Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders is focusing on reliably Republican Oklahoma with an appearance before the largest annual gathering of the Comanche Nation in the state where rival Elizabeth Warren was born.
Sanders' visit may remind some of a sensitive subject for Warren, still criticized after her October release of a DNA test meant to bolster her claim to Native American heritage. That was supposed to rebut President Donald Trump's mocking of the Massachusetts senator as "Pocahontas," but only intensified it.
Last month, Warren offered a public apology to Native Americans, trying to show that the issue won't be a political drag in her White House campaign.
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders walks on stage to speak at the Polk County Democrats Steak Fry, Saturday, Sept. 21, 2019, in Des Moines, Iowa. (AP PhotoCharlie Neibergall)
The Comanches, who are holding their 28th annual Nation Fair Powwow, are a Plains Indian tribe of about 17,000 enrolled members, with headquarters just north of Lawton, in southwest Oklahoma. Powwows are important social events for many tribes, and typically feature traditional dance, songs, food, regalia and other customs.
Sanders, a Vermont senator, won Oklahoma's 2016 Democratic primary over Hillary Clinton. The state votes next year as part of the earlier and expanded "Super Tuesday," which comes on March 3 and includes neighboring Texas.
University of Oklahoma political science professor Keith Gaddie said Sanders' powwow visit was unusual because the tribe, which well-known, is not a particularly large Native American nation.
"There's no reason, in order to win the state, that you'd have to go down to that event," Gaddie said.
Warren has made her family's down-home, financial struggles after her father had a heart attack and couldn't work — forcing her mother to get a minimum wage job — a central theme of her campaign. Sanders and Warren are friends who agree on many policy issues, including the "Medicare for All" universal health insurance plan.
Both also have refused to attack one another, ducking questions about whether they eventually will have to compete for the Democratic Party's most liberal wing. But a Des Moines Register-CNN-Mediacom poll released Saturday showed Warren outpacing Sanders in Iowa, which launches the 2020 Democratic nominating contest on Feb. 3, and running about even with former Vice President Joe Biden, who had been the crowded field's front runner.
Sanders planned a rally at the University of Oklahoma before speaking at the powwow.
JERUSALEM (AP) — Yemen's Houthi rebels on Saturday claimed shooting down another of the U.S. military's MQ-9 Reaper drones, airing footage of parts that corresponded to known pieces of the unmanned aircraft.
The Houthis said they shot down the Reaper with a surface-to-air missile, part of a renewed series of assaults this week by the rebels after a relative lull in their pressure campaign over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.
U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Bryon J. McGarry, a Defense Department spokesperson, acknowledged to The Associated Press on Saturday that “a U.S. Air Force MQ-9 drone crashed in Yemen.” He said an investigation was underway, without elaborating.
The Houthis described the downing as happening Thursday over their stronghold in the country's Saada province.
Footage released by the Houthis included what they described as the missile launch targeting the drone, with a man off-camera reciting the Houthi's slogan after it was hit: “God is the greatest; death to America; death to Israel; curse the Jews; victory to Islam.”
The footage included several close-ups on parts of the drone that included the logo of General Atomics, which manufactures the drone, and serial numbers corresponding with known parts made by the company.
Since the Houthis seized the country’s north and its capital of Sanaa in 2014, the U.S. military has lost at least five drones to the rebels counting Thursday's shootdown — in 2017, 2019, 2023 and this year.
Reapers, which cost around $30 million apiece, can fly at altitudes up to 50,000 feet and have an endurance of up to 24 hours before needing to land.
The drone shootdown comes as the Houthis launch attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, demanding Israel ends the war in Gaza, which has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians there. The war began after Hamas-led militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people and taking some 250 others hostage.
The Houthis have launched more than 50 attacks on shipping, seized one vessel and sank another since November, according to the U.S. Maritime Administration.
Houthi attacks have dropped in recent weeks as the rebels have been targeted by a U.S.-led airstrike campaign in Yemen. Shipping through the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden has declined because of the threat. American officials have speculated that the rebels may be running out of weapons as a result of the U.S.-led campaign against them and after firing drones and missiles steadily in the last months. However, the rebels have renewed their attacks in the last week.
A Houthi supporter raises a mock rocket during a rally against the U.S. and Israel and to support Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, in Sanaa, Yemen, Friday, April. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Osamah Abdulrahman)
