Fake News by Fake Native Americans

In today's society, many celebrities and influential figures claim to be of Native American or other minorities descent but could not provide proof or show any connections to their claimed lineage. Even some 2020 presidential candidates have claimed Native American lineage only to be publicly proven wrong and humiliated. A recent news story about 2020 Democratic Candidate Elizabeth Warren who is the current Senator of Massachusetts is making headlines because she claims to be of Native American descent and more specifically descended from the Cherokee and Delaware tribes.

President Donald Trump

In the media, Warren has recently been referred to as Pocahontas by President Donald Trump after he questioned her claim of Native American ancestry. Trump among others claimed that Warren used her “minority” status to get ahead. When she worked for Harvard's School of Law and The University of Pennsylvania she was touted as a minority and had a leg up on other applicants because she claimed Native American ancestry. Once Warren got the job she was given an extended tenure due to her minority status. On her 1986 Texas Bar Exam application, Warren claimed to be “American Indian” on the line that asked her race which allowed her to receive special privileges. After announcing her run for President in December of 2018, Warren released a five-minute campaign video of her visiting her hometown of Norman Oklahoma to trace her family tree where she discusses her heritage with relatives. They recall her mother constantly claiming to be of Native American ancestry. She claimed that growing up she heard stories that her parents had eloped after her father's family objected to him marrying her mother because she was part Cherokee. In the video, Warren calls on renowned Stanford geneticist Carlos Bustamante who is an advisor for the website 23andme. Bustamante claims that Warren may have Native American ancestry but could not confirm it. Trump continued to push Warren to take a thorough DNA test to prove her ethnicity and even offered to donate one million dollars to the charity of her choice if she took a test that confirmed her claims. She later took a DNA test publishing the results that she is between 1/64th and 1/1,024th Native American. This is less than the average American citizen of European descent. Once the results became public, the secretary of the Cherokee nation publicly called out Warren when he said “Using a DNA test to lay claim to any connection to the Cherokee Nation or any tribal nation, even vaguely, is inappropriate and wrong.” He further stated that “Elizabeth Warren is undermining tribal interests with her continuous claims of her tribal heritage.”

Elizabeth Warren

Warren has since reached out to several tribes and leaders to apologize for her test results and for lying but has lost the support of many contributors to her campaign that no longer fund her. Even the Democratic party is turning their back to her.

Citations

"Cherokee Nation Says Elizabeth Warren Apologizes for DNA Test Flap." NBCNews.com. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/elizabeth-warren-apologizes-cherokee-nation-over-dna-test-flap-n965921.

Cillizza, Chris. "Elizabeth Warren's Heritage Reveal Was Just as Bad as You Thought It Was." CNN. December 07, 2018. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/06/politics/elizabeth-warren-native-american/index.html.

"Is Elizabeth Warren Native American?" PowWows.com - Native American Pow Wows. February 20, 2019. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.powwows.com/is-elizabeth-warren-native-american/.

Korecki, Natasha, Stephanie Murray, Matthew Choi, Daniel Strauss, and Holly Otterbein. "Warren Launches 2020 Bid amid Ancestry Fallout." POLITICO. February 10, 2019. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/09/elizabeth-warren-2020-1160751.

Linskey, Annie, and Amy Gardner. "Elizabeth Warren Apologizes for Calling Herself Native American." The Washington Post. February 05, 2019. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/elizabeth-warren-apologizes-for-calling-herself-native-american/2019/02/05/1627df76-2962-11e9-984d-9b8fba003e81_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.bab11aa3df46.

Naylor, Brian. "Elizabeth Warren Apologizes For Latest Revelation Of Native American Claims." NPR. February 06, 2019. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/02/06/692103008/elizabeth-warren-apologizes-for-latest-revelation-of-native-american-claims.

Spiering, Charlie. "Trump: 'Pocahontas' Elizabeth Warren Presidential Campaign Finished." Breitbart. April 28, 2019. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/04/27/donald-trump-pocahontas-elizabeth-warren-presidential-campaign-finished/.

Young, Shannon. "Elizabeth Warren Releases Personnel Files from Harvard, Other Schools." Masslive.com. September 03, 2018. Accessed April 29, 2019. https://www.masslive.com/politics/2018/09/elizabeth_warren_releases_pers.html.