Trump uses historic Native American massacre to mock 2020 opponent Elizabeth Warren

Native Americans have condemned the president's tweet as 'just plain racist'

Donald Trump faces a backlash after once again mocking 2020 presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren, with a joke referencing one of the worst massacres of Native Americans in US history.

During a series of controversial late-night tweets, the president taunted one of the first major Democrats to enter the upcoming race for the White House by referring to the Wounded Knee massacre, duing which hundreds of Sioux Indians were killed at the hands of US soldiers.

Mr Trump posted a recent video Ms Warren shared online in which she drinks a beer in her kitchen shortly after announcing her intention to run in 2020. “If Elizabeth Warren, often referred to by me as Pocahontas, did this commercial from Bighorn or Wounded Knee instead of her kitchen, with her husband dressed in full Indian garb, it would have been a smash!” The president wrote.

The tweet — met with swift rebuke from Native Americans across the country — seemed to revive Mr Trump’s longstanding feud with Ms Warren, a progressive Massachusetts senator who the president has often derided for claiming Native American ancestry.

Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota was the site where hundreds of Native American men, women and children were shot and killed on 29 December 1890 after being intercepted by US troops while on their way to a refuge.

It took the US Congress nearly a century to issue a formal apology, writing in 1990 in a “long overdue measure” that the governing body felt a “deep regret on behalf of the United States.”

Mr Trump’s tweet was condemned by Native Americans like Ruth H Hopkins, a Sioux writer and tribal lawyer who wrote on Twitter: “+300 of my people were massacred at Wounded Knee.”

“Most were women and children,” she continued. “This isn’t funny, it’s cold, callous, and just plain racist.”

The president has long railed against Ms Warren, repeatedly calling her “Pocahontas” and claiming she does not actually have Native American DNA. After the senator released a video providing evidence of her claims, Mr Trump responded by saying, “Who cares?”

He also denied a promise he made during a July rally last year in which he told his supporters, “We will say, 'I will give you a million dollars, paid for by Trump, to your favourite charity if you take the test and it shows you're an Indian.”

Ms Warren’s DNA results are said to show her Native American ancestry dates back somewhere between six to 10 generations ago.

The senator has dealt with criticism of her own from the Native American community, after revealing the DNA test results.

The Cherokee Nation responded saying using a test to claim any tribal connection was “inappropriate”.

The senator has not claimed to be a citizen of any tribal nation and said she respected the distinction between DNA and tribal affiliation.