A panel on CNN questioned 2020 presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren on Friday for her decision to release two policy proposals targeting Native Americans.
Asma Khalid of NPR, Michael D. Shear of The New York Times, Dana Bash of CNN, and Tarini Parti of the Wall Street Journal appeared on Inside Politics to discuss Warren’s newest policy proposal. During the conversation, they brought up her previous claim that she was of Native American ancestry, only for a DNA test to prove otherwise.
“I mean, you know, the issues of Native Americans in the country are I’m sure very important, but I don’t know that the Democratic Party is clamoring for a massive policy position on it and she could well have decided, why poke the bear, right?” Shear said. “Why put this so out front that President Trump can come in and raise this again, and she’s going to have more interviews like the one where she wasn’t very comfortable?”
“This is not just about righting a political wrong or potential misstep early in the campaign with that DNA test, it’s about getting voters,” Bash said. “She has to right any potential wrong that the Native American community sees in her candidacy and her — you know, her history here, and that’s obviously poked at by President Trump.”
Host John King added, “The use of the term ‘Pocahontas’ is offensive, but the issue does come up to the point about electability that you were raising and not just in Republican circles.”
The show then aired a clip of Warren’s appearance on “Breakfast Club,” during which Charlamagne tha God brought up her previous claims of Native American heritage and suggested she was “the original Rachel Dolezal a little bit.”
“But it’s a topic she’s still not totally comfortable with,” Khalid responded. “We sat down with NPR politics last week. I spent half an hour on a wide-ranging interview with her, and I did ask her this question about some folks, even some Democrats, do question whether your judgment on race may be off. I will say, the entire rest of the interview, I felt she was completely comfortable moving to policy positions.”
She continued, “Her response to that question, she shifted again to a policy position. I think that’s where she’s comfortable and I don’t know that she feels fully comfortable yet in terms of how to answer these questions that even Democrats have about whether her judgment on race might be off.”
