3 weeks before the midterm elections, Elizabeth Warren, a frontrunner for the Democratic Presidential nomination, released a video reporting her Native American ancestry. The video garnered national attention and received negative public opinion. Many claim the video to be insensitive to Native Americans and a failed attempt to undermine Trump, who has accused Warren of claiming minority status for professional gain and commonly refers to her as “Pocahontas”. In the video, Warren calls Stanford genetics profesor, Carlos Bustamante, who tells Warren that she “ absolutely have a Native American ancestor in your pedigree.” Specifically, Warren has 5 Native American genetic segments, meaning she is between 1/64th to 1/1024th Cherokee or that she had a Native American ancestor 6 to 10 generations ago. In accompaniment to the genetic results, Warren includes testimonials from faculty from acclaimed universities and documents that insist that Warren’s professional achievement are not tied to her heritage.Warren created the video in response to Trump’s promise to donate 1 million dollars to a charity if Warren could prove she had Native American genetics. Since the video’s release, Warren even tweeted that Trump should “send the check to the National Indigenous Women's Resource Center”. However, Trump has characteristically shrugged off the demand and stated that Warren “owes the country an apology”. In fact, the public has been criticizing Warren’s decision to create the video.Chuck Hoskin Jr, Cherokee Nation Secretary of State, released a statement asserting that “using a DNA test to lay claim to any connection to the Cherokee Nation or any tribal nation, even vaguely, is inappropriate and wrong," and that "It makes a mockery out of DNA tests and its legitimate uses while also dishonoring legitimate tribal governments and their citizens, whose ancestors are well documented and whose heritage is proven.” Furthermore, Kim TallBear, an associate professor and research chair in indigenous people, reprimands Warren for refusing Cherokee nation members to refute her ancestry and relying on a DNA company that uses “ultimately settler-colonial definitions of who is indigenous” to base her claims. The fact that DNA tests results are in fact based on available genetic markets is rather troubling. In other words, Native American classification is made in comparison to genetics of people within the database who have self identified as Native American. Whereas, traditional tribes trace lineage through direct descendents and blood quantums. All in all, the video was made in bad taste. Even given her ‘minority ancestry”, Warren has neither faced the discrimination that Native American have nor has she practiced their culture. Instead of putting the issue to rest, Warren rose to Trump rouse and exemplified white ignorance. Recently, more politicians are playing into identity politics to garner more votes rather than actually addressing issues that plague a community. It would have been much more beneficial and sincere if Warren apologizes to the Cherokee people for claiming ancestry and donating one million dollars to National Indigenous Women's Resource Center herself. Sources
- https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/15/politics/elizabeth-warren-dna-test-native-american/index.html
- https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/17/opinion/elizabeth-warren-dna-trump-native-american.html
- https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/elizabeth-warren-falls-for-trumps-trap-and-promotes-insidious-ideas-about-race-and-dna