There has been a fair amount of attention devoted recently to the subject of “Pretendians,” typically left of center white women in academic or government jobs who have decided that they aren’t what they appear—regular white women—but are actually American Indian princesses who are not only glamorously attention-getting but also eligible for affirmative action.
You can find which states and districts have the highest concentration of Pretendians to real Indians by sorting Wikipedia’s 2018 (pre-COVID) life expectancy by race in each state table for average life expectancy among self-designated American Indians.
The lowest life expectancy (67.8 years) is, not surprisingly, in South Dakota, home to the huge and tragic Pine Ridge Sioux reservation, site of the last battle of the Indian wars in 1890 and notorious today for alcoholism and suicide. So, I’d guess that in South Dakota a larger fraction of people who say they are American Indian are more or less American Indian, culturally and genetically.
| State | All Races [18] | White [18] | Hispanic [18] | Black [18] | Asian [18] | American Indian and Alaska Native [18] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 South Dakota |
79.1 | 80.0 | 82.7 | 81.2 | 85.2 | 67.8 |
 Montana |
78.8 | 79.3 | 82.1 | 81.9 | 86.1 | 69.5 |
 North Dakota |
79.9 | 80.1 | 85.1 | 82.1 | 88.3 | 69.7 |
 Minnesota |
80.9 | 81.0 | 83.4 | 79.3 | 86.8 | 69.9 |
 Alaska |
78.8 | 80.0 | 80.9 | 79.0 | 87.1 | 70.5 |
 Nebraska |
79.6 | 79.6 | 82.1 | 73.9 | 86.3 | 71.1 |
 Wisconsin |
79.4 | 79.4 | 83.3 | 73.4 | 85.8 | 71.7 |
 Arizona |
79.9 | 80.0 | 81.0 | 76.8 | 87.0 | 71.8 |
 Wyoming |
79.0 | 79.0 | 81.8 | 80.2 | 85.2 | 72.9 |
 Oklahoma |
76.0 | 76.1 | 80.9 | 72.9 | 81.0 | 73.6 |
 New Mexico |
78.1 | 78.7 | 78.6 | 74.8 | 81.8 | 73.9 |
 Washington |
80.4 | 80.1 | 81.7 | 78.0 | 84.3 | 74.0 |
 Colorado |
80.5 | 80.6 | 81.0 | 77.2 | 87.9 | 74.2 |
 Utah |
79.9 | 79.6 | 81.9 | 80.2 | 84.3 | 74.3 |
 Idaho |
79.3 | 79.1 | 83.1 | 81.3 | 84.9 | 74.6 |
 Nevada |
78.5 | 76.8 | 80.7 | 76.3 | 84.1 | 74.9 |
 California |
81.6 | 80.7 | 83.6 | 76.0 | 87.6 | 75.7 |
 North Carolina |
78.0 | 78.5 | 81.8 | 75.0 | 84.3 | 76.8 |
 Oregon |
79.8 | 79.5 | 84.0 | 77.5 | 86.4 | 76.9 |
 Arkansas |
75.9 | 76.0 | 79.2 | 72.8 | 80.6 | 78.4 |
 Alabama |
75.4 | 76.0 | 79.1 | 72.9 | 80.2 | 78.7 |
 Kentucky |
75.4 | 75.5 | 79.6 | 72.9 | 80.2 | 78.9 |
 West Virginia |
74.8 | 74.8 | 79.7 | 72.2 | 79.8 | 79.0 |
 Kansas |
78.5 | 78.2 | 81.5 | 73.8 | 84.2 | 79.1 |
 Mississippi |
74.9 | 76.0 | 79.3 | 72.6 | 80.8 | 79.2 |
 Michigan |
78.0 | 78.0 | 80.9 | 73.5 | 86.0 | 79.8 |
 Iowa |
79.4 | 79.3 | 81.8 | 74.8 | 86.6 | 80.1 |
 Tennessee |
76.0 | 76.1 | 80.7 | 72.7 | 82.6 | 80.4 |
 Louisiana |
76.1 | 77.1 | 80.9 | 73.1 | 81.1 | 80.5 |
 Ohio |
76.9 | 77.1 | 81.1 | 73.0 | 85.9 | 80.6 |
 Georgia |
77.8 | 78.0 | 81.3 | 75.5 | 85.2 | 80.8 |
 South Carolina |
77.0 | 78.0 | 81.4 | 73.6 | 83.1 | 80.9 |
 Missouri |
77.3 | 77.5 | 81.9 | 73.6 | 84.6 | 81.0 |
 Indiana |
77.0 | 76.8 | 82.0 | 73.2 | 85.1 | 81.2 |
 Florida |
80.0 | 79.9 | 82.1 | 76.1 | 86.1 | 81.6 |
 Texas |
79.1 | 78.5 | 81.3 | 74.2 | 85.1 | 81.8 |
 Hawaii |
82.3 | 81.3 | 87.9 | 80.9 | 83.7 | 81.9 |
 Pennsylvania |
78.3 | 78.3 | 82.2 | 73.2 | 86.9 | 82.2 |
 Virginia |
79.5 | 79.7 | 84.7 | 74.5 | 86.0 | 82.3 |
 Illinois |
79.3 | 79.1 | 82.9 | 73.9 | 85.3 | 83.0 |
 Delaware |
78.4 | 78.5 | 81.3 | 75.2 | 85.7 | 83.1 |
 Connecticut |
80.9 | 80.6 | 82.9 | 78.0 | 87.2 | 83.6 |
 Maryland |
79.1 | 80.0 | 81.9 | 75.3 | 87.3 | 83.7 |
 New York |
81.3 | 81.0 | 82.4 | 78.0 | 87.4 | 83.7 |
 Maine |
78.7 | 78.6 | 82.1 | 80.9 | 85.9 | 83.8 |
 Rhode Island |
79.9 | 79.7 | 83.9 | 73.6 | 86.4 | 84.0 |
 Massachusetts |
80.5 | 80.2 | 82.1 | 78.8 | 86.1 | 84.1 |
 New Jersey |
80.4 | 80.2 | 82.7 | 74.8 | 87.2 | 84.1 |
 New Hampshire |
79.5 | 79.3 | 83.5 | 80.8 | 87.6 | 84.4 |
 Vermont |
79.7 | 79.6 | 83.1 | 81.1 | 87.2 | 85.0 |
 District of Columbia |
78.6 | 87.5 | 87.8 | 72.6 | 89.5 | 98.5 |
 United States |
78.7 | 78.6 | 82.0 | 75.0 | 86.3 | 77.4 |
In contrast, the highest life expectancy for self-proclaimed American Indians is the District of Columbia, where the average life expectancy in 2018 (no doubt on a small sample size) was 98.5.
I think we’ve found the Pretendians!
