Category: Haiti

Rasmussen: 46% of Americans say ‘no’ to more Haitian refugees

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Here is a report from last week (hat tip: Susan) about results of a poll by the Rasmussen group on Haiti.

Authorities are preparing for a potential surge of Haitian refugees to the United States following their country’s horrific earthquake.

Though the surge has yet to materialize, the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that just 31% of Americans believe Haitian refugees should be invited to live here. Forty-six percent (46%) say the refugees should not be invited to live in the United States. Another 22% remain undecided.

They asked many more questions relating to the earthquake crisis, read it all.

Haitian “orphan” ping pong

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update February 3:  No Haitian orphans going to San Antonio, yet, here.

In the wake of the horrible earthquake in Haiti we have reported on efforts of do-gooders to round-up the “orphans” and bring them to the US.   Most notably it was all over the news about  Pennsylvania Democratic Governor Ed Rendell organizing a mission within days of the quake to bring 50-plus orphans to PA.  Also, Catholic Charities was getting in gear for a massive recreation of Operation Pedro Pan.

Now comes a report that cooler heads are prevailing, and agencies such as the International Rescue Committee (I can’t believe I’m agreeing with the IRC and this radical publication!*) are obviously at odds with Catholic Charities.

International Social Services and the International Rescue Committee concur, stating “in general, international adoption should not take place in a situation of war or natural disaster, given that these events make it impossible to verify the personal and family situation of children. Any operation to adopt or to evacuate children that are victims of the earthquake to another country must be absolutely avoided, as was the case during the 2004 tsunami….”

A professor in the Netherlands tells readers to follow the money! 

The Quebec government has followed the advise of these experts, putting a hold on new adoption applications for Haitian children while the U.S. and the Dutch have sent planes to bring children out of Haiti in the midst of the recovery efforts despite Professor Rene Hoksbergen of Utrecht University, the Netherlands, warning that authorities should take great care in dealing with orphans from such a disaster, fearing the hurried evacuation could send a wrong signal.

“You have to be very careful in adopting these children from a country in chaos,” he said. “It might look like when a country is a disaster it is easy to adopt children there.” Worse still is the fear of all NGOs of corrupt baby brokers and opportunistic child traffickers using such disasters to their advantage.

When confused by pro and con statements about adoption, with both sides claiming to have the best interest of children at heart…follow the money.

Adoption agencies, even religious and non-profit rely on the redistribution of children to pay their bills, including salaries. This motivates their “concerns.” They have lobbyists that pressure government into quick “feel good” bills and “rescue” actions that don’t always look so quite so good in hindsight, and by those “rescued” and their families – or snatched – depending on your point of view.

I’ll reiterate my opinion, with all this foreign concern and presumably funds, these agencies should set up first rate orphanages in Haiti and make every effort to reunite Haitian children with their families, a project that might take a couple of years.

*  Read the whole article. I think they have picked a few cases, and possibly overstated them, where “orphans” were hurt by quick action.  But some were surely helped and within those groups they cite I feel sure there are many former “orphans” who are glad they were saved.  Surely, all those little Jewish girls saved from the Nazis did not go into mental institutions.  Still, I concur with the general theme of this article—keep the kids in Haiti until the crisis is over, and try to find their families!

Miami Herald: Maybe as many as 200,000 Haitians illegally in US will apply for TPS

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We told you about the Obama Administration’s decision to grant illegal alien Haitians already in the US before the earthquake Temporary Protected Status here.

Now comes word, oops! that the number is far greater than originally thought. 

The Obama administration is preparing to handle applications from as many as 200,000 undocumented Haitian immigrants who want to live and work legally in the United States under a new immigration program unveiled last week in the aftermath of Haiti’s destructive earthquake.

The federal government will begin accepting Temporary Protected Status (TPS) applications on Thursday, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Alejandro Mayorkas, whose agency will process the paperwork.

Mayorkas was in Miami Wednesday to meet with local immigrant aid groups to South Florida to talk about the daunting task of handling the likely blizzard of applications from Haitians seeking the opportunity to remain in the United States.

[….]　

The TPS designation is reserved for selected undocumented migrants from countries disrupted by natural disasters, armed conflicts or other emergencies.

Those Haitians approved will be allowed to stay in the United States for 18 months and be issued work permits to find jobs.

