In what ranks as one of the most memorable debate moments in recent history, Donald Trump said that Haitian immigrants are eating people’s pets in Springfield, Ohio.
In what ranks as one of the most memorable debate moments in recent history, Donald Trump said that Haitian immigrants are eating people’s pets in Springfield, Ohio.
No one has yet turned up evidence that this is true, although there is an audio recording of a man reporting that he witnessed four Haitian immigrants absconding with geese from a local pond.
Since everyone is always happy to see geese go someplace else, this call hasn’t made much impression on the debate over Trump’s comments, which, true to form, were the most incendiary and dubious thing he could say about Springfield.
Even if Tabby and Fido aren’t on the menu in the small Ohio town, the fact remains that a place with a population of 60,000 has seen an influx of 15,000 to 20,000 Haitian immigrants since 2020, making the new arrivals a wildly disproportionate share of the population in short order. Deep in Middle America
Prior to this point, Springfield had nothing to do with Haiti, and looking at the map, a town located between Columbus and Dayton would be one of the least likely places to have anything to do with Haiti.
It is very far from Little Haiti in Miami, and it had no pre-existing Haitian population or an infrastructure to provide services to Haitian Creole speakers.
