Tracy Paschke-Johannes, a resident of Springfield, Ohio, watched the presidential debate on Tuesday night from her home with apprehension. She was concerned about whether former President Donald Trump would spread false and hateful rumors about Haitian immigrants living in her city, as she had seen online and on TV in recent days.
It didn’t take long for Trump to address Springfield during the debate. In his response to the first question about the economy, Trump went on a racist rant against immigrants, claiming that immigrants from prisons and mental institutions were coming into the country and threatening American jobs, calling for their deportation. Later in the debate, he repeated baseless claims about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, alleging that they were “eating the dogs … they’re eating the cats.”
Tracy Paschke-Johannes, an ordained Lutheran minister, was shocked by Trump’s comments and worried about the potential harm they could cause to Haitian members of her community. She expressed her disapproval, stating, “We don’t want to be known for being the place that hateful things are being said about our immigrant neighbors.”
Experts and advocates who focus on immigration issues share Paschke-Johannes’s concerns, fearing that Trump’s comments could lead to physical harm, job loss, criminalization, and negative mental health effects for Haitian and other Black immigrants in the U.S. These harmful effects, they argue, are not new but are deeply ingrained in a long history of discrimination against immigrants, particularly Black immigrants and those from Haiti.
Early anti-Haitian sentiments in the U.S. can be traced back to the early 1800s in slaveholding states in the American South, according to Willie Mack, a professor at the University of Missouri. After enslaved Haitians successfully rebelled against the French and gained independence in 1791, American slaveholders feared a potential invasion to free enslaved Africans in the U.S. This fear led South Carolina to pass a law in 1822 that prevented Black sailors from disembarking in the state’s ports, out of concern that they would interact with enslaved individuals and spread information about Haiti, potentially inciting rebellion.
“Haiti has always been feared within the imagination of the United States — there’s always been this fear of ‘the Black Republic,'” Mack explained.
Following the assassination of Haiti’s president in 1915, the United States military invaded and occupied Haiti, exerting control over its government for five presidencies until power was returned to the Haitian people in 1934. The U.S. governed Haiti with a system of racial violence and colorism akin to the discriminatory laws of the Jim Crow South, Mack noted. Within the U.S., Americans were exposed to negative portrayals of Haiti as a “voodoo and backwards, uncivilized Black country.” He suggested that Trump’s comments about eating cats and dogs stem from these myths about voodoo.
On Monday, Trump’s vice presidential pick, Senator JD Vance, perpetuated the rumor on X that Haitian immigrants in Springfield were abducting and eating pets. City leaders and police officials denied these claims, stating that no reports had been received of pets being consumed within Springfield’s immigrant community. During the debate, ABC co-host David Muir fact-checked Trump live, but the former president stood by his false statements, attributing them to what he had seen on television.
Nana Gyamfi, executive director of Black Alliance for Just Immigration, emphasized that Trump’s comments are not unique to him but are part of a broader narrative of how the U.S. depicts Black people. Throughout history, America has portrayed individuals from Black countries, including African nations, as criminalized and bestial, perpetuating harmful stereotypes.
“In spite of the fact that we know that, if you know Haitians personally, they ain’t nothing like that,” Gyamfi added.
“They are attending Catholic church or possibly Pentecostal services, enjoying delicious food that does not include dog or cat meat,” she noted. “In the Haitian context, there is an additional element of raw energy that ties back to the Haitian revolution, as well as the politics and spirituality of the Haitian people.”
As the influx of Haitians and individuals from African countries to the United States grew in the 1970s, these discriminatory attitudes persisted. In 1978, President Jimmy Carter’s administration initiated the Haitian Program, which led to the incarceration of new Haitian arrivals in local jails, prohibiting them from working and rejecting their asylum claims in hopes of forcing them to return to the turmoil and violence they had fled, as outlined in research by Carl Lindskoog, an assistant professor of history at Raritan Valley Community College who authored a book on the punishment of Haitian refugees.
During Ronald Reagan’s presidency, Haitian immigrants arriving by boat were turned away, resulting in tragic drownings. In contrast, Cuban immigrants, often with lighter skin, were not subjected to the same harsh treatment when fleeing communism, as Gyamfi pointed out.
Despite the courts overturning Carter’s program, Reagan used the growing number of Haitian immigrants to expand a system of mass incarceration and immigrant detention, laying the foundation for the current system, as Lindskoog explained. Additionally, political leaders propagated racist stereotypes, labeling Haitians as carriers of tuberculosis, posing a public health risk, and advocating for their deportation. Furthermore, Haitian immigrants were unfairly targeted by the Food and Drug Administration during the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Reflecting on recent events, Gyamfi highlighted the 2021 incident in Del Rio, Texas, where Border Patrol agents on horseback aggressively confronted Haitians and other Black migrants, further dehumanizing them.
While the Biden administration has granted Temporary Protection Status to 300,000 Haitians already in the U.S., Gyamfi expressed concerns about how Trump’s rhetoric could exacerbate the challenges faced by Haitians and other Black immigrants.
Both Gyamfi and Mack emphasized the need for Vice President Harris to denounce Trump’s remarks more forcefully, expressing disappointment in her lack of response during the debate. They underscored the urgency of confronting the hatred and racism perpetuated by Trump, which poses a threat to all immigrants, including Harris, who herself is a child of immigrants.
In Springfield, Paschke-Johannes recounted a recent incident where hate against Haitians escalated following a tragic accident involving a Haitian driver and a school bus. This event led some community members to unfairly blame the Haitian population for various issues, prompting the boy’s father to criticize Trump and Vance for exploiting his son’s death for political gain.
Amidst the surge of right-wing rumors online, Paschke-Johannes used social media to counter the false narratives, highlighting the positive contributions of immigrant communities to the local economy and emphasizing the need to ensure the safety and well-being of all residents, regardless of their background. Please rewrite the following sentence for me.
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