{"id":1351,"date":"2018-01-17T11:54:30","date_gmt":"2018-01-17T16:54:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.ca\/?p=1351"},"modified":"2018-01-17T11:54:30","modified_gmt":"2018-01-17T16:54:30","slug":"trumps-2016-vow-to-haitians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/?p=1351","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s 2016 vow to Haitians"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>Trump\u2019s 2016 vow to Haitians That he\u2019d be their champ<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Has just turned into tragedy<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">This article <em>by Raymond Joseph<\/em>, was a Special to the\u00a0New York Sun which published\u00a0it on January 11, 2018,\u00a0identifying the author as\u00a0Ambassador Joseph, founding\u00a0editor of the Haiti-Observateur and formerly Haiti\u2019s\u00a0envoy in Washington, is a\u00a0contributing editor of the Sun.\u00a0Flabbergasted was my reaction<br \/>\nwhen I read about Haiti, El\u00a0Sal vador and African lands\u00a0being described with crude\u00a0language by the President of\u00a0the United States. Could that\u00a0be true ? The story that I first\u00a0read in the Washington Post<br \/>\nwas also carried by the New\u00a0York Post and the social networks,\u00a0which gave it wide\u00a0coverage.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Not denying what the\u00a0President reportedly said, the\u00a0White House compounded the\u00a0insults by issuing the following tatement: \u201cPresident\u00a0Trump is fighting for permanent\u00a0solutions that make our\u00a0country stronger by welcoming\u00a0those who can contribute\u00a0to our society, grow our economy\u00a0and assimilate into our\u00a0great nation.\u201d<br \/>\nI wonder whether the\u00a0President has read about\u00a0Haiti\u2019s contribution to making\u00a0America great! It was Haitian\u00a0soldiers called \u201cChasseurs\u00a0Volontaires\u201d (Volunteer Riflemen) under French leadership\u00a0at the time that covered the\u00a0American retreat in October\u00a01779 at the siege of Savannah,\u00a0Georgia. They went on to fight\u00a0at Yorktown.<br \/>\nIt was the rag-tag Haitian\u00a0army that defeated the crack\u00a0troops of Napoleon\u00a0Bonaparte, spoiling his plan to\u00a0have a French empire in the\u00a0New World. Fearful of further\u00a0losses, Napoleon ordered the\u00a0sale of Louisiana which was\u00a0signed in 1803. Six months\u00a0later, French troops were vanquished\u00a0at Verti\u00e8res, near Cap\u00a0Ha\u00eftien, Haiti\u2019s second largest\u00a0city. So the Haitian war of liberation,\u00a0the first successful slave revolt, made it possible for the\u00a0young American nation to\u00a0double its territory. The Louisiana Territory was that vast\u00a0expanse of land west of the\u00a0Mississippi River to the\u00a0Rocky Mountains, and south\u00a0from the Gulf of Mexico to the\u00a0border of Canada, comprising\u00a013 states. All of that for the\u00a0equivalent to $15 million\u00a0today.<br \/>\nLet us deal with current\u00a0history. During the 2016 presidential\u00a0election in the United\u00a0States, Candidate Donald\u00a0Trump went to Little Haiti in\u00a0Miami, Florida, in search of\u00a0the Haitian-American vote.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">That visit got him a major article\u00a0in the Miami Herald by\u00a0Jacqueline Charles, a Haitian-American on the staff of the\u00a0daily. Mr. Trump told his audience\u00a0he had come to \u201clisten\u00a0and learn\u201d and build a new<br \/>\nrelationship with the community.<br \/>\nHe made a pledge :\u00a0\u201cWhether you vote for me or\u00a0not, I really want to be your\u00a0biggest champion.\u201d The Miami Herald understood what\u00a0the candidate wanted to say\u00a0and corrected it in the headline :\u00a0\u201cDonald Trump to\u00a0Haitian voters : I want to be\u00a0your greatest champion.\u201d The\u00a0Haitian-American citizens,\u00a0 especially in Dade County,\u00a0voted overwhelmingly for Mr.\u00a0Trump. Apparently, the Candidate didn\u2019t learn anything\u00a0and the new relationship he\u00a0said he wanted has soured.