MIAMI – The arrival of 103 Haitians from Haiti’s northwest Port de Paix area, showing signs of dehydration and exposure to the elements, claiming one life and requiring the hospitalization of others, underscores hypocritical contradictions in U.S. policy.
We’ve just returned from Haiti. The spirit of the Haitian people is indomitable, remarkable, alive and well.
Haitians want to stay in their country. But kidnappings and other problems continue, and stifling poverty is unrelieved, all but ignored by the U.S, whose policies in fact exacerbate these problems.
Instead of keeping the remittances flowing which support a million Haitian adults, for example, enabling them to educate their children and improve their small businesses and plots of land, giving them hope and staving off the despair that leads to desperate sea voyages like this one.
President Bush’s ICE continues to deport non-criminal Haitians who have lived in the United States for a dozen years; who have U.S.-born children, own houses, and pay taxes; and who send money to Haiti ten times a year which sustains hundreds of thousands of relatives there!
Nicaraguans, Hondurans, Salvadorans, and others have received TPS based on environmental or political factors; Haiti fully qualifies but has never received it. TPS temporarily halts deportations and keeps the remittances flowing. Instead, in a racist policy, President Bush prefers to endanger U.S. borders and destroy Haitian-American families including US-born children by deporting people whose remittances are crucial to Haiti’s economy.
Vastly outweighing foreign aid, Haitians in the U. S. remit $1.17 billion to relatives in Haiti annually, according to the Inter-American Development Bank in a March 5 press release.
“About 1.1 million adults in Haiti receive remittances, typically 10 times a year, at an average of $150 at a time. About half the families that receive money from abroad have incomes of less than $500 a year.
“Most Haitians who receive remittances use the money to cover basic expenses. However, many families manage to save a portion of their money or invest it in small businesses, home improvements or the education of their children.”
It is wrong for President Bush to exacerbate Haiti’s problems instead of helping relieve them. And those who arrive, instead of becoming LPRs a year later like our Cuban brothers and sisters, are being prepared for expeditious removal without benefit of legal assistance. They should be paroled for the opportunity to make appropriate legal claims in fair hearings represented by counsel.
