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immigrants
Outraged Over False Claims of Pet Eating? Consider the True Horrors of Factory Farms
What we do to billions of animals legally in the U.S. food system is far more extensive, not to mention ghastly, than much of the animal sacrifices that may occur in other people’s religious rituals.
Oct 13, 2024
The stories about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, eating pets have been debunked. Even the woman who filed a police report accusing Haitian migrants of stealing her cat apologized when she later found her cat in her own basement. Sadly, despite being proven false, the damage from these unfounded claims has been severe. Haitians living in Springfield have been subject to hate crimes and threats from people who believe the lie and have coupled their outrage with bigotry to terrorize a community of migrants who are living and working legally in the community through the Temporary Protective Status designation.
Despite the fact that there is no substantiation for the stories, a friend tried to convince me that Haitians are really, truly eating cats and dogs. The evidence, he insisted, came from police bodycam footage. As it turned out, the footage he was talking about was from an arrest of a woman—who was not Haitian—in another part of Ohio who allegedly killed and ate a cat. This woman was born and raised in America and apparently has a mental health disorder. When I pointed these facts out to my friend, he still didn’t acknowledge his error. Instead, he sent me a description of Vodou (aka Voodoo), a religion practiced by many Haitians, which included descriptions of animal sacrifice. He wrote that it would be better if this religion died out and its immigrant practitioners assimilated into American culture.
Perhaps this particularly pernicious and bigoted moment in our polarized society could be a wake-up call to become a bit more introspective and cultivate some moral consistency in how we treat others.
My head was spinning. There were so many ways I could respond. Should I focus on helping him to acknowledge that his original claim was false? Should I point out that his Irish family and my Jewish family were vilified for their cultural differences when they came to this country and invite him to reflect upon his negative judgments about newer immigrants? Should I talk about the range of religious injunctions, not confined to Vodou, which cause harm to animals? I didn’t know where to begin.
Because we’d discussed animal cruelty many times in the past, after mentioning all the points above, I further responded that what we do to billions of animals legally in the U.S. food system is far more extensive, not to mention ghastly, than much of the animal sacrifices that may occur in other people’s religious rituals. Moreover, I pointed out, he was an enthusiastic participant in the cruelty we inflict on cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys, and other animals raised for food because he regularly consumes meat, dairy, and eggs. Until now, he’d never expressed much concern about the welfare of animals, often telling me that he cares more about people than animals. Suddenly, along with millions of other Americans who erroneously believe Haitians are eating dogs and cats, he claims to care a lot.
In our culture, most people recoil at the thought of eating dogs and cats and believe it would be wrong to do so. But if it’s wrong to eat dogs and cats, then how is it right to eat pigs—known to be as or more intelligent than dogs—or to consume cows and chickens, both able to feel pain just as acutely as cats and cockatiels do? If we look inward to consider who we eat, we may discover justifications but little disgust or moral outrage.
And yet, the abuse we inflict upon billions of farmed animals each year is on a scale nearly unimaginable. For example, dairy cows in the United States are forced to produce a calf every year, and when they are born, the newborns are taken away from their distraught mothers on their first day of life. We then take the milk meant for the calves for ourselves. The cows are then forced to produce 5 to 10 times the amount of milk they would naturally produce to feed their young, resulting in mastitis, a painful udder infection necessitating antibiotic treatment in about half the dairy cows in the United States. After years of this cycle of artificial insemination, birth, and perpetual milking, their milk production declines. At that point, the cows are sent to slaughter, usually to become hamburger or processed meat.
What about chickens and turkeys, whose names we hurl as an insult of cowardice (for the former) and stupidity (for the latter) even though these birds are brave and intelligent? Almost all of them live the entirety of their lives in crowded, ammonia-saturated buildings; are debeaked without painkillers to prevent them from pecking each other to death in their confinement; and, if they are being used for egg production, are likely caged so tightly they cannot even stretch a wing.
Where is the outrage? Where is the disgust? In her book Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows, psychologist Melanie Joy describes the invisible belief system, which she calls carnism, that leads us to eat certain animals while protecting others. It is this invisible belief system that explains our horror at the thought of people eating pets—a horror we might conceivably express around the dinner table as we gnaw on the rib of a pig or the wing of a hen.
I’d like to hope that the false accusations made against Haitian migrants will help us realize the glass houses we’re living in so that we stop throwing stones. Perhaps this particularly pernicious and bigoted moment in our polarized society could be a wake-up call to become a bit more introspective and cultivate some moral consistency in how we treat others. And then maybe we’ll each take a step toward minimizing the harm we cause humans and nonhumans alike.
