Oscar Winner Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Native Ancestry Questioned

Oscar-winning singer-songwriter Buffy Sainte-Marie says she is the subject of an upcoming Canadian documentary that questions her indigenous heritage. “It is with great sadness, and a heavy heart, that I am forced to respond to deeply hurtful allegations that I expect will be reported in the media soon,” she said in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter. Sainte-Marie has long said that she was born on a Piapot Cree reserve in Saskatchewan and was removed from her home by the government and adopted by a white family, who raised her in Massachusetts. She says she reconnected with the Piapot Cree people as a young woman and was ceremonially adopted by the son of the chief. “I may not know where I was born, but I know who I am,” she said in the statement.