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Former President Donald Trump’s campaign is turning to a well-worn playbook, seizing on baseless claims that Haitian immigrants living in a southwestern Ohio city are abducting and eating local wildlife and their neighbors’ pets, to stoke fears over migrants living in the United States.
On Monday, an official social media account of Trump’s 2024 campaign posted that “20,000 Haitian migrants were dumped into the small town of Springfield, Ohio. Here’s our Border Czar Kamala Harris bragging about bringing them to our country. ‘They need support.’”
Another post claimed that “President Trump will deport migrants who eat pets. Kamala Harris will send them to your town next. Make your choice, America.”
There’s no evidence to back up those claims. Karen Graves, a spokesperson for the city of Springfield, Ohio, said in a statement that “there have been no credible reports or specific claims of pets being harmed, injured or abused by individuals within the immigrant community.”
Even Trump’s Republican running mate, U.S. Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, who helped promote the claims against Springfield’s growing Haitian population, acknowledged in a post on the social media site X on Tuesday morning that “it’s possible, of course, that all of these rumors will turn out to be false.”
But he then appeared to endorse cat memes that several high-profile Republicans, including U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, have promoted on social media, saying, “Please vote for Trump so Haitians immigrants don’t eat us,” with a photo of two cats hugging.
“Keep the cat memes flowing,” Vance said.
RELATED CONTENT: In debate, Trump amplifies false claim that Haitians abducted and ate pets in Ohio
The falsehood of Haitian immigrants as eaters of pets serves as a stand-in for what the Trump campaign and Republicans say are broad concerns over immigration, public safety and the availability of resources in the U.S. It’s a tactic Trump has used in the past, and one that his allies see as an effective weapon against Vice President Kamala Harris in her presidential bid.
“There’s a Haitian aspect to it, sure, but it’s not really all about Haitians. It’s about crime and migration and [Harris] being part of the problem,” said Ford O’Connell, a Republican strategist and former Florida congressional candidate. “It’s a mosaic about safety and being tough on the border.”
Rulx Jean-Bart, 72, a pioneer in Haitian refugees’ fight for immigration rights and a former director of the Haitian Refugee Center in Miami, said he isn’t surprised that Haitians are being used as a scapegoat by Republicans. He believes the community is easy prey, given the anti-immigrant stance of Trump and his MAGA supporters, along with Republicans like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a frequent critic of President Joe Biden’s immigration policies.
“This idea of Haitians eating cats is an old story that has been used in the past, and probably will continue in the election year,” said Jean-Bart, who lives in Mirama. “It’s just a myth, bad propaganda that people are using to attack immigrants, Haitians, and in a sense Black folk.”
Given the long hard-fought battles against such stigmatization, the latest attacks have led Haitians to speak out.
“If you compare from where we were years ago from when I was active in the ‘70s to now, where we have Haitians in positions of responsibility being mayors, congresswoman and so on and taking a leadership role in the community and for the betterment of the community, I think we’ve proven ourselves as far as who we are and what we can do to help,” Jean-Bart said
In a statement, Republican National Committee spokesperson Anna Kelly did not echo the false claims about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, but painted a bleak portrait of life in the town of about 58,000 people, which has seen an influx of thousands Haitians and other immigrants in recent years.
“Kamala Harris’ amnesty for Haitian migrants has destroyed Springfield, Ohio. Hospitals are overwhelmed and residents can’t afford the booming housing costs. Kamala wants to bring this disaster to every single American town,” Kelly said.
Kelly’s “amnesty” comment refers to Temporary Protected Status, the immigration benefit that Trump tried to end during his previous presidency and that the Biden administration recently extended and redesignated for Haiti due to its ongoing gang violence and humanitarian crisis. The measure allows more than 500,000 Haitians already in the U.S. to legally live and work here until Feb. 3, 2025. That includes hundreds of thousands of Haitian nationals who arrived in the U.S. as of June 3 under a two-year humanitarian parole program that the Biden administration also rolled out for nationals of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. A similar humanitarian program also benefits nationals of Ukraine.
Haitians in Haiti and the U.S., including some who are registered Republicans, have blasted the misrepresentation of Haitians. Leslie Voltaire, a member of Haiti’s ruling Transitional Presidential Council, called it “deeply troubling.” Foreign Minister Dominique Dupuy, in a social media post on X, responded by sharing a quote from African-American author and Nobel laureate Toni Morrison about racism being a distraction.
