Singer Buffy Sainte-Marie, whose purported indigenous lineage has been called into question, says she has returned her Order of Canada “with a good heart” and restated that she never claimed to be Canadian.
In her first comment since she was stripped of the award in February, Sainte-Marie said that she is an American citizen and holds a U.S. passport, but was adopted as a young adult by a Cree family in Saskatchewan, according to the Canadian Press.
She said that she “made it completely clear” she was not Canadian to government representatives and to former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau when he asked her to perform for Queen Elizabeth in 1977.
In a statement issued Tuesday, the singer expressed her “love and gratitude to Canada” and said she is “overwhelmingly grateful that I’ve been able to make my contribution.”
“It was very lovely to host the medals for awhile, but I return them with a good heart,” she wrote, adding that she’s “lived with uncertainty” about her parentage and unsuccessfully explored the possibility that she was born in Canada.
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