Here's the deal with Elizabeth Warren's Native American heritage

[DonViejo]

By Gregory Krieg, CNN
Updated 12:24 AM ET, Tue November 28, 2017

-snip-

Is Warren part Native American?

Warren says, yes, she is, and points to "family stories" passed down to her through generations as evidence. "I am very proud of my heritage," Warren told NPR in 2012. "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."

In that account and others, a genealogist traced Warren's Native American heritage to the late 19th century, which, if true, would make her 1/32 Native American. (However, the legitimacy of those findings has been debated.)

The Washington Post's "Fact Checker" page has actually decided against judging the issue at all, offering "no rating" and, in a piece Tuesday, suggesting "readers to look into it on their own and decide whether Trump's attacks over Warren's background have merit."

more
https://www.cnn.com/2016/06/29/politics/elizabeth-warren-native-american-pocahontas/index.html

[moda253]

1. IT DOESN'T MATTEER

It is of no consequence and stories like this take the heat off of his stupid racist remark.

[Orrex]

4. Yes exactly

Trump says something stupid, then points in the other direction, and the submissive media immediately races to see what their master is pointing at.

Then they spend a week or so in discussing it, all the while downplaying or outright forgetting Trump's initial stupid comment.

Occasionally we'll get a "brave" mainstream journalist who says "wait a minute," but shortly thereafter they fall right back into submissive mode.


Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

[spooky3]

2. I may be in the minority here, but...

Debating this seems like arguing over whether someone is the biological father of a certain child.

There are reliable and inexpensive DNA tests available. If Sen. Warren wants to have these tests done, she can, and then decide whether she wants to release them. It is also possible for someone with a NA ancestor to have no DNA from that particular person.

I have no doubt that she was told the stories she describes. Even if her DNA test results show no evidence of NA heritage, that does not change the stories or whether she believed them.

[csziggy]

19. At 1/32 or less DNA may not show it

My family has a story of American Indian blood, maybe from my great great great grandmother.

There are three surviving daughters, plus my Mom who have all gotten our DNA tested. In addition, there is a male first cousin with a grandfather in the same line who has been tested.

Out of those five, only my older sister's DNA results show American Indian DNA and that is only a trace amount. No one else shows any American Indian DNA at all.

Some of Elizabeth's Warren's family shared stories about their American Indian heritage - that is all I need to know.

[pnwmom]

24. Since, as you correctly say, someone could have a NA ancestor but no DNA from that person

(because of how DNA gets passed down) the DNA tests wouldn't be a reliable measure of her NA ancestry. So I'm not sure why you mention them.

This is very different from determining whether someone is a biological father, which can be determined with a great deal of accuracy.

[spooky3]

28. I believe that the services such as ancestry.com provide

Detailed info on reliability, if you ask them.

What you’re talking about is the degree of precision or accuracy. Obviously it is scientifically easier to determine genetic relationships with a higher degree of accuracy between a parent and a child (vs an unrelated person) than between persons potentially separated by multiple generations.

My point is that the situations are analogous, not identical, in that it is stupid for strangers to speculate about matters when there are physical data that more directly show evidence of relationships.

If I were in her position, I would want to take advantage of the science, though I wouldn’t necessarily make this public. (In fact I’ve done this; my family also told of one NA ancestor, and my DNA results were consistent with that. It was more interesting to get that info than to wonder if the stories were true.)

Particularly if Sen. Warren has more than one NA ancestor as it sounds may be the case from the family lore, she will likely find that the DNA results will show some percentage range of NA ancestry.

[pnwmom]

39. I've taken the test and it's very unreliable for amounts under 6%. It was fun to see that the

major result (over 80% from one region) correlated with my father's genealogical research, but that was it -- just fun.

Because DNA is passed down in clumps (my word, not scientific), and mixed, not uniformly split between your two parents, two siblings can have different percentages of DNA from their ancestors. So one sibling might have 0 percent connected with Native American, while the other has 6%. Both had the same distant Cherokee ancestor, as proved by the Cherokee rolls, but only one got the DNA. (Just like one might get brown eyes and one might get blue -- even though they have exactly the same ancestors.)

So while the science might support Warren's family's story of having some Native American ancestry, it also might not -- even if she can point to a Native American ancestor in her family tree.

IOW, if you had gotten a negative result on your DNA test, that wouldn't mean your family's story was false. So there would still be reason to wonder.

[Generic Other]

27. Shades of one drop rule

I would be very insulted if someone asked me to "prove" my ethnicity, nor would I expect my blonde, blue-eyed quarter Japanese offspring to have to do so. Who has the right to demand such a genetic test? Certainly not Trump. Or anyone else for that matter. One sixteenth Japanese blood was enough to qualify for the internment camps. That would be my great-great grandchild.