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The Case for Noncitizen Voting
Immigrants are under attack today and need greater tools to defend themselves, so why not debate the merits of restoring immigrant voting rights?
Oct 11, 2024
Former U.S. President Donald Trump and GOP leaders continue to promote the insidious falsehood that noncitizen immigrants are voting. Democrats and pundits point to evidence in study after study showing noncitizens are not voting, except in exceedingly rare occasions.
Few talk about whether noncitizen immigrants should have voting rights. Although it may sound odd or outlandish at first blush, there are strong moral and practical reasons to consider the merits of immigrant voting rights:
First, it’s rational. Twenty-two million residents are noncitizens (about 1 in 14), both documented and unauthorized immigrants. They live in every state and virtually every town. They are teachers and students, physicians and nurses, musicians and construction workers. They raise families, send kids to schools, contribute billions in taxes, make countless social and cultural contributions, serve in the military, and even die defending this country. Despite Trump’s desire to deport them, immigrants make the operation of much of our economy and society possible. Yet they cannot vote on issues crucial to their daily lives.
Just as the civil rights movement extended the franchise to African-Americans who had been barred from voting, efforts to extend the franchise to new Americans similarly seek to advance their equitable representation and inclusion.
America’s experience of excluding African Americans, women, and young people points to the dangers of excluding groups from the political process. Discriminatory practices and public policy in housing, education, healthcare, welfare, and criminal justice are the inevitable by-products of political exclusion. As the age-old political maxim attests, if you are excluded from the vote, politicians can more easily ignore you.
Although highly heterogeneous, as a group immigrants rank at the bottom of the social order, scoring low on indicators of well-being, including income, education, housing, and health. One in four low-income children is the child of an immigrant, and one in four low-wage workers is foreign-born. Immigrant families are more likely to lack health insurance, have poor health, and be “food-insecure” than the native-born. Latinos, the largest group of immigrants, experience the worst conditions, and Mexicans, the largest group of Latinos, face the biggest obstacles. Social scientists have long established that immigrants’ lack of access to citizenship and patterns of low voter registration and participation are highly correlated with underrepresentation in government and biased public policy outcomes.
Just as the civil rights movement extended the franchise to African-Americans who had been barred from voting, efforts to extend the franchise to new Americans similarly seek to advance their equitable representation and inclusion.
Second, it’s as American as apple pie. Most people are surprised to learn that noncitizens legally voted in 40 states at some point in time between 1776 to 1926. Immigrants voted not just in local elections, but also in state and even federal elections, and noncitizens could run for office. “Alien suffrage,” as these laws were called, was seen not as a substitute for citizenship, but as a pathway to foster citizenship and immigrant integration. The notion that noncitizens should have the vote is older, was practiced longer, and is more consistent with democratic ideals than the idea that they should not. Curiously, this 150-year history has been largely eviscerated from American national memory. In fact, the U.S. Constitution still does not preclude noncitizen voting, and the courts—including the Supreme Court—have upheld voting by noncitizens.
During the 19th century, when immigrants comprised 10% to 30% of the population in many states, noncitizens voted in significant numbers, and factored into election outcomes on salient issues of the day, helping advance anti-slavery causes, pro-worker issues, and progressive policy. The abolition of alien suffrage in the early 1920s coincided with the enactment of literacy tests, poll taxes, felony disenfranchisement laws, and restrictive residency and voter registration requirements that disenfranchised millions of voters.
Third, it’s feasible. Immigrant voting rights are being restored. Today, noncitizens legally vote in 17 localities from coast to coast, and other jurisdictions are considering restoring immigrant voting rights.
The Civil Rights movement helped revive immigrant voting in New York City in 1968, followed by the Sanctuary movement in the 1980s in Maryland where 10 towns allow it, and more recently in three towns in Vermont during the 2020s (Montpelier, Winooski and Burlington); San Francisco (2016) and Oakland (2022), California; New York City (2021) and Washington D.C. (2022). Other jurisdictions have enacted local laws—or have considered restoring immigrant-voting rights—including five localities in Massachusetts, six in California, one in Maine and Ohio, and in state elections in Connecticut.
Some laws provide voting rights to all residents—both documented and undocumented immigrants (MD, SF, D.C.)—while other jurisdictions enfranchise only Legal Permanent Residents (LPRs) and those with work permits (NY, VT). In some jurisdictions, noncitizens have voted in significant numbers, electing diverse representative bodies and fostering improvements in schools and student outcomes.