“The function, the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being,” Dupuy posted.
The Haitian American Foundation for Democracy, whose membership includes a number of prominent Haitian-Americans in South Florida and Haitians in Haiti, called Vance’s and several congressional leaders’ demonization of Haitian immigrants “as homeless and hungry invaders” who represent a threat to Ohioans as “dangerous.”
“This reckless fear-mongering puts vulnerable communities at risk, stokes division, and incites hate crimes. Local law enforcement, faith communities, and social services must be supported in protecting these new community members from harm,” the group said.
This is not the first time Haitians have found themselves thrust into the U.S. political fray. Ever since they began arriving in waves in South Florida aboard boats in 1972, fleeing their country’s brutal Duvalier dictatorship, they’ve been subjected to disparaging labels.
Back then, it was their description as “boat people” as their unprecedented influx was used to write the present-day U.S. immigration policy of jailing undocumented migrants. In the 1980s, during the onslaught of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, they were falsely accused of spreading the disease after the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention singled out Haitians as being among four risk groups that included gay men, hemophiliacs and heroin users.
Trump claimed early in his presidency that Haitians “all have AIDS,” and said immigrants from Haiti, El Salvador and 54 nations in Africa came from “shithole countries.” Trump later denied making both remarks, but the sting of the anti-Haitian vitriol was revived this week when his campaign and supporters once more turned to Haitians to advance a hard-line anti-immigrant stance.
The latest narrative erupted when Vance endorsed social media claims that Haitians were abducting and eating the pets of their neighbors in Springfield. Vance had accused the Haitian immigrants in Springfield of being “ bad people ” during a July speech at the National Conservatism Conference in which he complained immigration “ has made our societies poor, less safe, less prosperous, and less advanced .”
Haitian residents in Springfield acknowledge that their growing presence in the city has raised eyebrows and created problems, especially after a Haitian immigrant was involved in a fatal bus crash last year.
But with their presence getting national attention, some newcomers like Jean Senel St. Juste, 40, fear that the unfounded characterization of them will encourage the kind of racists attacks “where Haitians will begin to die under awful conditions.”
“The declarations of Sen. Vance have nothing to do with the truth,” he said.
St. Juste, a former candidate for Haiti’s Lower House of Deputies who also worked in the presidential palace under interim President Jocelerme Privert , moved to Springfield five years ago from Washington, D.C. He was drawn to the city, he said, after a friend told him about its employment opportunities and lower cost of living.
“Haitians are not the only Black immigrants in Springfield,” he said, noting there are also migrants from the African continent as well as African Americans and Hispanics. “There is a photo that is circulating on the Internet where a Black man is holding a duck and they claim it’s a Haitian. There is nothing to justify that... and no one can say exactly where it happened.”
According to the city of Springfield, which has a section on its website to answer questions about the Haitian immigrants, Clark County has an estimated immigrant population of approximately 12,000-15,000. The city doesn’t specify how many are Haitian, but says that the community has opened 10 new businesses, including two restaurants, grocery stores and a food truck, all Haitian.
Business owner Jacob Payen, 45, had lived in Port St. Lucie for 27 years, he said, when he decided to relocate his family to Springfield after getting discharged from the U.S. military.
“I wanted to try something new,” Payen, who owns a religious storefront catering to Haitians and a services business in the city, said about relocating to Springfield.
Payen acknowledges that the arrival of Haitians and thousands of other immigrants has been shocking for some residents who, for example, are not used to the long lines such an influx has brought to the town that had a little over 58,000 residents four years ago. But the hatred and discrimination, he said, has been on social media and not in his everyday dealings with Springfield residents.
Payen blames the rumors on a “small group of people who do not understand Haitians and perhaps haven’t yet been able to adapt to the influx of Haitians in Springfield.
“Not only I have not seen or heard what they are claiming, but I believe it has a political motivation behind it. This is not something I see or believe is happening in the community,” he said.
Payne said he thought the community had moved on from the kind of anti-Haitian sentiments that had long defined Haitians’ early struggles in the United States.
“With what we already experienced in Florida,” he said, “I thought we were past these kinds of rumors and insults.”
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