Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire
  • omnibus

Black Alliance for Peace Condemns Biden Administration’s Order to Deport Haitians as Illegal and Racist
Black Alliance For Peace
22 Sep 2021
Black Alliance for Peace Condemns Biden Administration’s Order to Deport Haitians as Illegal and Racist

U.S. policies have created the conditions in Haiti that have compelled tens of thousands to flee.

When a white Fox News reporter used a drone to film the thousands of Haitian and other Black asylum seekers camped beneath a bridge spanning the Rio Grande and linking Del Rio, Texas to Ciudad Acuña, in the Coahuila state of Mexico, he immediately (and deliberately) brought a stereotypical image of Black migration: That of the teeming, African hordes, ready to burst the borders and invade the United States. Such images are as cheap as they are racist. And, typically, they erase the larger question: Why are so many Haitians at the U.S. border?

But before that question could be addressed, the Biden administration struck with a decisiveness not seen throughout its 9-month tenure in office in ordering Haitian refugees—many of them with legitimate asylum claims—to be summarily deported to Haiti. As of September 20, more than 300 Haitian asylum seekers have been forced to board deportation flights to Haiti. The Associated Press and other U.S. media outlets have reported the Haitians were flown back to their “homeland.” But few knew where the flights were going, and many would have preferred to return to Brazil and other places they had sojourned. Cold, cynical and cruel, the Biden administration promises more deportations in the coming days.

This rogue state action is both morally indefensible and illegal under international law. The United Nations 1951 Refugee Convention “recognizes the right of persons to seek asylum from persecution in other countries” and stipulates that states have an obligation to provide reasonable measures to allow for individuals to seek asylum.

“Seeking asylum by individuals who may be facing prosecution, imprisonment and even death because of political affiliation or membership in racial, national, sexual or religious groups is a recognized requirement under international law,” says Ajamu Baraka, national organizer for the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP). “That the Biden administration has ordered federal authorities to mass deport thousands of Haitians, which will probably have the effect of driving many of them who will resist deportation back into Mexico and Central and South America, is both unprecedented in its scope and fundamentally racist.”

What makes the Biden policy even more outrageous is U.S. policies have created the economic and political conditions in Haiti that have compelled tens of thousands to flee.

Janvieve Williams of BAP member organization AfroResistance points out, “Racist U.S. policies in Haiti, supported by the Core Group, the UN, and other international organizations, have created the situation in Haiti—and at the border.”

If successive U.S. administrations had not undermined Haitian democracy and national self-determination, there would be no humanitarian crisis in Haiti or on the U.S. border. George W. Bush greenlit the 2004 coup against elected president Jean Bertrand Aristide. The UN sanctioned the coup with a full-scale military occupation. The Obama administration installed Michel Martelly and the Duvalierist PHTK party. And the Biden administration upended democracy in Haiti by supporting Jovenel Moïse despite the end of his term. All of these imperialist interventions have ensured that thousands would have to seek safety and refuge outside of Haiti. The U.S. policy response? Imprisonment and deportation. The United States has created an endless loop of dispossession, depravity and despair.

The Black Alliance for Peace calls on the Congressional Black Caucus and all human-rights and humanitarian groups to demand the Biden administration live up to its responsibility under international law and give Haitians a fair chance to seek asylum. We also call on the Biden administration and the Core Group to stop their interventions into Haitian politics and allow Haitian people to form a government of national reconciliation to restore Haiti’s sovereignty.

This statement originally appeared in BlackAllianceforPeace.com.

Haiti
Haitian immigrants

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles. Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

