Trump on Elizabeth Warren: ‘Who’s that, the Indian?’

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Senator Elizabeth Warren and Donald Trump

Donald Trump responded to an increasingly heated series of attacks from Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren by mockingly referring to her as “the Indian.”

After a reporter brought up the Democrat’s recent criticism of him, Trump interrupted, asking sarcastically, “Who’s that, the Indian? You mean the Indian?”
“The problem with the country right now is it’s so divided,” he said, after touting his success in the GOP primaries. “People like Elizabeth Warren really have to get their act together because it’s going to stay divided.”
In 2012, Warren’s past claims about her Native American ancestry came under scrutiny, with her Republican campaign rival Scott Brown demanding she provide documented proof. But Warren said her heritage had been passed down in words, not on paper.
“Being Native American has been a part of my story, I guess since the day I was born,” she told reporters in May of that year. “I don’t know any other way to describe it.”
Earlier on Monday, Warren in a storm of heated tweets had called Trump a “loser” who threatens “to tear apart an America that was built on values like decency, community, and concern for our neighbors.”

Trump introduced the “Indian” insult during an interview later on Friday with New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd.
“I think it’s wonderful because the Indians can now partake in the future of the country,” the Republican front-runner offered glibly when asked about Warren’s comments. “She’s got about as much Indian blood as I have. Her whole life was based on a fraud. She got into Harvard and all that because she said she was a minority.”

Reality

BRN’s critique echoed my original comments but wrote it better than I ever could have:

When he refers to Warren as “the Indian,” he’s not merely being insulting—although that, too—but he is seeking to to discredit her critique on the basis that she isn’t fit to criticize him; isn’t his peer; is less than; isn’t even deserving of recognition of her complex humanity.

 

 

This reductive dismissal, like so many others he has issued, is a clear signal of his contempt for marginalized people, unless he can exploit their support to undermine credible challenges to his ubiquitous claims of being well-liked by “everybody.”

 

 

Trump must be held accountable for his sickening reliance on racism, misogyny, and dehumanization. He is not an insult comic. He is a candidate for President of the United States of America.

Links

http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/21/politics/elizabeth-warren-donald-trump-indian/

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