Episode 18: Fear of Freedom

This is an interview with Rev. Craig B. Mousin, an Adjunct Faculty member of the DePaul University College of Law and the Grace School of Applied Diplomacy. The podcast contends that United States discrimination against Haitians over the last two centuries has created a moral obligation to Haiti and its residents. Most recently, efforts to swiftly deport Haitians, contrary to the Refugee Act’s non-return requirement, reveals how efforts to restrict Haitian asylum-seekers over the last forty years has contributed to the continual denigration of asylum protections under the Refuge Act of 1980.

ACTION STEP: The United Church of Christ offers you a way to promptly inform your representatives that deportations to Haiti must cease at: https://p2a.co/MnT2c4m

A petition to stop Haitian deportations:

https://actionnetwork.org/forms/sign-the-petition-demand-that-the-biden-administration-halt-all-deportations-to-haiti?source=2021EndDeportationstoHaiti_NIJC&referrer=group-national-immigrant-justice-center&eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=daa3e06b-7fb9-41d5-90db-1f488e4d0344&sl_tc=button

For additional information on the history of United States responses to Haiti and Haitian asylum seekers, Azadeh Erfani of the National Immigrant Justice Center’s writes: “President Biden, It is Past Time to Protect Haitian Asylum Seekers, at: https://immigrantjustice.org/staff/blog/president-biden-it-past-time-protect-haitian-asylum-seekers

An American Immigration Council report on Haiti can be found at: Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, “Del Rio Migrant Camp Shows How Biden Administration Is Not Living Up to Its Promises” at:

https://immigrationimpact.com/2021/09/21/haitian-migrant-camp-biden-promises/#.YVSS8S1h1fE
See also, Raymond Joseph, former envoy of Haiti to Washington, “Haiti Cries Out: Where is President Biden, as My Countrymen Swelter Under a Bridge in Texas,” https://www.nysun.com/foreign/haiti-cries-out-where-is-president-biden-as-my/91660/

Former Justice Harry A. Blackmun’s quote from his dissent is at page 208 in Sale v. Haitian Centers Council, 509 U.S. 155, (1993). His other quotes in the podcast are from his law review article, “The Supreme Court and the Law of Nations,” 104 Yale L.J. 39, 44 (1994). (https://www.jstor.org/stable/796983).

Professor Peniel Joseph’s quote can be found at: “This Is the Story of Haiti That Matters Most,” (August 20, 2021) at: https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/20/opinions/haiti-earthquake-flooding-assassination-revolution-joseph/index.html

Professor Annette Gordon-Reed’s quote can be found at: “We Owe Haiti A Debt We Can’t Repay,” (July 21, 2021) at: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/21/opinion/haiti-us-history.html