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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Published on <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Tuesday, November 19, 2019<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>by<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><a href="https://www.commondreams.org" target="_blank"><span style='color:blue'>Common Dreams</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><b><span style='font-size:24.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>After Week of Violence and Unrest, Warren Criticized for Conciliatory Remarks on Post-Coup Bolivia<o:p></o:p></span></b></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"Maybe it's just me, but if you're going to call yourself a progressive who stands up for the little guy you might want to start calling a right wing coup that's resulted in the curbing of democratic freedoms and onslaught of violence... well, a right wing coup."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>by<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><a href="https://www.commondreams.org/author/eoin-higgins-staff-writer" target="_blank"><span style='color:blue'>Eoin Higgins, staff writer</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><a href="https://commons.commondreams.org/t/after-week-of-violence-and-unrest-warren-criticized-for-conciliatory-remarks-on-post-coup-bolivia/70187" target="_blank"><span style='color:blue'>0 Comments</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><img border=0 width=955 height=500 id="Picture_x0020_1" src="cid:image001.jpg@01D59ECD.6DF05950" alt="2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) came under fire Monday for her statement on the Bolivian coup."></span><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) came under fire Monday for her statement on the Bolivian coup. (Photo: Marc Nozell/<a href="https://flic.kr/p/2d5vP1W%20%20"><span style='color:blue'>Flickr</span></a>/cc)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Top-tier 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren is under fire from progressives and Indigenous activists for her comments Monday about the recent coup in Bolivia—remarks her critics called too conciliatory to the right-wing un-elected government that seized power after President Evo Morales was forced to resign and flee the country.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"The Bolivian people deserve free and fair elections, as soon as possible," Warren tweeted Monday afternoon. "Bolivia's interim leadership must limit itself to preparing for an early, legitimate election. Bolivia's security forces must protect demonstrators, not commit violence against them."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"Sometimes silence is better," <a href="https://twitter.com/kthalps/status/1196592950836449280"><span style='color:blue'>replied</span></a> journalist Katie Halper.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"Please get a better foreign policy advisor and condemn the coup," <a href="https://twitter.com/evagolinger/status/1196520578200592384"><span style='color:blue'>said</span></a> attorney Eva Golinger.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>The coup on November 10 resulted in the democratically-elected Morales being forced to resign from office. Morales fled Bolivia for Mexico days later after Sen. Jeanine Aņez, a right-wing Christian extremist, unilaterally declared herself president. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><i><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Jacobin</span></i><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>'s Luke Savage <a href="https://twitter.com/LukewSavage/status/1196526927554793473"><span style='color:blue'>pointed ou</span></a>t that Warren's statement appeared to be an attempt to downplay the violence of the coup and reframe the conflict as a purely political conflict.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"This isn't an issue of process," said Savage. "A right wing military coup deposed Bolivia's sitting president and the U.S.A. supported it."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Chief among progressive criticiques of Warren's statement were the Massachusetts' senator's apparent endorsement of the legitimacy of the coup government. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"Maybe it's just me, but if you're going to call yourself a progressive who stands up for the little guy you might want to start calling a right wing coup that's resulted in the curbing of democratic freedoms and onslaught of violence... well, a right wing coup," tweeted <i>Al Jazeera</i> host Sana Saeed. "And condemn it."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Protests against Aņez's government have spread across Boliva over the past week. On Friday, as <i>Common Dreams</i> reported, police and military forces killed nine Indigenous protesters in the city of Sacaba, near Cochabamba.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a fellow frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, on Monday evening tweeted once again his condemnation of what he has consistently called a coup and shared a video of the violence in Cochabamba. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"I oppose the intervention of Bolivia's security forces in the democratic process and their repression of Indigenous protesters," said Sanders. "When the military intervened and asked President Evo Morales to leave, in my view, that's called a coup."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"Bolivia highlights another stark contrast with Sanders that can't be obscured with semantics," <a href="https://twitter.com/adamjohnsonNYC/status/1196524907083030530"><span style='color:blue'>tweeted</span></a> journalist and media critic Adam Johnson. "Sanders firmly calls what happened a coup, Warren gives us process handwringing."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>In response to Warren's statement, civil rights activist Kade Crockford <a href="https://twitter.com/onekade/status/1196780664789573634"><span style='color:blue'>tweeted</span></a>: "This has me seriously reconsidering my support for Warren over Sanders."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><i><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>The Intercept</span></i><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>'s Ryan Grim, in a tweet, <a href="https://twitter.com/ryangrim/status/1196618013707030528"><span style='color:blue'>called out</span></a> Warren's refusal to call Aņez's seizure of power a coup. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"The 'interim leadership' has already threatened to arrest elected lawmakers in Morales' party for sedition," said Grim, "while killing people in the streets."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>Texas Democrat Sema Hernandez, who is Indigenous<i>,</i> <a href="https://twitter.com/_SemaHernandez_/status/1196607455335190528"><span style='color:blue'>said</span></a> on Twitter that she found Warren's statements on the coup and the violence unaccetable.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"I condemn Elizabeth Warren for taking this position on the Bolivia coup," said Hernandez. "The interim leadership is ethnically cleansing Bolivia's indigenous population and declaring Bolivia a Christian nation."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><i><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>In the Now</span></i><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'> journalist Rania Khalek, in a withering <a href="https://twitter.com/RaniaKhalek/status/1196570306162372608"><span style='color:blue'>criticism</span></a> of Warren's position, referred to the Massachusetts senator's longstanding controversial claim of Cherokee heritage.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal align=left style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;text-align:left'><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>"This is a pathetic statement in light of a U.S. backed coup," said Khalek. "And it's coming from a person who claimed to be Indigenous. But now she says nothing in defense of actual Indigenous people."<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div></body></html>