I can totally see it being a red herring for Moana. Just like how they looked for “Rumple’s Mother” for Merida and “Sinbad and that other arabian princess” for Aladdin and Jasmine. I know the Polynesian people are not even remotely close to Native Americans, but this could just be a decoy to polynesian people, and both groups have roughly the same skin tone.
Tiger Lily is known for living on Neverland, which is an island. Moana’s entire thing is that she lived on an island and wanted to sail on the sea. And it even fits with the Hook tie-in he owns a ship and sails on the sea.
We also have Ariel and Eric coming back, who are currently stuck on an island, which could be Motonui, Moana’s island.
And the whole “she’s willing to risk her life for others, and will do it even faster if it benefits her”? Moana fled her island to save her island, but she also did it so she could finally see what lied beyond the reef. It kinda benefited her.
The character description (other than the native american part) actually fits Moana more than Pocahontas and even Tiger Lily herself.
So to me, it could be Tiger Lily, Pocahontas, Moana or some other character we don’t know about. I am putting my bet on Moana. The movie is the current Disney blockbuster and it won’t surprise me if they introduce her soon in attempt to help the rating.
The issue with this is that the actors auditioning would see “Native American” just like us. The purpose of a casting call is to draw out specific types of actors, so race isn’t something that would be lied about. Even when they lied about casting for Rumple’s mother, they were still looking for someone who was Scottish. The actors don’t find out whether a casting call is a red herring or not until after the fact. Karen David talked about how she didn’t know she was auditioning for Jasmine until she literally arrived for her audition.