"As droughts strain water supplies across Western states, some cities and farmers have struggled with mandatory cutbacks. Determining who gets cut is decided by the foundational pecking order of Western water: the older your claim to water, created as the country expanded westward, the better protected it is.
When there's a shortage, those with newer water rights have to cut back first, sometimes giving up their water completely before older claims lose a single drop.
It's known as "first in time, first in right." But "first" is a relative term.
"First in time, first in right is kind of laughable, because the ones that were here first were the indigenous people," says Gary Mulcahy, government liaison for the Winnemem Wintu tribe in Northern California."
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