[2] While working as a full-time store clerk at Petsmart, he "took on America’s second-largest Indian tribe, the Cherokee Nation, in what led to a landmark tribal decision.
Cornsilk served as a lay advocate, which permits non-lawyers to try cases before the Cherokee Nation’s highest court.
He believes the Nation needs to stand as a political entity, be large enough to include the people in its jurisdiction, and honor its obligation to the Freedmen descendants.
[10] Cornsilk was among Indigenous writers who commented in July 2015 on the controversy over fluctuating claims to Cherokee identity by Andrea Smith, associate professor at University of California, Riverside.
[4] Smith originally hired Cornsilk to research her family tree, but later she was outed by others after he could find no native ancestor.