For Haitians in North Carolina, Trump’s attacks are just the latest indignity

When Mirlesna Azor-Sterlin heard former president Donald Trump repeat the lie that Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio were eating pets during his debate with Kamala Harris, she was reminded of her job as an educator at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“We teach our students to — when they’re writing papers in class — to really have the facts right, the evidence,” she told The Independent on a Thursday evening in a suburban neighborhood in Durham, North Carolina. She was surprised that Trump and Vance failed to do the same.

The story was repeatedly debunked until Trump’s running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, admitted himself that the story was made up.

“Repeating something just for the sake of repeating it is the tactic there. Without any factual evidence, continuously to repeat it is a choice,” Azor-Sterlin added.

The Trump-Vance campaign, however, has doubled down on the sentiment even after admitting the story was false. Vance repeatedly slammed Haitian migrantsduring a campaign stop in Raleigh this week which drew protesters. Specifically, he claimed that the people currently residing in Springfield, Ohio are not legal immigrants because they gained legal status through either Temporary Protected Status or humanitarian parole during the Biden administration.

“Well, if Kamala Harris waves the wand illegally and says these people are now here legally, I’m still going call them an illegal alien,” Vance said to applause at Union Station in Raleigh. “An illegal action from Kamala Harris does not make an alien legal.”

Many people associate Haitian migrants with coastal states like Florida or, now, Ohio. But Haitians live in numerous states, including potential battleground states. According to the US