The Liberian example*:   This 18 months business is a joke.  We granted Liberians TPS years ago and halted it in 2006.  When the deadline approached this year to deport those who had TPS status, heavy lobbying by the likes of Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island (here) and others persuaded the Obama Administration to extend their deadline to be deported, here.   What do you think the chances are that once established in jobs, buying homes and sending kids to school they will ever be returned to Liberia (or Haiti)?

What a surprise, earlier in the week immigrant advocacy groups had the number of Haitians in the US wrong.

Local immigrant advocacy groups say that between 34,000 and 68,000 potential TPS applicants may be in South Florida and almost 100,000 statewide. They had earlier pegged the number of Haitians eligible for TPS at 30,000 nationwide.

So, let’s see!  We are going to give TPS status to 200,000 Haitians so they can compete with Americans for scarce jobs then send a large portion of the money they make back to Haiti.  And, if they don’t find jobs, will they send their welfare checks back to Haiti?

By obtaining work permits with the possibility of getting a job, tens of thousands of undocumented Haitian immigrants in the United States are likely to send tens of millions of dollars to homeland relatives.

The latest estimate shows that Haitian immigrants in the United States send more than $1 billion in remittances to Haiti, according to the Inter-American Development Bank, which closely tracks remittances to the region.

The money sent from Haitians living in the United States and other foreign countries represents more than one-third of Haiti’s gross national product.

There is a fee schedule for TPS applications, but no surprise the feds are considering waiving it.

* Update:  A reader sent me this good article by Roy Beck at NumbersUSA from last March about the Obama extension of TPS for Liberians.

Dominican Priest: We can’t handle 100,000 Haitian refugees

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I was hoping to write about something other than Haiti this morning, but it seems there is no escaping the Haitian refugee issue—it is everywhere in every alert on refugees.   This is a short article that says that the International Organization for Migration (IOM), by the way largely funded by US taxpayers, wants to set up a refugee camp in the Dominican Republic.   A priest implied it would drag down the Dominican Republic and commenters mostly blasted him.

One commenter (one of those leftist faux humanitarians) wants to poke his eyes out for giving a rational suggestion.   Don’t you just love it when those people who demand everyone be kind and generous are the meanest SOB’s themselves.   But, I digress, here is the article from Dominican Today about the Priest and what he said:

SANTO DOMINGO. – The charity organization Dominican Border Solidarity, characterized for the defense of human rights of Haitians immigrants in the Dominican Republic, opposes the International Organization for Migrations’ (OIM)[IOM] alleged attempt to build in this country a refugee camp to house 100,000 victims of Haiti’s quake.

The Jesuit priest Regino Martinez, Solidarity coordinator, said there are enough places in Haiti to shelter people in the camp which the IMO [IOM] proposes.

He said the Dominican Government has supported the Haitian people with solidarity after the catastrophe and the help for Haitians to respond to their calamity, but in their own country, is the effort which should prevail for now.

All of the commenters however did not criticize the Dominican.   A commenter named NegroDeLaBachata from Stuttgart, Germany had a whole series of good suggestions and comments, including this one:

As far as camps go, set them up in Haiti. There’s sufficient room for this. Haiti has 10 states, nearly 11,000 sq. miles. There’s plenty of room to set up tent cities where the international community can care for the survivors of the quake, evacuate the capital if deemed necessary, and organize the rebuilding of the Haitian capital. There is absolutely no reason that Haitians need to evacuate Haiti.

Makes sense to me!

Dengue fever on the rise

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Let me be clear, by posting this story I am not saying anything about refugees bringing Dengue fever.  I simply thought the article was interesting to note and want to keep it in our files (our health issues category).  It does however affect Haiti and those traveling to and from the earthquake devastated country.

From Sphere:

Last year, the H1N1 outbreak killed at least 12,500 people worldwide, and billions of dollars were spent on vaccine development and the rush to stymie the virus’ spread. At the same time, another global health crisis was expanding with staggering speed but much less attention.

Dengue fever, a mosquito-borne illness once contained to Central America and Southeast Asia, now threatens 2.5 billion people in more than 100 countries. The affected areas include wide swaths of the United State and Haiti, where the illness was already endemic before last week’s earthquake.

“The bottom line is that this is a neglected disease,” said Dr. Raman Velayudhan, a dengue specialist with the World Health Organization. “No attention means very little donation money, so countries are fending for themselves.”

Dengue (pronounced “DENG-ee”) was identified and named in the late 18th century. The first modern pandemic was reported in Southeast Asia during the 1950s. Since then, outbreaks have become common in tropical regions. About 40 million cases are diagnosed each year, with 22,000 deaths.

Read it all.