San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Thousands of Haitians are sent to homeland
Americans with asylum claims — more than 90 percent of single adults from the Northern Triangle nations of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.
But images of border agents on horseback rounding up Haitians were an unintended reminder of the role racism played in the ordeal Haitians underwent over the last decade. Black descendants of slaves were unwelcome in the South American countries where they settled after fleeing violence and natural disaster in Haiti. They were an unwelcome presence at the border. That many ended up back amid the poverty and violence in their home country is an indication of the overwhelmed and chaotic U.S. border policy.
Stuck at the border
He had expected to be in the U.S. by now.
On a chilly November evening, Paul, wearing a brown beanie, leaned back on a parked semitruck outside a dance hallturned-shelter in Ciudad Acuña. The 40-year-old shot a wary look at a crowd of fellow Haitians rushing around a trailer full of donated winter clothes and toys. He sat back, watching.
“It embarrasses me because foreigners think that we’re all the same,” he said in Spanish, referring to the stigma of being a Haitian migrant. “This is the time when we (Haitians) need to present ourselves differently.”
It was Paul’s final night at the migrant shelter, which would be cleared out by month’s end. He was ready to leave but feared crossing the Rio Grande into Del Rio.
Dozens of Haitians had found temporary housing in the Mexican shelter since leaving Brazil or Chile. Many had been in the area since September and were waiting to be processed by Mexican immigration officials.
Paul’s son called out to him. Both of his kids were sick.
After traveling around 10,000 miles to get to the border, they were stymied at the final mile.
“We thought with Joe Biden it was going to be better,” Paul said. He expected that the left-leaning president would have more humanitarian policies toward migrants, which was the case in Chile, where more progressive leadership had welcomed Haitians years back.
“With Donald Trump, of course this would happen,” he said. He almost prefers Trump’s tactic — at least his anti-immigrant message was clear and consistent.
“I don’t like it when people say they love you to your face and then treat you differently behind your back,” he said.
He had decided not to risk deportation and instead was taking
up the Mexican government’s offer to build a new life in Torreón, a city of 720,000 in northern Mexico. In the morning, he and his family would take a bus there with dozens of others.
Tens of thousands of Haitians have decided not to continue into the U.S., causing a sharp increase in Haitian asylum-seekers in Mexico with nowhere else to go. Mexico saw a 773 percent increase in Haitians seeking asylum in 2021, nearly 52,000 people, along with nearly 7,000 Chileans who are children of Haitians, according to the country’s refugee agency COMAR.
With the support of the United Nations’ refugee agency, Haitians at the temporary shelter, like
Paul, were encouraged to pursue their asylum claims in Mexico. Local business owners said they would hire Haitians, and with the goal of closing the migrant shelter, the government began busing families to Torreón.
The next morning, the sun was shining on a crisp November day in Ciudad Acuña. Standing in the bus line within the shelter’s concrete walls was Paul’s wife, Quettlie Fanfan. With minimal luggage in tow, she smiled in anticipation of finally leaving.
“We want to thank the Mexican people, above all Acuña,” Fanfan said in Spanish. “It’s a town with a heart of gold.”
She said that if it weren’t for their help, they would be dead.
She was ready to get on with her life, especially for her kids, both Chilean citizens, both extremely sick.
She hopes they can forgive her and understand it was all done for them.
“We believe, God willing, in Mexico we can find what we were looking for,” Fanfan said.
A disastrous change of mind
Not long after the family moved to Torreón, a friend told the couple that immigration authorities released him into the U.S. after he crossed the border. The friend convinced the family that they would be able to enter without any problems.
They made a snap decision to cross into the U.S. from Ciudad Juárez, across the Rio Grande from El Paso.
In WhatsApp messages, Fanfan described what happened.
They were caught and detained by border officials and spent a week in cold detention centers with little food.
Then, one night around 3 a.m., they were suddenly woken up without any word of what was going on. Their feet and hands were bound, so she couldn’t hold her children, and they were put on a plane.
“They deported us. Now we are in Haiti,” she said, her voice lethargic and strained.
After three years, they were back where they started, and conditions were much worse than before.
“Returning to this country is like hell. There’s no electricity, there’s no potable water, there isn’t anything,” she said. “There’s no life.”
The violence and political instability in Haiti has reached alarming levels. It was severe enough for the Biden administration to give temporary immigration protections to Haitians last August after President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated. The State Department has advised U.S. citizens not to travel to Haiti because of “kidnapping, crime, civil unrest and COVID-19” under a level 4 advisory (the most serious). For context, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras are all at level 3.
Fanfan and Domingue were living at her mother’s house in northern Haiti, by the border with the Dominican Republic. They left home only during the daylight, though the possibility of being killed for no reason was an everyday threat.
They had to live with family because she left everything in Haiti behind when she moved to Chile.
“We don’t know what to do with the kids,” she said, beginning to weep.
Expulsions increase
The Biden administration’s decision to ramp up the expulsions of Haitians in September was made under a challenging political context for the new president.