Automatic stay
The court order that freezes all collection the moment you file for bankruptcy — tribal lenders included.
What "automatic stay" means
The automatic stay is a federal injunction that takes effect the instant a bankruptcy case is filed. It stops all collection activity at once — calls, lawsuits, wage assignments and bank debits — for as long as the case is open.
For years tribal lenders argued their sovereign immunity let them ignore the stay. The U.S. Supreme Court ended that in Lac du Flambeau Band v. Coughlin (2023): the Bankruptcy Code binds tribes too, so a tribal lender that keeps collecting after you file is violating a federal court order.