The U.S. Department of Justice has reported that American Indian women “are more than 2.5 more likely to be raped or sexually assaulted than women in the USA in general”. The DOJ also reports, per its Bureau of Justice Statistics, that at least 70 percent of the “violent victimizations experienced by American Indians are committed by persons not of the same race.”

Until recently, tribal courts throughout Indian Country did not have jurisdiction to prosecute non-Indians for these crimes. With the passage of the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act (VAWA) of 2013, that changed...