Accusations that Haitian immigrants are stealing white Americans’ pets and eating them are more than bizarre ramblings by Donald Trump, UnidosUS President Janet Murguia said during a press call with immigration advocates.
Janet Murguia
“Their purpose is clear — to dehumanize immigrants in this country, to justify their draconian immigration schemes and political purposes,” she said. “This is a tactic as old as time. Dehumanizing and othering people are the foundation of every unspeakable act against humanity in world history.”
Trump’s anti-immigrant rant during his Sept. 10 debate with Kamala Harris included a barrage of insults against Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, claiming “they’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there, and this is what’s happening in our country, and it’s a shame.”
The comments have caused tension between some Republican lawmakers and have generated untold numbers of memes and videos sarcastically disparaging Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, who has defended the unfounded claims.
But the leaders of Haitian, African American, Asian and Jewish organizations called the Sept. 19 online briefing to underscore the serious, even deadly nature of the Trump campaign’s anti-immigrant language.
“They have no values to unite Americans, no policies to move the nation forward. Instead, they rely on the oldest play in the book that authoritarians always summon, which is hatred, fear, division and terrorism,” said Patrick Gaspard, president of the Center for American Progress Action Fund and former U.S. Ambassador to South Africa.
“These vile attacks can only be labeled as racist.”
“These vile attacks can only be labeled as racist,” he added. “We should all understand and appreciate that words have consequences. Elections have consequences. Words like the ones that are being used about the Haitian community, in the context of political campaign and election, when a nation is pausing to consider its future, will have a profound legacy.”
Anti-Haitian rhetoric already has resulted in some Springfield municipal buildings and schools being closed in response to bomb threats by white supremacists inspired by Trump’s assertions.
Patrick Gaspard
The irony is that Haitians who settled in Springfield during the past 20 years have filled positions local businesses could not otherwise fill, Gaspard said. “We know that those brave, well-meaning Haitians who have arrived in Springfield are making a contribution not only to the community there, but back in Haiti with the remittances they are able to send, which creates stability in that nation.”
Trump has embarked on a “pathetic political strategy to prey on innocent people by using them as pawns to stoke fear and division at a time when they would rather not be talking about their own failings,” he said.
Immigrants in Springfield “are receiving bomb threats, getting physical hate mail delivered in their homes and are being doxed (cyberbullied) on social media, and they have asked me to communicate that they are finding ways to partner with the community but they can’t get there with these violent, vulgar terror attacks coming from national leadership.”
Aarti Kohli
Trump’s fear-based approach is an attempt to prevent American unity, said Aarti Kohli, executive director of the Asian Law Caucus.
“They’re using the well-known playbook to distract us from coming together for solutions we need. And I will just say Asian communities have recently experienced this under COVID-19. We were scapegoated, resulting in numerous incidents of violence, especially toward vulnerable women.”
But the strategy will not work, she added, because a broad, multi-racial coalition is forming to counter hate speech and to inspire higher voter turnout in November.
“I am working with Asian leaders across this country and they are fired up,” Kohli explained. “We will protect our freedom to vote for the people who govern in our name. We will come together for the policies that we need to put down roots and to create a better life for the next generation.”
Members of that coalition will have their work cut out for them given that, over the past three elections, 47% of white voters turned out at the polls compared to 27% of Black voters, 21% of Asian voters and 19% of Latino voters, said Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League and former mayor of New Orleans.
Marc Morial
“We’ve got to channel this outrage and this anger into the ballot box in this election and continue to condemn it. We know what this is. It’s an effort to divide and demagogue, create paranoia and fear. It’s an old American tactic. It’s been refreshed by the Orange Man. It’s been refreshed in this era, and we have to say no, not on our watch.”
The Trump campaign’s vilification of immigrants is a classic example of how Aldous Huxley defined the purpose of propaganda, which “is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human,” said Rachel Laforest, chief campaign officer with Bend the Arc: Jewish Action.
Rachel Laforest
“We’ve seen this time and time again from Trump and his MAGA base when they spout their rhetoric around taking this country back. Right-wing propaganda is the tool that they use to drive this message and vision home and get their base all riled up.”
Their goal is to take the nation back to when immigrants and other people of color were regarded as subhuman and we treated them as such, she said. “And the people who you’re hearing from today and the groups and communities that we are a part of, are here to make it very clear that we will not go backward. We know that this election is not the end-all-be-all, but we will be showing up with our powerful voices for democracy and cast the votes that stop MAGA so we can continue to build tomorrow.”
Related articles:
Faith leaders urge Springfield residents to resist the fear of Trump and Vance
I grew up in Springfield; here’s the real story on what’s happening there | Opinion by Steve Rabey
Trump and Vance’s Springfield lie is ‘another test for Christian America,’ Russell Moore says
Haitian-descent lawmakers have a word for Trump and Vance and their claims about pets in Springfield