Issues Under Fire: 45, Elizabeth Warren, Pocahontas & Native Americans
Initially, we were gonna pass on this story, as it seemed as though it was just another stupid, ignorant and ill-advised issue Donald Trump has become infamous for inciting. But, after considering the implications of what Trump has been accusing Senator Warren of, we reconsidered and decided to dig deeper to find the truth. If you recall, Trump started calling Warren Pocahontas during the 2016 campaign to insinuate she lied about her heritage and ethnicity. Trump says Warren claimed an ethnic connection to Native Peoples for the purpose of career advancement. Now, if Trump is lying, it wouldn't be the first time he's sunk so low, but if there's a shred of truth to what he's alleging, we got a bona fide scandal on our hands. Let's dig in, shall we?
Actually, Donald Trump wasn't the first to call Warren out for being untruthful regarding her ethnicity. During her 2012 campaign against Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts, accusations were made that directly challenged Warren's claims. In fact, during the heat of the battle, the Brown campaign asked Warren to submit to a DNA test to prove her assertions. As far as we can tell, that never happened. The only evidence Warren has provided thus far is family stories passed down by previous generations and told to her and her siblings as children.
However, then Senator Brown was hardly impressed. During a particularly contentious debate, Brown said, "Professor Warren claimed that she was a Native American, a person of color." "And as you can see, she's not." Being blonde-haired and blue-eyed, we couldn't ignore the obvious, so we wanted to know how Warren responded and here's what she said: " As a kid, I never asked my mom for documentation when she talked about our Native American heritage. What kid would? But I knew my father's family didn't like that she was part Cherokee and part Delaware, so my parents had to elope." But wait, there's more.
In an NPR interview, Warren said: "I am very proud of my heritage." "These are my family stories. This is what my brothers and I were told by my mom and my dad, my mammaw and my pappaw. This is our lives. And I'm very proud of it." According to CNN, Warren's account includes a genealogist who traced her Native American heritage back to the 1900's, and if true, would make her 1/32 Native American. On the other hand, the legitimacy of those findings has been vigorously debated. When we dug deeper, the only thing we could find to corroborate Warren's account is a 1894 document that purports to list Warren's great-great-great grandmother as being a Cherokee.
Unfortunately, the New England Historic Genealogical Society later found the document in question to be merely a mention in a family newsletter. Eventually, it was discovered the mention in said newsletter was an application for a marriage license and not the license itself. The actual license was never seen by the society or The Boston Globe who covered the story during the campaign. Hence, the existence of the document has never been proven. Even more concerning, Senator Warren has yet to produce any credible documentation to support her claims of being part Cherokee and Delaware.
So, what's a reasonable person to think? Who are we to believe? Do we believe Donald Trump, a proven pathological liar or Elizabeth Warren, whose story leaves a lot of room for doubt and even more room for some tough questions. This story has been swirling around Warren for years and has become a question of her character and integrity. She could put these ugly allegations to rest with a simple DNA test to confirm a racial link to Native Peoples or confirm the ugly truth. And considering Cherokee groups have demanded more proof, Warren has an obligation to make every effort to deliver it.
Bottom line: Native Americans have suffered greatly at the hands of White People, as have most people of color in this space called the United States of America. They've been lied to and cheated. Their land has been stolen. The women have been raped and the children murdered. They've been isolated from the general population, while Whites simply ignored that culture's slow and painful death. How the Native Peoples have survived as a culture this long can only be described as a miracle. So the very idea of someone using their history to profit in any way at all is insulting, appalling and beyond despicable. Podcast below.
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