Attack Against Haiti’s De Facto Prime Minister on Independence Day (+Core Group)
José Manuel Blanco Diaz
Attack Against Haiti’s De Facto Prime Minister on Independence Day (+Core Group)
04 January 2022
The Core Group chose Ariel Henry as the de-factor president of Haiti, in defiance of the people's wishes. But a conflict among factions makes h
A Department of Homeland Security internal document acknowledges that deportations of Haitian asylum seekers are in violation of US law.
Hamed Aleaziz
An Internal Document Shows DHS Officials Advised Against Haitian Deportations, Fearing They Could Violate Human Rights Obligations
14 December 2021
A Department of Homeland Security internal document acknowledges that deportations of Haitian asylum seekers are in violation of US law.
Frederick Douglass and American Empire in Haiti
Peter James Hudson
Frederick Douglass and American Empire in Haiti
14 December 2021
Toward the end of his life, Frederick Douglass served briefly as U.S. ambassador to Haiti.
Credit: AFP
Jemima Pierre, BAR Editor and Columnist
A Dirty Occupation: The UN’s Criminal Enterprise and Ecological Catastrophe in Haiti
17 November 2021
What are the environmental and ecological impacts of large-scale military occupations by the United Nations “peacekeeping” missions?
Let Haiti Breathe – CORE Group Out of Haiti
Kevin Edmonds
Let Haiti Breathe – CORE Group Out of Haiti
06 October 2021
Dismantling the unelected and colonialist CORE Group is the first step to loosening the imperialist stranglehold over Haiti.
The Resignation of Biden’s Special Envoy to Haiti Once Again Exposes the White Supremacist Foundations of U.S. Foreign Policy, No Matter Which Party Is In Charge
Black Alliance For Peace
The Resignation of Biden’s Special Envoy to Haiti Once Again Exposes the White Supremacist Foundations of U.S. Foreign Policy, No Matter Which Party Is In Charge
26 September 2021
The blatant racism of Biden's Haiti policies—in both controlling Haiti’s governance and the illegal and inhuman abuses of Haitian asylum seeker
Abusing Migrants While on Horseback Fits With the Border Patrol's Long History of Brutality
Sarah Turberville, Chris Rickerd
Abusing Migrants While on Horseback Fits With the Border Patrol's Long History of Brutality
26 September 2021
Such cruelty warrants a congressional investigation—not only into the specific actions in Del Rio but, more importantly, into systemic problems
Jemima Pierre, Black Agenda Report Contributor
Borders, Blackness, and Empire
22 September 2021
The spectacle of violence against Haitians at the U.S.-Mexico border needs to be seen in light of ongoing U.S.
Afghanistan is No 'Graveyard' for U.S./EU/NATO Axis of Domination
Black Alliance For Peace
Afghanistan is No 'Graveyard' for U.S./EU/NATO Axis of Domination
25 August 2021
Black Alliance for Peace analysis on Afghanistan, Haiti and the U.S. effort to maintain hegemony.
The Return of the Marines
Thomas Peralte
The Return of the Marines
25 August 2021
It’s hard to teach an empire new tricks. Once again, the U.S.

More Stories


  • Moroccans Protest Normalization of Ties with Israel
    Peoples Dispatch
    Moroccans Protest Normalization of Ties with Israel
    07 Dec 2021
    Governments choose to make deals that often do not reflect the wishes of the people. Normalization of relations with Israel elicited protests in Morocco, the latest state to act agains
  • Barbados: the Long Road to the Republic
    Richard Drayton
    Barbados: the Long Road to the Republic
    07 Dec 2021
    The nation of Barbados recently became a republic, severing its ties with the British crown. The road to independence began years earlier as part a wider Caribbean movement.
  • China is Not Colonizing Africa
    Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    China is Not Colonizing Africa
    01 Dec 2021
    International media cannot be trusted to give accurate information. Skepticism is especially warranted when China is the topic and allegations of colonizing Africa make headlines.
  • Interview: Malcolm X and Young Socialist, 1965
    Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    Interview: Malcolm X and Young Socialist, 1965
    01 Dec 2021
    A 1965 interview with Malcolm X demonstrates how his encounters in Africa had a profound impact on his thinking about the domestic struggles of Africans in the Americas.
  • U.S. military outposts, port facilities, and other areas of access in Africa, 2002-2015 (Nick Turse/TomDispatch, 2015)
    Dina M. Asfaha, Tunde Osazua
    Eritrea Versus AFRICOM: Defending Sovereignty in the Face of Imperialist Aggression
    01 Dec 2021
    The rapid expansion of AFRICOM on the African continent should be a cause for concern as African nations are quickly surrendering their sovereignty to the US.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us