Around this time 10 years ago, when Florida was still seen as a competitive battleground state, Donald Trump campaigned in Miami and spent some time at the Little Haiti Cultural Center, stressing the “common values” he shared with Haitian Americans.

“Whether you vote for me or not,” the candidate said, “I really want to be your biggest champion.”

In Trump’s first term, he left little doubt that he hadn’t meant a word of it. And in his second term, he has made matters vastly worse, ending humanitarian safeguards under the temporary protected status program, subjecting Haitians — many of whom have been working legally in the United States, paying taxes and contributing to their communities — to immediate deportation.

As recently as August, Trump’s Department of Homeland Security published an item to social media, bragging about the termination of TPS for Haitians via a 50-second video that purportedly showed Haitians being forced onto a deportation plane while literally in chains, for unexplained reasons.

As this week got underway, the president headlined a campaign rally in Ohio, where Haitians were once again on his mind.

Referring to the Ohio city of Springfield, Trump said “they dropped” about 35,000 Haitians into the community — but, thanks to him, they’re “being taken out,” helping restore Springfield as a city with “no problems.”

He added, “They dropped 35,000 people in from Haiti, and it didn’t work out too well. Remember during the debate, I said some of the things they were doing? I was right. It turned out I was right. I won’t get into the exact — remember that? I was right.”

No, he wasn’t.

In September 2024, Trump stood on a debate stage and told a bizarre lie about Haitians living in Springfield.

“In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs,” he said before a national television audience despite reality. “The people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”

Predictably, there were dangerous consequences — bomb threats, closed buildings, canceled events, terrified residents, death threats, etc. — both for the immigrants and the broader community. State and local officials from his own party urged Trump to stop lying. He declined.

More than four years later, Trump isn’t just returning to the slander, he’s seemingly building on it, exaggerating the number of Haitian immigrants (there weren’t 35,000), pointing to a resettlement effort that didn’t exist (“they” didn’t “drop” these people into the community) and apparently saying he was right about the consumption of household pets, which is just as false now as it was four years ago.

But stepping back, there’s a related question hanging overhead: With three weeks remaining in the midterm elections cycle, is this really the closing message Trump wants to take to voters? With ample evidence showing an electorate focused on the economy and the cost of living, does the president seriously expect to give Republicans a boost by emphasizing stale, racist nonsense?

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

The post Despite reality, Trump appears to suggest he was ‘right’ about Haitians eating household pets appeared first on MS NOW.

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