MSNBC anchor Craig Melvin said Monday that Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D., Mass.) DNA test results show she’s about as Native American as he is.
On Monday, Warren released test results that found she could be anywhere between 1/64th to 1/1,024th Native American, putting her Native American ancestor between six and 10 generations back. Melvin, who is black, jokingly asked the Boston Globe’s Annie Linskey, who reported the story, what that does politically for Warren.
"Did she gain anything by putting out this DNA test’s results? Best I can gather, according to your paper's reporting, she's 1/1000th or something like—I think I might be just as Native American as she is," Melvin said.
"The report that was released yesterday to the Boston Globe said she has a Native American ancestor between 10 and six generations back in her family. So that's going pretty far back," Linskey replied. "I don't know who my great, great, great, great grandmother or grandfather is."
She also noted that this is the first documentary evidence about the family lore Warren previously referred to in order to say she was part Native American.
"This is the first time there is some evidence that look, hey, somebody in the family probably was Native American—indeed was, way way back," Linskey said.
Warren said she heard from her family that her great, great, great grandmother was part Native American. This would be consistent with the 1/64th possibility, although that is the most recent ancestor that she could possibly have according to the results.
Warren changed her ethnicity from white to Native American while at Pennsylvania Law School and was listed as a minority later at Harvard Law School, but she claims it played no role in her hiring. She released an ad this week noting the DNA results and hitting back at President Donald Trump and others who have questioned her claims of Native American heritage.