Once whites invoked the 1 drop rule forcing people of color to prove they were white. Now they invoke the no drop rule and insist you prove you are an ethnic minority.

I am 50% British. If I call myself white, there are those who would say I was not.

Mixed race people have every right to self-identify unless they dare to claim to be something other people don't recognize.

Can you see why calls to do DNA testing might rankle?

[spooky3]

30. Youre missing my point. Nowhere did I say that

She had any obligation to do the tests OR to share results if she did decide to do them.

My point is that there is science out there to help answer the question. Instead of wondering about it, she could get more info that would be valuable. But it is stupid for people to argue about whether she is or isn’t x, y, or z.

[Generic Other]

32. Like I said, it is insulting to ask

You are missing my point. I tried to say it politely.

[jg10003]

33. Excuse me for nitpicking, but 1/16 is a great great grandchild

Everyone has;
2 parents
4 grandparents
8 great grandparents
16 great great grandparents
32 great great great grandparents

[Generic Other]

34. Damn I edited it to fix it

I had it right in the first place! Thanks.

[torius]

29. Nope

Genetic tests are not necessarily reliable with such a small blood percentage, both a negative or a positive could be wrong and different cos. will get different results depending on the sampling they use. I read a long explanation of this someplace. It said you could have no DNA of some specific origin but still be a biological descendant of someone full-blooded.

[spooky3]

31. I think you will want to explore that more fully. Nt

[pnwmom]

40. The poster is right. Just as two siblings can inherit very different mixing of genes --

so one is blue eyed, freckled, and short; and another is brown eyed, olive skinned, and tall; so they can inherit different amounts of various ancestors' genes.

[JI7]

3. It doesn't matter

[Eliot Rosewater]

5. Climate change will wipe us all out soon and this is what THEY want to talk about

no good mutherfarkers

[Gothmog]

6. This is not an issue in the real world

[exboyfil]

7. The aggrieved party is the veterans

It does not matter Warren's status. Trump had no business taking away the focus from the accomplishments of these WWII veterans to score partisan political points.

The veteran's organizations should be up in arms about it.

A side note of racism as well. What does Warren's status have to do with the veterans anyway?

[Hekate]

14. SPOT ON. One final point...

Final point: Why are Trump and his racist enablers trying to rob a fellow American of her family heritage? Every family has stories that about their ancestors that inspire them, and it becomes a kind of mythology, and it is a heritage in that family, specific DNA notwithstanding. Senator Elizabeth Warren, PhD, consumer advocate extraordinaire, has done nothing to dishonor the family mythology that was handed down to her word of mouth over many generations.

This is just another case of Birtherism, a demand to "prove" that you are who you say you are, that you produce your birth certificate, that you show you are a "real" American. Barack Obama's birth certificate was never the issue to the racists; his blackness was the issue, and Trump used that to the fullest. Elizabeth Warren's blue eyes and family stories are not the issue; the issue is she is an uppity smart-as-a-whip woman and Trump is a misogynistic bully to his bones.

Democrats, please stop buying into this stinking pile of horseshit shoveled out by Trump.

[Maeve]

23. Oh, there you go, talking sense again!

Squirrel!!

[Hekate]

25. Thank you, Maeve

[pnwmom]

41. +1000. n/t

[moose65]

8. I agree - it doesn't matter

Warren is like a lot of people who have heard family stories about their Native American heritage. It's no big deal - lots of people say the same things that she did. She never claimed to be full-blooded or anything like that, and she does not deserve the ridiculous "Pocahontas" nonsense. Does Trump even know who Pocahontas was? I doubt it very much!

[Ms. Toad]

9. For most nations, percentage of ancestry does not matter

My sister is currently trying to be registered as a member of her nation. She is (I believe) 1/4, but it would not matter if she was 1/32 or 1/64, as long as she can trace back to a single registered member. (My sister was adopted (so she does not have her original birth certificate), and even though she has found her parents and all of her siblings, she needs her mother to claim her as her child - which she is currently refusing to do.)

So - from the perspective of the nation of her ancestors, she would be eligible to be a member of the nation (or not), regardless of the portion of her ancestry that was Native American - and the claim that she is a native american equally true, regardless of how far removed she was from that ancestor.

Just noting that the fraction is not a reason to quesiton the legitimacy.

[dhol82]

26. How sad that her birth mother will acknowledge her.

[Ms. Toad]

44. for a while she did -

and her siblings do.

