No, I'm not native-american. I live in the foothills here in ABQand the north part is actually tribal land (Sandia Pueblo). So my german-swedish-french-irish background american ass is on tribal land the second I hit the street, or take a walk off my property in the foothills. If I look out my window to the NW, most all the land I see is tribal, all the way to the river (7-8 miles as the crow flies).
Like more remote reservations (this is virtually within Albuquerque), every store takes ATM cards. Every eatery. All gas stations and convenience stores have ATMs. Most (all that I can think of off hand, actually, but I might be missing a few) reservations keep the casinos away from the pueblo itself, so for normal activity, the casino would be far out of the way to use an ATM machine, particularly since they place them inside to encourage spending the money there. Since anyone wanting to spend money on the res would be doing so at a store (which would virtually always take an ATM card), I don't see any reason for welfare recipients to be hitting up an ATM at a casino for convenience.
Maybe in Ireland where tribesman hails from ATM cards are only used for getting cash. Here in the US, you have to work hard to find any business that does not take ATM cards. Even my yard work guy has cell-phone unit that takes CC and ATM cards, lol. I never have cash any more.
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