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">The visit to Little Haiti was\u00a0the idea of Rudolph Giuliani,\u00a0the former mayor of New\u00a0York who had experienced the\u00a0power of the Haitian vote in\u00a01993. In his first run in 1989,\u00a0Mr.Giuliani had been narrowly<br \/>\ndefeated by David Dinkins.<br \/>\nOnce he embraced the Haitians (who came to feel jilted\u00a0by Mayor Dinkins) he became\u00a0Mayor. And I am confident\u00a0that this point was made to Mr.\u00a0Trump. In the event, in 2016,\u00a0the Haitian-American citizens\u00a0at Florida, especially at Dade\u00a0County, voted overwhelmingly\u00a0for Trump. In the event he\u00a0wants to repeat, he\u2019ll have his\u00a0work cut out for him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">The Haitians had first\u00a0impressed New Yorkers on\u00a0April 20, 1990 when more\u00a0than 75,000 marched over the\u00a0Brooklyn Bridge to protest the\u00a0policy of the Food and Drug\u00a0Administration \u2014dubbed\u00a0\u201cFederal Discrimination Administration.\u201d Ehe Centers for Disease Control had classified\u00a0Haitians along with Homosexuals, Hemophiliacs and Heroin addicts as being responsiblefor the AIDS epidemic.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">By 1983, the FDA issued a\u00a0ruling banning Haitians who\u00a0had immigrated after 1977\u00a0from donating blood. By 1990\u00a0the ruling was generalized to nclude all Haitians. That\u00a0caused Haitians to unite to\u00a0fight the arbitrariness of being\u00a0the only ethnic group blamed\u00a0for the disease that was causing\u00a0havoc in America.<br \/>\nEventually, the FDA withdrew\u00a0Haitians from their classification.<br \/>\nAfter the Brooklyn Bridge march, the FDA, which\u00a0was already negotiating with\u00a0Haitian medical doctors and\u00a0other health specialists backed\u00a0down and withdrew Haitians\u00a0from their classification.<br \/>\nHence my astonishment\u00a0when last month I read in the\u00a0Times that President Trump\u00a0had resurrected the AIDS\u00a0issue regarding Haitians, disparaging\u00a0them along with Africans, especially Nigerians, who would not \u201cgo back\u00a0to their huts\u201d once they arrived\u00a0in the United States. The\u00a0White House quickly denied\u00a0that the President said such\u00a0thing last June.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">That\u2019s going to be hard to\u00a0credit his latest sortie against\u00a0Haitians, Salvadorans, Africans and others. If he harbors\u00a0&#8211; as he seems to do &#8211; an\u00a0antipathy toward foreign\u00a0minorities, believing they are\u00a0changing the makeup of\u00a0America, it is a tragedy mainly\u00a0for him. It\u2019s unfortunate for\u00a0the leader of such a great\u00a0nation to act on impulse,\u00a0showing either bigotry or\u00a0ignorance.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>l&#8217;article dans sa version originale se trouve en <strong>P. 1 &amp; 9<\/strong> de l&#8217;\u00e9dition du 17\/01\/2018, de l&#8217;hebdomadaire Ha\u00efti Observateur, se trouve \u00e0 l&#8217;adresse suivante :\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/Journal17January2018compressed.pdf\">http:\/\/haiti-observateur.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/Journal17January2018compressed.pdf<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Trump\u2019s 2016 vow to Haitians That he\u2019d be their champ Has just turned into tragedy This article by Raymond Joseph, was a Special to the\u00a0New York Sun which published\u00a0it on January 11, 2018,\u00a0identifying the author as\u00a0Ambassador Joseph, founding\u00a0editor of the Haiti-Observateur and formerly Haiti\u2019s\u00a0envoy in Washington, is a\u00a0contributing editor of the Sun.\u00a0Flabbergasted was my reaction when I read about Haiti, El\u00a0Sal vador and African lands\u00a0being described with crude\u00a0language by the President of\u00a0the United States. Could that\u00a0be true ? The story that I first\u00a0read in the Washington Post was also carried&#8230; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1339,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,17,20,48,41,45],"tags":[256,599,608,1149,1304,1314,1331,1356],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1351"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1351\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/haiti-observateur.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}