And - it is partly a result of self-protection on my sister's part. Her mother has a fantasy that my sister is wealthy. In reality, my sister is living paycheck to paycheck, and her birth mother is withholding acknowledgement because my sister isn't sending her money.

There will be more options after she dies - not that I would wish it on her - but it is hard to see my sister denied a relationship with her birth mother becasue of the same kine emotional trauma that resulted in her children being taken from her in the first place.

[awesomerwb1]

10. It shouldn't be an issue at ALL

But we're talking about that stupid moran in the WH.

Pay for a friggin' DNA test and find a way to release the results. Once the results are out there it changes the whole narrative if he keeps calling her Pocahontas.

But....I have a feeling those stories that "were told to her" may have been inaccurate.

[BannonsLiver]

11. What makes you think the stories are inaccurate?

[awesomerwb1]

12. The fact that the issue could've

easily been put to rest with a little test by now.

[Hekate]

15. Suuuure. Just like Obama's citizenship was "put to rest" by the release of his birth certificate

This is Birtherism by another name. Don't fall for it and don't give these bullies what they say they want. They will deny your truth and move on to another topic to hit you over the head with.

[awesomerwb1]

16. Birth certificate would be vastly different

I don't think it's a different form of birtherism. It's obvious BO was born in HI and DNA can't be used to determine where you were actually born.

If you're gonna make a claim back it up with something better than "that's what my pappaw told me" or expect these nasty f-ers to jump on that.

Right now there's no proof other than anecdotal "evidence" that E Warren is of native American ancestry. Take a damn test already and stop replying to the moron in chief.

[Hekate]

17. Don't give in to the ratfcking. It never, ever stops, and nothing will satisfy the haters

So, no. To hell with them.

[awesomerwb1]

18. I just have a different take

on this one. If you're gonna bring something up like Warren did, be ready to back it up. Warren's "my pappaw told me" is very weak. In fact it's kind of ridiculous. One test, get it over with. Unless she knows it's BS.

Let's just agree to disagree.

[Hekate]

20. The RW declared war on us, and no lie is too big or too petty. Kerry was a Swiftboat HERO...

...and they turned his entire war record into a nasty joke.

Stop it. Just stop it.

[awesomerwb1]

43. Stop it? lol

Tell that to Warren. She seems to take the bait every time.

This is not Obama, and it's not Kerry. Wayyyy different situations.

[chowder66]

13. The only thing that matters in this is the racist slur.

Some people do not want to give DNA for privacy concerns and/or because they can't or don't trust businesses to handle it appropriately.

Whether Warren is or is not Native American wouldn't change the fact that Pocahontas is being used as a slur and is racist.
It's just another one of Trumps disgusting obsessions.

[ProudLib72]

21. Well Dotard still thinks Obama was born in Kenya

https://www.thedailybeast.com/report-trump-still-pushing-obama-birtherism

So why the hell should Warren waste $100 on trying to prove with science what Dotard can easily dismiss with one tweet? She knows she is fighting against a brain dead horde of deplorables.

[icymist]

22. This is the part that's being debated.

Correction: Because of a reporting error, a story in the May 1 Metro section and the accompanying headline incorrectly described the 1894 document that was purported to list Elizabeth Warren’s great-great-great grandmother as a Cherokee. The document, alluded to in a family newsletter found by the New England Historic Genealogical Society, was an application for a marriage license, not the license itself. Neither the society nor the Globe has seen the primary document, whose existence has not been proven.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2012/05/14/for-record/20uQnW6yCV3uOL2bRDfseK/story.html?camp=pm

I've been a member of the New England Historic Genealogical Society for many years and find them quite credible. Just because they couldn't find the license itself doesn't nullify what's on the application. Back in 1894 there were some very strict rules and laws about how much Native American one could have in them to be declared 'white' so I don't believe anyone would be lying on a marriage application if they claimed Cherokee.

[Motownman78]

35. Isn't the issue with her ethnicicity

that she declared herself NA to help get into a more prestigious school by minority quota?

[Generic Other]

37. I think Trump needs to take a lie detector test

It would clear up a lot of things.

[Caliman73]

38. Lie detector tests don't work well on sociopaths.

A lie detector test is basically a physiological response detector. When people who have a conscience tell a lie, there are physiological responses (maybe even imperceptible to the eye) that occur. That is what the lie detector is picking up.

Trump has no empathy and no sense of shame. He lies within the same sentence and will lie multiple times within a conversation and not lose one ounce of sweat over it.

[Generic Other]

42. How about sodium pentathol?

Or one of those psychological tests they give to retail people to see if they will be dishonest?