CNN's Dana Bash Covers #MASenate Race — Elizabeth Warren 'Really Surprised' Anyone Would Make Native American Claims a 'Political Issue'

It's a fair and balanced report, at CNN, "Bipartisanship isn't dirty word in Massachusetts Senate race." Elizabeth Warren stays on message, er, false message, that is.

From Bash's report:

Question over Native American heritage

But Warren has stumbled over an issue that she admits tripped her up.

When the Boston Herald reported that Harvard University had touted Warren as a minority faculty member and that she was listed as part Native American in law school directories, she at first said she knew nothing about it.

But after weeks of questions from the media and accusations by her opponents that she claimed minority status to advance her career, Warren admitted that she had listed herself as part Cherokee in faculty directories at Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania in order to meet people with similar backgrounds.

"I listed myself in the directory in the hopes that it might mean that I would be invited to a luncheon, a group, something that might happen with people who are like I am. Nothing like that ever happened, that was clearly not the use for it, and so I stopped checking it off," Warren told reporters in May.

As a first-time politician, Warren admits she could have responded faster.

"I was really surprised that anyone wanted to make this a political issue. I was really surprised by that and very slow to respond to it," Warren said. "I'm like every other kid. I learned about my family from my parents."

Warren explained she heard stories from her parents about having to elope because her father's family did not accept her mother's because of her Native American roots.

"My mom and dad were very much in love. They grew up in a little town that had been Indian Territory just a few years earlier. When they wanted to get married, my father's parents said no because my mother was part Cherokee and part Delaware. And my parents fought it as long as they could and finally they eloped," Warren said.

"I lived with that, between two families," she said.

But Brown has not backed down, insisting that Warren's failure to explain herself from the beginning calls her integrity into question.

"When you run for high elected office you have to pass a test, and that test is one of honesty, trustworthiness and truthfulness, and she's failed that test," Brown said.

He continues to call on his opponent to release confidential documents to show whether or not she claimed her Native American roots on job applications.

A Republican source even gave CNN a copy of Warren's mother's death certificate, which listed her as white, not Native American.

Asked about that, Warren simply repeated that her parents "grew up in a very different time."

"They grew up in a little town that had been Indian Territory. My mother's family was part Cherokee and part Delaware. That's who they were," she said.

Harvard administrators said they did not know about Warren's ancestral claims when they hired her. And Warren bristled when asked if she considers herself a minority, saying simply that she is proud of her heritage.

"This is part of who I am. This is who I am," she said.

Warren said Brown is distracting from issues that really matter to people.

Asked whether he and other Republicans are engaging in divide and conquer politics, Brown responded that he is engaged in issues that touch people's lives "every day."
"With all due respect, I'm getting things done," said Brown.

At this point, it's going to be up to the voters to resolve the issue of Warren's Native American heritage. And that will be a political resolution, for or against the candidate. No amount of disconfirming evidence is going to shake this crazy woman from her fictitious belief about some long lost Cherokee heritage. It's family lore to her, even if her own actions as part of that family call into doubt everything she claims. For example, Warren's previous "high cheekbones" line has been called into question, at Legal Insurrection, "Serious doubt cast on Elizabeth Warren’s “Aunt Bea” “high cheekbones” story."

So no matter what evidence or non-evidence is presented --- like the reports CNN's Bash presented to the candidate --- Warren will continue to throw up smokescreens, whine about how surprising it is that her falsehoods have become a political liability, and decry the "right-wing extremists" who're attacking her "unfairly."

Legal Insurrection has more, "Challenge to Boston Phoenix: Defend Elizabeth Warren on Cherokee issue, or drop “right-wing smear machine” accusation." And see, "Elizabeth Warren has raised $24 million, but still is not Cherokee."