Bill Maher called U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren “Pocahontas” during an interview with her on HBO’s Real Time Friday night.
Warren, who didn’t seem to appreciate the quip based on her facial expression, is currently promoting a book called The Fight Is Our Fight: The Battle to Save America’s Middle Class, and is widely expected to run for president in the next election cycle for the Democrats. See clip embedded below.
Maher likely was alluding to the fact that President Trump revived the Pocahontas insult during a speech to the National Rifle Association in which he warned the group about her alleged presidential aspirations, a remark about which many on social media took exception.
Bill Maher and Elizabeth Warren are among Trump’s most vocal adversaries.
Apart from Maher’s joke, “It was a friendly sit-down for Warren; in the past Maher has advocated for Warren to run for president or run on a ticket with Hillary Clinton. During this interview, Warren dodged questions about running in 2020,” the Boston Globe recalled .
The context of the discussion was that in an oft-repeated contention by liberals, blue-collar workers and others operate against their own interests by voting Republican, in this case for Donald Trump, who was actually a Democrat and independent before seeking the presidency on the GOP ticket.
In assailing Trump’s tax reform plan as only helping the wealthy, Maher specifically mentioned Saturday night’s big Trump rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania , when he told Warren that Trump supporters aren’t in her corner. Warren said she was going to push back on Maher’s assumption, and he responded in this way to audience laughter.
“His fans are not with you. Come on. They don’t like you, Pocahontas.”
Warren seemed to give a Maher a silent, stern look before going on to insist that the progressive agenda is America’s agenda.
“Warren was caught off guard and rebuffed Maher’s joke as she continued to discuss her reasoning as to why the left is going to begin to win over more voters,” Western Journalism noted .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_mggO-WPis
Warren critics originally mocked her with the derisive “Fauxcahontas” nickname, which is a play on words from the election about five years ago.
In running against then-Senator Scott Brown in 2012, Elizabeth Warren maintained that she was 1/32 Cherokee, but no formal corroboration of this claim’s validity has ever emerged. There are allegations that Warren nonetheless used her “minority” status to obtain important law teaching positions at several Ivy League universities under affirmative action. Last year, a prominent Native American writer referred to Warren as a “Pretendian.” In 2012, Cherokee genealogist Twila Barnes asserted that no authentication existed for Warren’s purported Native American heritage.
In June 2016, then-candidate Trump said at a Tampa rally that he would apologize to Pocahontas for the reference “because Pocahontas is insulted by the statement,” MSNBC reported at the time. The future president also told ex-Fox News Channel anchor Bill O’Reilly that “I do regret calling [Warren] Pocahontas because I think it’s a tremendous insult to Pocahontas. So, Pocahontas, I would like to apologize to you,” CNSNews reported .
In May 2012, The Atlantic , a liberal publication, declared in a detailed story that based on genealogical evidence, Warren was not eligible for membership in one of any three Cherokee tribes recognized by the U.S. government, but also asserted that she never benefited in her professional career from claiming that heritage.
The incumbent senator is up for reelection next year. The self-described inventor of email, computer scientist and MIT graduate Shiva Ayyadurai, who has also described himself as a “real Indian,” is one of several Massachusetts Republicans who have announced a challenge to Warren, Boston Magazine reported . Former Boston Red Sox star Curt Schilling is also considering a bid to unseat Elizabeth Warren.
[Featured Image by Casey Curry/Invision/AP Images]