Tribal gas stations offer a reprieve from high prices during Iran war

FORT COLLINS, Colo. — Junelle Lewis was looking for a reprieve from gas prices in the Seattle area, driven up by the war in Iran, when an app on her phone gave her the answer: the Tulalip Reservation, north of the city, nearly a half-hour from her home.

She didn’t hesitate.

“I purposely drove here just for gas,” Lewis said as he filled up his Chevrolet Suburban at the Tulalip market this week for $4.84 a gallon (3.8 liters), about 75 cents less than prices near me. “The gas is ridiculous. But honestly, I’ve found over the years that this gas station is cheaper than many others here. Probably the cheapest.”

Lewis is not the only driver who has discovered that the cheapest fuel is found on Native American reservations.

Particularly in California, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma and Washington state — places with dozens of tribally owned stations, some located in busy traffic corridors — tribes exempt from state fuel taxes can sell at a price much lower than nearby competing stations.

Apps like Gas Buddy make it easier than ever to find the cheapest gas.

Nationally, gasoline prices have risen more than a dollar since the war in Iran began on Feb. 28, to an average of $4.15 per gallon, according to AAA.

Prices have been higher, surpassing $5 during the summer of 2022, but economists believe they will continue to rise and contribute to inflation in the coming weeks as geopolitical tensions persist.

However, deals can be found at many of the nearly 500 tribally owned convenience stores with gas stations across the United States.

Fifty-five are in California. At the Chukchansi Crossing gas station & Travel Center between Fresno and Yosemite National Park, gas at $5.09 was 60 cents less than neighboring stations.

New Mexico resident Jamie Cross usually finds savings on the Mescalero Apache Reservation, where gas was as low as $3.79 this week.

“I hope we don’t go any higher,” Cross said Thursday.

In eastern New York, in Cattauragus Indian Territory, between Buffalo and Erie, Pennsylvania, the cheapest gasoline was about $3.65 at more than a half-dozen stations, 50 cents less than in neighboring towns.

So how do the tribes do it? Two words: tax exemptions.

In general, tribes must pay the federal fuel tax of 18.4 cents per gallon for gasoline and 24.3 cents per gallon for diesel, and pass that cost on to drivers. National fuel taxes are another matter.

For more than a century, U.S. courts have held that states lack the authority to collect taxes from Native Americans on their lands, said Dan Lewerenz, an assistant law professor at the University of North Dakota who specializes in Native American law.

“The Supreme Court has consistently held this view, and it is one of the most enduring principles of Indian federal law,” Lewerenz said.

Federally recognized Native American tribes are present in 35 states, and gas taxes range from 9 cents per gallon in Alaska to 71 cents in California.

From there, things get complicated depending on where fuel is taxed — at fuel terminals, for example, or when distributors buy or sell fuel — and various agreements between states and tribes.

Court rulings come into play. In 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that off-reservation distributors in Kansas could charge a state sales tax to tribes for on-reservation fuel sales. But in 2019, the Supreme Court ruled that an 1855 treaty between the United States and the Yakama Nation, which guaranteed free movement of tribal members on roads with their goods, prohibited state fuel taxes on tribal lands in Washington state.

“It’s a little different than the principle that Indians are not taxed inside Indian Country, because that particular treaty also reserved certain off-reservation rights for Indians,” Lewerenz said.

Gasoline sales at convenience stores are not as profitable as getting people to the pump.

Selling snacks adds profit. But tribal businesses are increasingly offering groceries in what would otherwise be “food deserts,” far from grocery stores.

“Sometimes these gas stations and convenience stores are the closest best place to buy food or household items at an affordable price,” said Matthew Klas, of Minneapolis-based consultant Klas Robinson QED.

Klas conducts market research and consults with tribal businesses and tracks the 245 tribes across the country who, in 2025, operated 496 convenience stores with gas stations.

Oklahoma, California, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Michigan and New York have the most. Some tribes, including the Choctaw Nation in Oklahoma and the Oneida Indian Nation in New York, have their own chain stores.

Drive-thru smoke shops, car washes and truck stops also generate revenue. Then there are the casinos: 205 tribally owned gas stations are located in or near casinos.

Some tribal casinos are resorts with gas stations. Some tribal gas stations are “gasinos” type casinos, which have only a small number of slot machines.

Tribal-owned businesses are an important source of revenue for Native American reservations. On the Seattle-area Tulalip Reservation, increased gasoline sales were reinvested in the community, helping cover the cost of roads, policing, health care, education, housing and other needs, Tanya Burns, CEO of Tulalip Tribes Federal Corporation, said in a statement.

“Like any government, we provide essential services to our people,” Burns said.

“It’s terrible,” Todd Hall of Paden, Oklahoma, said of diesel prices as he spent about $90 to fill up his tow truck at the Citizen Potawatomi Nation gas station, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) west of Oklahoma City.

But he added: “They are cheaper here than anywhere else. »

Hall paid $4.57 a gallon for diesel and said the price exceeded $5 in many places in the area.

Mark Foster said he saves about $5 a week by buying fuel at the tribal-owned gas station. But he’s a loyal customer because the tribe is a good community partner, he said.

“I like the way the tribe works,” he said. “And the price is good too.”

At the Tulalip market, north of Seattle, Jared Blankenship wasn’t complaining about the prices, but about having to pay for gas.

“Yeah, well, my electric car just got destroyed,” Blankenship said. “So it sucks. It’s new. It’s either Costco or look for a cheap place, like the rez. So here we are.”

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Lindsey Wasson in Seattle; Sean Murphy in Oklahoma City; Susan Montoya Bryan in Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Savannah Peters in Edgewood, New Mexico, contributed.