Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) is fundraising off of President Donald Trump calling her “Pocahontas” during an event honoring World War II Navajo Code Talkers on Monday.
“You’re very, very special people,” Trump told the veterans at the White House event. “You were here long before any of us were here. Although we have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her Pocahontas.”
Warren, who is running for reelection in 2018, sent an email to supporters on Monday night saying, “You might have heard that Donald Trump likes to call me ‘Pocahontas.’ He does it on Twitter, at rallies, and even in official White House meetings.”
“But today, he stooped to a disgusting low,” the email continued, according to the Boston Herald. “He did this because he thinks that he can bully me and shut me up. He thinks he can bully and silence anybody he wants.”
Warren referred to the jab as a “racial slur” and the “very worst of gutter politics.” The campaign email, which included a donate button, also said that the comments distract from President Trump’s tax plan and its breaks for billionaires and giant corporations.”
Trump’s ‘Pocahontas’ reference is based on Sen. Warren’s claim of having Native American heritage. During her 2012 senate race against then-Sen. Scott Brown (R), the Boston Herald found that she was listed as a ‘minority law teacher’ in law school directories from the Association of American Law Schools from 1986 to 1995. Warren says she did this to try to meet people of similar heritage.
She told the Associated Press in 2012 that her parents told her (and her siblings) that they had Native American heritage. During the 2012 race, she declined to provide further evidence of her roots.
The President’s use of ‘Pocahontas’ on Monday also upset Native American leaders.
Navajo Nation President Russell Begaye explained to CNN that the way the term was used would be characterized as an ethnic slur, and he said it “doesn’t belong in the room when our war heroes are being honored.”
“Pocahontas is a real person,” Begaye continued. “It’s not a caricature. It’s not something that’s just made up. This is a person, a young lady and Native American woman, that played a critical role in the life of this nation.”