via The Washington Times by Valerie Richardson
Sen. Elizabeth Warren sought Sunday to bolster her shaky claims of Cherokee ancestry with the story of how her racist grandparents drove her parents to elope.
But Cherokee genealogist Twila Barnes says that account has its own credibility issues.
Ms. Barnes, who said her research into Ms. Warren’s family found “no evidence” of Native American ancestry, has challenged key elements of the senator’s tale of how her parents, Pauline Reed and Donald Herring, defied his parents by running off to marry.
“The problem with Warren’s story is that none of the evidence supports it,” said Ms. Barnes in a 2016 post on her Thoughts from Polly’s Granddaughter blog. “Her genealogy shows no indication of Cherokee ancestry. Her parents’ wedding doesn’t resemble an elopement. And additional evidence doesn’t show any indication of her Herring grandparents being Indian haters.”
Faced with renewed scrutiny over her heritage, however, Ms. Warren appeared Sunday on three morning news shows to give context to her claim of minority status made during her stints on the Harvard and University of Pennsylvania law faculties.
“You know, my mom and dad were born and raised out in Oklahoma, and my daddy was in his teens when he fell in love with my mother,” said the Massachusetts Democrat. “She was a beautiful girl who played the piano. And he was head over heels in love with her and wanted to marry her. And his family was bitterly opposed to that because she was part Native American.”
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