A group of senior Democratic lawmakers are calling out the Biden administration for not doing enough to curb the trafficking of illegal firearms into Haiti from South Florida, demanding stricter screening at the region’s ports.
A letter sent to four different agencies with responsibility over weapons exports and signed by several senators and representatives, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, expresses “alarm” at the “rising lethality, quantity, and caliber of illicit weapons in Haiti.”
The Biden administration’s efforts to combat the unlawful trade risks being “undermined without more thoroughly addressing the crisis of illicit arms trafficking to Haiti,” reads the letter, which is being sent long after the Miami Herald and other news media spotlighted the escalation of weapons and gang violence on the island.
The lawmakers directed their call to the heads of the departments of Homeland Security, State, Commerce and Justice. All four agencies have responsibilities for overseeing weapons exports to Haiti, where an underground market has flourished since the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse despite a U.S. and a United Nations arms embargo.
“Cracking down on the flow of illegal weapons that are facilitating rampant gang violence in Haiti advances U.S. security. It is also a moral imperative,” the writers of the letter said.
The administration has faced criticism for pulling back resources from the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince and the local Drug Enforcement Administration office. On more than one occasion the State Department has issued mandatory evacuations for staff, which has left the local DEA office empty at times. Congress has also faced questions over its allocation of money critical to federal screening programs.
Lawmakers are not expected to take any actions themselves in the coming months, heading into recess until after the November elections. Nor is there any proposed congressional action accompanying the request, despite pressure from Haitian Americans and leaders of the Caribbean Community.
The Caribbean, which is seeing a spike in arms-related homicides, has been calling on the U.S. to tighten controls with screenings at its seaports and do more to stop the flow of ammunition and high-powered rifles. In June 2023, during a historic visit to The Bahamas, Vice President Kamala Harris announced additional U.S. assistance to help Caribbean countries tackle illegal arms and ammunition trafficking. The U.S. said it would invest in a criminal investigative unit in collaboration with the Haitian national police, giving officers access to E-tracing capabilities with seized weapons. However, sources in Haiti said they have not seen any follow-up.
Homeland Security Investigations in Miami first started sounding the alarm about the escalation in weapons trafficking in 2022 after Haiti’s national police made several high-profile seizures at the main seaport in Port-au-Prince and another in the country’s northwest. One of the seizures involved shipping containers in the name of the Episcopal Church from Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale into Port-au-Prince . The containers, marked “Donated goods,” held 22 firearms, including 19 assault rifles, 140 magazine cartridges of different calibers, nearly 15,000 rounds of ammunition and $50,000 in counterfeit dollars.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland, Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York and Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick of Florida – the only Haitian-American member of the House – are among the nearly 60 lawmakers who signed the letter.
A Warren aide told McClatchy that her team also reached out to Republican offices for signatures. “We did not get any signers from this outreach,” the aide said.
One of their their requests is for the Justice Department to expand a federal firearms program to Florida requiring gun sellers to notify the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives when they sell someone multiple semi-automatic weapons during a five-day period. Right now, Florida isn’t among the states covered by the law. According to the ATF website, only Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas are required by the agency to report all transactions.
The request shows that lawmakers have finally recognized the role of Haiti in the weapons pipeline. Recent seizures of weapons in Haiti suggest that lawmakers have mistakenly focused on the Miami River as a choke point for illicit arms trafficking. The real source of the problem, the Herald has found, is scant screening of exports at South Florida’s major ports, particularly Port Everglades.
Florida’s seaports have served as a huge pipeline for the illegal firearms and ammunition flowing into Haiti and ending up in the hands of armed gangs now controlling more than 85% of the capital, The gangs are responsible for the deaths of more than 3,600 people in the first half of this year — a nearly 74% increase over 2023.
The violence has forced more than 578,000 Haitians from their homes and exacerbated a hunger crisis as gangs block roads, charge tolls and kidnap for ransom to collect money for high-powered weapons.
“Haiti’s armed groups have thousands of members, many equipped with powerful assault weapons that outgun the Haitian National Police,” the members of Congress wrote. “In this nation gripped by gun violence, American-made weapons are easy to come by, even as humanitarian aid becomes harder to deliver.”
“The United Nations estimates that there could be as many as 500,000 guns in Haiti, though the country does not produce firearms domestically,” they added. “Instead, the United States is the number one source of firearms entering Haiti today.”
Miami Herald federal courts reporter Jay Weaver contributed to this report.
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