Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is using a new DNA study as confirmation of her Native American ancestry. Naturally, this earth-shattering news has been splashed across the pages of the advocacy media as information of great consequence.
If Warren is Cherokee the earth foundations may shake, the oceans recede, and the storehouses of snow hidden in the heavens may fall on the American electorate. As a matter of fact, if you peruse the many leftist interpretations of this shocking newsflash, it reads like Chapter 38 of the Book of Job when God answers his servant out of the whirlwind.
Ms. Warren is apparently so disturbed by the moniker Fauxcahontas that she went to great lengths to clear up her questionable ancestry. According to The Boston Globe, the Massachusetts senator hired Carlos Bustamante - who is considered an expert in the field of “tracking population migration via DNA analysis” - to resolve this significant issue.
With bated breath, all of America awaited the results of Professor Bustamante’s detailed research on the Warren chromosomes, but The Globe broke the story and rushed to the presses:
"He concluded that “the vast majority” of Warren’s ancestry is European, but “the results strongly support the existence of an unadmixed Native American ancestor.”
The Backlash is HUUGE!
Before we get to this flawed and highly unusual study it is worth noting that Warren may have brewed a pot of political backlash so large it will take months to clear up --if ever. First the Cherokee Nation is well -- pissed off -- to put it bluntly. In a news release, Cherokee Nation Secretary of State Chuck Hoskin Jr. said:
"Sovereign tribal nations set their own legal requirements for citizenship, and while DNA tests can be used to determine lineage, such as paternity to an individual, it is not evidence for tribal affiliation," Hoskin continued. "Using a DNA test to lay claim to any connection to the Cherokee Nation or any tribal nation, even vaguely, is inappropriate and wrong. 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. Senator Warren is undermining tribal interests with her continued claims of tribal heritage."
And President Trump is having a field day on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1052173526919196672
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1052171444082360320
The Nitty Gritty of the Test
Unfortunately, in her haste to print this news of great import, Globe reporter Annie Linskey botched the math. She initially wrote that Warren’s Native ancestry percentage is between “1/32 and 1/512” when it is actually 1/1,024. Ultimately, the Globe fixed the error and ran a correction. Just what does all this add up to? Even The New York Times admits that these numbers mean that Warren is no more Indian than the average white American.
In fact, studies by the Genetic Literacy Project show that the average white American is 0.18% Native American; Warren could be as little as 0.098% based on her results.
In addition, Mr. Bustamante confesses that he “used samples from Mexico, Peru, and Colombia” to compare Warren’s DNA since Indian chromosomal information is not easy to come by. So, if you get down to the nitty-gritty all this data means is that at best Warren is 1/32 Mexican, Peruvian or Colombian.
As for Native American? Who knows?
The Latest Scandal?
But wait there’s more. Now that Mrs. Warren perceives this as evidence to back up her high cheekbones, she’s coming after the president at ramming speed. Back in July, Mr. Trump joked that he would donate $1M to a charity of the senator’s choice if she were proven to be Native American. Now she is using this campaign jab to taunt the president:
“Remember saying on 7/5 that you’d give $1M to a charity of my choice if my DNA showed Native American ancestry? I remember — and here’s the verdict. Please send the check to the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center.”
However, the actual context of what the president said is very different. The complicit media is playin video of only a short part of his speech that would seem to make her claims accurate. But the full video shows something different. The president was teling a story about what would happen if she were in a presidential debate with him. Here's the unedited version:
So now the story has morphed into how the president is a liar and failing to honor a promise. Oh, what a tangled web we weave…
But as usual, the president got his licks in on this breaking news that affects so many American lives. Just before boarding Marine One yesterday, the president issued perhaps his most astute political commentary in a long time when he said:
“Who cares? "I hope that she is running. I do not think she'll be difficult at all. She'll destroy the country. She'll make the country into Venezuela.”
