<
https://theconversation.com/the-us-election-has-put-the-spotlight-on-haiti-its-history-reveals-extensive-exploitation-by-the-us-and-france-239193>
"Since the recent US presidential debate, Donald Trump and his running mate JD
Vance have doubled down on claims that Haitian immigrants are causing crime and
disorder in Springfield, Ohio.
These claims spread rapidly because of the bogus assertion that pets were being
stolen and eaten. The claims fit a pattern of assertions by Republicans –
particularly around election time – about immigrant-fuelled crime. Trump also
repeated false claims that the town of Aurora in Colorado has been taken over
by Venezuelan gangs. In 2016, Trump made similar claims about El Salvadoran
gangs on Long Island.
Although false, these claims play upon the increased number of Haitians and
others seeking asylum in the US in recent years. Haiti has faced extraordinary
instability since the 2021 assassination of president Jovenel Moïse. Gangs have
taken control of large areas of Port-au-Prince, and increasingly of rural areas
well beyond their usual turf.
But the unfounded claims also play into a long history of hostility towards
Haiti, and especially Haitian immigration – despite the profound part the US
and others have played in creating the conditions driving Haitians to seek
asylum.
Many of the reasons driving Haitians to leave can be traced back to debt forced
upon Haiti by the US and France. Major General Smedley Butler, who participated
in the 19-year US occupation of Haiti between 1915 and 1934, later called
himself a “racketeer for capitalism.”
In 2022, the
New York Times estimated Haiti paid the equivalent of about
US$115 billion to France in reparations for the Haitian Revolution – about
eight times the size of its economy in 2020. Without that debt, a team of
international scholars estimates the country’s per capita income in 2018 could
have been almost six times as large."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
