the law, we’re willing to comply,” Miller said.

He said he would hope Watson would wait until that is determined.

Watson’s spokesman Bert Hammons said Watson’s bill is simple — but it’s opened a Pandora’s box about other Cherokee issues.

“Other chairmen are going to be weighing other issues,” he said to a small group meeting with Watson before the Town Hall Meeting at the Civic Center.

The Resources Committee also is interested in some Cherokee issues, he said.

Watson heard varied views Monday night in Muskogee.

Cherokee Nation Councilor Cara Cowan Watts told Watson she is wondering why “our democracy is being challenged by an outside government.”

Watts told Watson she was trying to create Cherokee Indians that don’t exist. Her comments brought a loud reaction from freedmen in the audience.

A man who identified himself as a freedman told the crowd: “The Cherokee Nation has skeletons in their closets — and you’re looking at them right now, and they’re not going away.”

The applause resounded.

“One of the things I can do is right a wrong,” Watson said. “I have no intention to determine your sovereignty. What we determine in this bill is whether the Cherokee Nation has fulfilled its obligation to the Cherokee Freedmen.”