Indigenous Canadian star Buffy Sainte-Marie lost one of the most prestigious honors for a civilian after an investigation found she might not have been Indigenous after all.
In 2023, Canadian Broadcasting Corp. (CBC) News conducted an investigation into Sainte-Marie based on public records and interviews, including with estranged family members of the singer-songwriter. The 82-year-old icon has said she was born in the Piapot First Nation in Saskatchewan and adopted as an infant by a White family in Massachusetts, but her birth certificate says she was born as Beverly Jean Santamaria to parents of Italian and English ancestry in the U.S.
The news organization obtained several documents that seemed to confirm the allegation, including Sainte-Marie’s birth certificate which says she was born as a White female in Stoneham, Massachusetts to Albert and Winifred Santamaria in 1941.
Though Sainte-Marie repeatedly criticized the investigation as an attack against her, the Canadian government’s official publication, the Canada Gazette, announced that her appointment to the Order of Canada had been rescinded.
“Notice is hereby given that the appointment of Buffy Sainte-Marie to the Order of Canada was terminated by Ordinance signed by the Governor General on January 3, 2025,” the Gazette published on Saturday.
Sainte-Marie was appointed to the Order of Canada in 1997. She was also considered the first Indigenous Oscar winner after winning an Academy Award for Best Original Song for co-writing the song “Up Where We Belong” from the 1982 film “An Officer and a Gentleman.”
Shortly after the investigation in 2023, Sainte-Marie released a lengthy statement calling the investigation “full of mistakes and omissions” based on a story “fabricated by [her] abuser and repeated by two members of [her] estranged family.”
She also argued that it was “common” for birth certificates to be “created” by western governments for Indigenous children after they were adopted.
“If you are a pure-blood documented something, I’m glad for you. It’s awesome and beautiful to hear you speak your lineage, history and genealogy. But even if your documentation says you’re racially pure, you might miss the point. Being an ‘Indian’ has little to do with sperm tracking and colonial record keeping: It has to do with community, culture, knowledge, teachings, who claims you, who you love, who loves you, and who’s your family,” Sainte-Marie wrote.
Fox News’ Kendall Tietz contributed to this report.
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