Globally, at least 45 countries on nearly every continent have extended voting rights to noncitizens in local, regional, and even national elections during the past several decades. These laws seek to align democratic principles with democratic practice.
Immigrants are under attack today and need greater tools to defend themselves, so why not debate the merits of restoring immigrant voting rights? As Jamie Raskin, a Maryland congressman and law professor who wrote a seminal 1992 law review journal article about alien suffrage that spurred its revival, put it, “immigrant rights are the civil rights” of the day and “by that logic, noncitizen voting is the suffrage movement” of our time.
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The Ugly Anti-Black Racism at the Heart of Trump's Attacks on Haitian Immigrants
One of the key lessons of the events in Springfield is that this type of hatred doesn’t just hurt the intended target, but whole communities.
Sep 28, 2024
Bomb threats against city hall. Proud Boys marching. Schools emptied. The residents of Springfield, Ohio are learning firsthand what it means to be caught in the crosshairs of Donald Trump’s dangerous tirades against immigrants in this nation. Long after the headlines have moved onto Trump’s next target, this town will be left to pick up the pieces.
We say “next target” because the Republican presidential nominee’s comments against Haitian immigrants during the September 10 debate were not a one-off, but an inevitable result of the anti-Blackness deeply rooted in our nation’s immigration policies and narratives. Until leaders in both parties step up to reject this racism, we can expect the consequences to continue.
This pernicious history goes back hundreds of years. Although Haiti became an independent nation in 1804, the United States refused to officially recognize Haiti’s independence for nearly another six decades - because white politicians feared the revolution would spread to enslaved Black people in the U.S. But echoes of the past reverberate. In 2021, horrific images surfaced showing border patrol agents on horseback, whips in hand, using excessive force against Haitian families along the Rio Grande.
Trump himself has a long track record of discriminating against Black people in this country, including but not limited to Black immigrants. Decades ago, he systematically denied housing to Black tenants in New York. He called for the execution of five innocent young men of color known as the Central Park Five and has continued peddling birther conspiracies against President Obama. During his presidency, Trump called African and Haitian nations “shithole countries” and instituted Muslim and Africa bans, the effects of which are still felt today.
But racist immigration policies transcend political party. Last year, the Biden administration began requiring people fleeing danger to use the CBP One app to make their asylum appointments – among the app’s many glitches included facial recognition technology that failed to consistently recognize the faces of Black people. In June of this year, Biden placed a harsh and arbitrary limit on the number of people who can seek asylum, effectively slamming the door on people trying to access safety. These policy failures disproportionally harm Black immigrants, though their effects are widespread.
One of the key lessons of the events in Springfield is that anti-Blackness doesn’t just hurt the intended target, but whole communities. While those who called in bomb threats may have aimed to hurt Haitian immigrants, a far larger group of residents experienced the evacuations of schools, hospital lockdowns, and the cancelation of an annual festival. This is unsurprising: we have seen repeatedly that attempts to harm one group of people have far-reaching ripple effects. Whether we are immigrants or born here in the U.S., our lives are intertwined, and it is in our collective interest to confront this racism and make clear it has no place in the future of this nation.
Looking back at our nation’s history, we know American cities have a rich history of integrating immigrants even after a bumpy start, including Irish and Italian immigrants in 19th and 20th centuries in New York, Liberians in the 20th century in Philadelphia, and more recently Ukrainians fleeing war. Those arriving from Haiti and African countries must be welcomed too. The federal government must do its job and support welcoming efforts so places like Springfield can access resources for integrating new residents.
Springfield’s leaders have been clear that Haitian immigrants have revitalized the city, working and contributing to the community. Once newly arrived people get their bearings, they become friends, neighbors, and leaders who expand cultural life, grow the economy, pay taxes, and work essential jobs. In 2022 (the most recent data available), immigrants in Ohio paid $7.0 billion in taxes, including $2.4 billion in state and local taxes. What the city needs is support to help incorporate this new group of people, including translation services and hospital staffing. These are real but solvable logistical challenges that deserve practical solutions – not the racism, dehumanization, and lies from shameless opportunists like Donald Trump and JD Vance.
It is past time that we turn the page. We as a country must prioritize confronting anti-Blackness in our immigration system and reject the tired Birth of a Nation political playbook of stoking fear using immigrants of color as scapegoats. Our collective future depends on it.Keep ReadingShow Less
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