Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on the campaign trail. Photo from Facebook
Debra Haaland (Laguna Pueblo), the first Native woman to serve as chair of the Democratic Party of New Mexico, condemns Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump for his "disrespectful" race-based attacks on Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts):
First, I doubt very seriously that Donald Trump is any authority on Native Americans. For example, Elizabeth Warren identifies as Cherokee and Pocahontas is Powhatan. Trump doesn't understand how or why Native folks choose to identify themselves or how tribes place individuals on their tribal rolls. He may never have heard that tribes have the authority to make their own enrollment laws and be ruled by them. For centuries Native people were moved. Large numbers were forced to walk, forced on trains, sent to boarding schools thousands of miles from their communities, and sometimes they never went back home. Some absences of tribal members were a great hardship for a tribe to bear, and the systematic attempts at assimilation (and even extermination) caused many tribes to lose things - family heirlooms, land, songs, dances, traditions. We owe a debt of gratitude to our ancestors for not dying off and ultimately to our tribal governments for fighting hard through the years to regain much of what we had lost. I myself feel very fortunate to have my community that I can call home. Trump’s very use of Pocahontas’ name is disrespectful. The story of Pocahontas is heart-wrenching. Toward the end of her life she left her people, went to England, contracted a disease and died at a very young age. When I think of that story - and the hundreds of sad and disturbing stories of how Native people have suffered throughout history, I can’t imagine making a mockery of their names or their lives. In my culture, we have deep respect for our relatives who have gone before us. It would be an utter disgrace to carry on as Donald Trump has about a Native woman whose life was cut short in a terrible way.Get the Story:
Debra Haaland: Trump's Very Use of Pocahontas's Name Is Disrespectful (Indian Country Today 5/29)
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