Myron Red Eagle announces candidacy for Assistant Principal Chief

Written By: Collyn Combs

On a fall Saturday afternoon, Myron Red Eagle hosted a dinner announcing his upcoming candidacy for Assistant Principal Chief in the Osage Nation’s 2026 election.

Read this story on Osage News here.

More than 75 people from all three districts attended the Oct. 4 dinner in the Hominy Village Community Building, with the cooks serving a traditional Osage meal. Red Eagle, who is one of the Nation’s four remaining full bloods, is the first to announce his candidacy for Assistant Principal Chief. This is also the first time Red Eagle is seeking election as an Executive Branch officeholder. He has served as a Minerals Councilman on the 2nd, 4th and 5th Osage Minerals Councils.

If more than two candidates decide to run against him, a Primary Election will be held on Feb. 23. The Wahzhazhe Elections Office announced the candidacy filing period for the Principal Chief and Assistant Principal Chief candidates opens on Nov. 3 and closes on Nov. 13.

Red Eagle is currently serving on the 5th Osage Minerals Council and comes from a long line of tribal leaders. His great-grandfather Henry Red Eagle served as assistant chief for the 3rd Osage Tribal Council in 1910, he also served as a councilman. His grandfather, Paul Red Eagle, served as assistant chief for the 6th, 7th, and 9th Osage Tribal Councils. His uncle Harry Red Eagle also served as a councilman.

His father, Ed Red Eagle Sr., served as assistant chief on the 23rd, 25th, 26th, 27th, 29th and 30th Osage Tribal Councils. Myron is the youngest brother to the late John D. Red Eagle, who served as assistant chief from 2006-2010 and then principal chief. His oldest brother, former ON Congressman Eddy Red Eagle Jr., gave the opening prayer for his dinner in the Osage language.

ON Congressman Joe Tillman introduced Myron to the attendees and shared a story about Red Eagle inviting him to play music and went on to share that his family and the Red Eagle family have been friends for years. He also brought attention to Red Eagle’s political career and the family’s political history within the Osage Nation.

“Myron currently sits on the Minerals Council and he has just come off as serving as Chairman of the Minerals Council. Under his watch they’ve accomplished some wonderful things protecting our Minerals Estate. One thing I know about Myron, he’s not afraid to get on an airplane and go to Washington, D.C. and talk to those leaders out there and get discussions and get things done out there. And I’ll always be proud of him for that,” he said.

“As he steps into the spotlight of going into politics within the governmental side, he’s very well qualified and has the dignity, the respect, our Osage ways and he will represent us well,” Tillman said in introducing Red Eagle.

In his remarks, Red Eagle said he wanted to accomplish some things before running for assistant chief.

“I was actually asked in 2022 if I wanted to run for Assistant Chief,” he said. “Even then, I had some things I wanted to do on the Minerals Council and I hadn’t got done yet, and in my opinion needed to be done, and one of them was money; we didn’t have a whole lot of money. I managed to get some back. And the other was the election wasn’t done the way it should’ve been done the last time. Those two things were weighing on me.”

In the 2022 Minerals Council election, there were issues about unprocessed absentee ballots. The election rules have since been updated.

Red Eagle shared some of his knowledge about Osage history and the removal from Kansas.

“I always talk to the Council about a lot of our history,” he said. “I talked about those things but it involves my people. My dad used to say, my brothers always told me that this is our home. My dad used to tell us when them old guys came in, some of them even walked down to Kansas and our great-grandfather, Henry Red Eagle, and all the other people that came down, they walked down here; and they said ‘this is as far as we’re going to go.’… I’ve heard a lot of people say this is as far as we’re going to go; we’re not going any further than this. This is our home.”

When Red Eagle was younger, he listened to stories the elder men in his family would tell him, something he would like to pass on to the younger generations of Osages.

“They said we want these younger people to learn this,” he said. “About what our history involves … So that’s some of the things I was taught as a young man, it’s still in my mind.”

Since being involved with the Minerals Council and coming from a politically involved Osage family, Red Eagle has learned a lot and he commended Principal Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear and his administration on the progress that’s been made.

“I’ve learned a lot since I’ve been in politics,” he said. “What they’re doing now is good. They’ve got big casinos and they’re (planning) one in Missouri. I’ve been here and that’s good. That’s revenue, that’s capital. The thing about it is we get that capital we got has to go to the right places. What the administration’s doing now, they’re doing a good job, I can’t complain a whole lot, but it can be done.”

He voiced support for housing and said there are some Osages that would like to move back to the reservation. While attending a California gathering for Osages, Red Eagle recalled a conversation between an attendee and Standing Bear on housing.

Medical upgrades are something that Red Eagle finds important to offer to constituents moving home. 

“They want medical facilities,” he said. “I told them I would tell you all that, and that’ll be on the table. When I’m elected, that’s one of the first things I want to do with Congress. And the Assistant Chief, that’s a big part of that too, the Constitution says. That’s something for everybody to think about. There’s a lot of people in California that really think a lot of us out here (in Oklahoma).”

Education will be a priority for Red Eagle, especially Osages wanting to learn a trade.

“I asked him, is there any program that the Osage Nation has or has right now or has in the past to educate our people like the middle road jobs, plumbing, or electrician,” he said. “When you get an electrician around in Osage County, you’re going to pay a lot of money. They make good money too; why can’t our people get enrolled in some kind of a program in Tri-County where they teach these things? They can become a journeyman, go into the business, make a living for themselves.”

Red Eagle voiced support for the new assisted-living facility that will be built in Hominy and touched on the possibility of expanding and building assisted living facilities in Grayhorse and Pawhuska.

“In 2017, I asked one of the administrators, ‘When are we going to get assisted living?’” he said. “She said in 2025 … there’s other communities like Grayhorse, Hominy and Pawhuska and senior housing, that’s good. But assisted living, that’s a vital thing. People are living longer and need help and need assistance, medical assistance. I’m almost at that age myself.”

He made the younger generation a priority when speaking about the future of the Nation.

“The main thing is our younger people,” Red Eagle said. “They don’t know unless we tell them where we came from and they have probably heard the stories about it. We have a language school that is going very well.”

He spoke about previous leaders and Osages who were prominent figures within the community.

“I’ve been looking at the administration, I’ve been looking at our Congress; I don’t say anything too much unless they ask me to,” he said. “I just look and observe and I think something is missing … When we grew up, those old men … they walked around and then they looked like they were somebody. They looked like they were Chiefs. They went around like they were Chief and they had this stature; when I talk you listen. That’s the kind of attitude they had.”

He thanked all the attendees and promised to work hard if he is elected assistant chief.

“If I’m elected, I’m going to give it 110%,” Red Eagle said. “Show up every day; there’s something that needs to be done, something needs to be filled in. If Chief’s not there, I’ll fill in and do the best of it to my ability; and what I’ve learned, what I’ve been taught, what I can give to the young people. That’s what I’m all about.”

Misha Moore attended the dinner and shared some things that stuck out to her.

“Housing for one, and for unity; trying to get everybody to work together,” she said. “That’s what we really needed. And to get the young people involved.”

James McHenry also gave his take on Red Eagle’s speech.

“I’ve known Myron for a long, long time,” he said. “I remember what he was talking about and always kind of just had to take a back seat to his older brothers and now it’s his time. That’s what I got out of that is that he’s kind of following traditions of the hierarchy of the family and traditions of how he grew up. It’s just good that all these young people got to hear stuff like that because those traditions that we have as men and women around these three districts, it’s going to keep carrying on.”