With that orange haired brute of a president supposedly ushered out of the White House with moralising delight, the Biden administration was all keen to turn over a new leaf.\u00a0 There would be more diplomacy, and still more diplomacy.\u00a0 There would be a more humanitarian approach to refugees and asylum seekers \u2013 forget, he claimed, the Border Wall.\u00a0 Kindness would come over border officials and guards of the imperium.<\/p>\n
Instead, we have had secret diplomacy culminating in the trilateral security pact of AUKUS, one reached unbeknownst to allies in Europe, Asia and the Indo-Pacific.\u00a0 And we have had a particularly ugly spectacle concerning Haitian refugees, with many being bundled into planes to be sent back to their country, having been taken from the burgeoning border camp around a bridge in Del Rio, Texas.<\/p>\n
Having been blooded in the mass evacuation exercise from Afghanistan, the Biden administration was now doing the reverse in an exercise of expulsion, promising the deportation of 14,000 Haitians over a period of three weeks.\u00a0 The jarring contrast was not lost<\/a> on Nicole Melaku, executive director of the National Partnership for New Americans.\u00a0 \u201cWhen you contrast the welcome mat that was rolled out for many Afghan refugees who are deserving \u2013 of course \u2013 of our support and resettlement, with the deplorable treatment of Black migrants on our home soil, it is just an unfathomable contrast.\u201d<\/p>\n At the Rio Grande River, US border agents, crowned by cowboy hats and sporting a thuggish \u00e9lan, left a remarkable impression of ugliness by their free use of reins in pushing migrants back across the river.\u00a0 Many members of their quarry had made the journey to obtain food.\u00a0 \u201cI can\u2019t imagine what context would make that appropriate,\u201d White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki expressed<\/a> with the sort of wonder that is becoming her hallmark style.\u00a0 \u201cBut I don\u2019t have additional details and certainly I don\u2019t think anyone seeing that footage would think it was acceptable or appropriate.\u201d<\/p>\n Political atmosphere and atmospherics is everything, and while Psaki might be puzzled, her colleagues in the Biden administration are happy to maintain a firm line against mischievous incursions.\u00a0 The US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro N. Mayorkas has been firm.\u00a0 \u201cIf you come to the United States illegally,\u201d he declared<\/a> on September 20, \u201cyou will be returned.\u00a0 Your journey will not succeed, and you will be endangering your life and your family\u2019s life.\u201d<\/p>\n Such conduct did not sit well with the May announcement<\/a> by Secretary Mayorkas that Haiti had been designated for Temporary Protection Status (TPS) for 18 months.\u00a0 \u201cHaiti is currently experiencing serious security concerns, social unrest, an increase in human rights abuses, crippling poverty, and lack of basic resources, which are exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic,\u201d Mayorkas stated<\/a> at the time.<\/p>\n Despite that official characterisation, the administration has taken comfort in using Title 42<\/a> of the United States code Section 265, a public health statute freely employed by the Trump administration, to prohibit \u201cthe introduction of persons or property, in whole or in part, from Mexico and Canada\u201d into the US for fears of pandemic spread.\u00a0 The liberal use of the statue has received judicial excoriation, with US District Judge Emmet Sullivan claiming it<\/a> \u201ccollectively deprived\u201d asylum seekers and refugees facing \u201creal threats of violence and persecution\u201d of \u201ccertain statutory procedures\u201d.<\/p>\n Public health officials have also been disconcerted.\u00a0 As Dr Ronald Waldman of the human rights group Doctors of the World remarks<\/a>, \u201cThe prohibition for crossing the border has been applied selectively to asylum seekers\u201d.\u00a0 It certainly has not been applied to students and those doing business.<\/p>\n In a sober assessment<\/a> of Biden\u2019s report card so far, Natasha Lennard of The Intercept<\/em> points out that the Trump administration\u2019s use of the law saw half a million people removed. During the short tenure of the Biden administration, the current number stands at 700,000.\u00a0 Over the course of January, 62,530 migrants were expelled according to the figures<\/a> of Customs and Border Protection. For the month of April, it was 110,846.<\/p>\n In a resounding judgment of Biden\u2019s policy towards Haitians and Haiti in general, Washington\u2019s envoy to the country, Daniel Foote, has resigned.\u00a0 His September 22 letter<\/a> to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was an effort of extrication from \u201cthe United States inhumane, counterproductive decision to deport thousands of Haitian refugees and illegal immigrants to Haiti, a country where American officials are confined to secure compounds because of the danger posed by armed gangs in control of daily life.\u201d<\/p>\n Foote also took a stab at a long standing practice of US foreign policy: that habitual meddling in the affairs of a country that had \u201cconsistently produced catastrophic results\u201d.\u00a0 The de facto, unelected prime minister Ariel Henry had received yet \u201canother public statement of support as interim leader of Haiti\u201d from the US embassy, among others. They had continued touting \u201chis \u2018political agreement\u2019 over another broader, earlier accord shepherded by civil society.\u201d\u00a0 The now resigned envoy, sniping at this policy of backing \u201cwinners\u201d, stated the essential heresy of the imperium: What Haitians needed was \u201cthe opportunity to chart their own course, without international puppeteering and favoured candidates, but with genuine support for the cause.\u201d<\/p>\n In response<\/a> to the resignation, US State Department spokesman Ned Price was a picture of regret and hollow advice. \u201cIt is unfortunate that, instead of participating in a solutions-oriented policy process, Special Envoy Foote has both resigned and mischaracterised the circumstances.\u201d<\/p>\n Psaki was icily dismissive.\u00a0 \u201cSpecial Envoy Foote had ample opportunity to raise concerns about immigration during his tenure.\u00a0 He never once did so.\u201d Such bitchiness is a nice summation of the Biden administration so far: policies that continue to furnish us the acceptable face of Trumpism.<\/p>The post Trumpism with a Biden Face: US Haitian Policy<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.\n This post was originally published on Dissident Voice<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" With that orange haired brute of a president supposedly ushered out of the White House with moralising delight, the Biden administration was all keen to turn over a new leaf.\u00a0 There would be more diplomacy, and still more diplomacy.\u00a0 There would be a more humanitarian approach to refugees and asylum seekers \u2013 forget, he claimed, [\u2026]<\/p>\n The post Trumpism with a Biden Face: US Haitian Policy<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[186,231,3359,49,657,51,1056,238,58],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323759"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=323759"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323759\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":323779,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323759\/revisions\/323779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=323759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=323759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=323759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}