When President Donald Trump casually invoked "Pocahontas" during a ceremony honoring Native Americans on Monday, Washington's political class swiftly went into its familiar and usually unfulfilling ritual of trying to decipher his deeper intentions.

Was he attempting to purposefully distract media coverage away from the White House's skirmish with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau? Was he simply reaching for cheap levity among a group he was largely unfamiliar with?

Or did he view it as an irresistible opportunity to strike at a reoccurring political nemesis who he views as a gathering threat to his re-election prospects in 2020?

The president first deemed Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts "Pocahontas" in May of 2016. After Trump had become the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Warren began coming at him hard on Twitter, vowing to battle his "toxic stew of hatred & insecurity."

Never allowing an attack to go unanswered, Trump responded in kind on his favorite social media platform, blasting her "phony Native American heritage."

When The New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd phoned Trump to ask him if Republicans were chafing at his Twitter-feud with Warren at a time he should be presenting a unifying posture, he replied, "You mean Pocahontas?," thus producing another memorable caricature.

Trump's reignition of the racially-charged slight reinforced his complete disregard for politically correct boundaries. It illustrated his affinity for branding his opponents with pithy nicknames in order to degrade their stature. But it also reopened a controversy for Warren that even some Democrats say she mishandled during her 2012 campaign.

And if she runs for the White House in 2020, the "Pocahontas" problem won't go away. She'll need a pithier, clear-throated response to those hearing the details for the first time and a way to turn the tables on Trump.

"Next time, with these nicknames, everybody will take it more seriously because there's a chunk of the population that believes him no matter how ridiculous he sounds," says Massachusetts-based Democratic consultant Dan Payne.

While they didn't call her "Pocahontas" in 2012, Republicans seized on a report during her first campaign that Warren listed herself as Native American at Harvard Law School, raising questions of whether she claimed minority status in order to gain an advantage in attaining an Ivy League professorship. A Fordham Law Review piece later described her as Harvard Law School's "first woman of color."

Slow to respond and lacking any tangible proof of her heritage, Warren relied on anecdotal stories within her family, noting her grandfather's "high cheekbones."

The New England Historical Genealogical Society, which originally said there was evidence Warren was 1/32 American Indian, later recanted the claim.

"We have no proof that Elizabeth Warren's great great great grandmother O.C. Sarah Smith either is or is not of Cherokee descent," the group's spokesman said.

But fellow Harvard Law School professor Charles Fried, who served as President Ronald Reagan's Solicitor General, provided cover, saying any allegation that Warren received her professorship due to affirmative action was "false" and "complete nonsense."

Still, while she defeated Sen. Scott Brown in 2012, she never fully put to bed questions about why she suddenly identified as Native American at Harvard, but not during earlier points in her career as a professor and student.

The coverage following Trump's remark on Monday mostly revolved around his sheer audacity to launch a political attack during a White House ceremony meant to honor Navajo code talkers who served in World War II standing beneath a portrait of Andrew Jackson and the charges that he invoked a racial slur in doing so. To many Native Americans, Pocahontas is not a Disney movie character, but a historic figure who suffered countless indignities before being kidnapped and possibly murdered, dying suddenly in her early 20s, in 1617.

But while only Trump knows his true motive, those close to Warren are clearly sensitive about that attack and realize it will be resurrected if she decides to reach for the presidency.

Trump has proven to have a keen sense for identifying a candidate's weak spot and pounding away at it so it becomes a central part of their being, no matter the veracity.

In 2016, there was "Crooked Hillary", "Low Energy Jeb," "Lyin' Ted," and "Little Marco."

In 2020, he could wield "Pocahontas," to paint Warren as an inauthentic phony.

Payne says the lessons from her 2012 experience, coupled with Trump, should be to respond quickly with a concise answer.

"If she runs nationally, she'll perhaps have to explain it in other places," he says. "She'll have to explain why she listed it and what she hoped would be the benefit of it and then go on to other things and make people understand this is the way Trump operates. Make sure people understand Trump is just using it as a way to deflect criticism of him. He uses cheap tricks for the press. He doesn't hesitate to act like an 8-year-old."

In the meantime, someone is monetizing the kerfuffle on Warren's behalf.

Visit the website Pocahontas.com and you will be redirected to Warren's campaign page for her 2018 reelection, where a request for a donation pops open.