Dear Progressive Reader,

On Tuesday, October 1, many across the country will be tuned to radios and television sets for the first and only vice-presidential-candidates debate in this election season. Republican Ohio Senator J.D. Vance and Democratic Minnesota Governor Tim Walz will face off at 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time in a debate hosted by CBS News. Because this year’s presidential race remains so close, NPR notes in it’s recent history of the past half century of televised VP match-ups, “That makes this October 1 match in New York seem far more important than the VP’s usual 'undercard' status: In boxing terms, it could be the main event of the campaign’s final month.”

Without a doubt, one item that will get some discussion is the lie, propagated by both Vance and Donald Trump, about the mass devouring of pets by immigrants living in Springfield, Ohio. Not only has this lie been challenged by Republicans and Democrats, with Ohio Governor Mike DeWine calling it a “hoax,” but even Vance himself appears to confess that it was “made up.” In a September 16 interview on “State of the Union,” Vance told host Dana Bash “If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I am going to do.” Well, J.D. Vance never claimed that he was a Boy Scout (but then, as I wrote in 2017, neither was Trump).

The targeting of Haitians in particular has a long history. As Forbes reported last week, rumors of immigrants eating pets goes back at least to the 1980s, but the vilification of Haitian immigrants in the United States has been much more insidious. As Jeff Abbott writes this week, “During the late 1980s and early 1990s during the AIDS crisis, Haitians were listed in the United States as part of the ‘four H’s,’ of origins of HIV/AIDS, along with ‘Homosexuals, Hemophiliacs, and Heroin users.’ ” Abbott continues, “While the narrative was disproven, it wouldn’t ever be removed from the Republican wheelhouse. These types of narratives seek to paint immigrant communities as a threat, as outsiders, and as those who seek to undermine the social order.” It is a part of what Bill Lueders calls in his op-ed on the situation in Springfield, “a bleak landscape of anger and ill will where politicians and their followers shamelessly exploit every opportunity to sow fear and division.”

Educator Jesse Hagopian explains some of the longer history of these attacks, “Widespread ignorance surrounding Haiti’s revolutionary history is one of the most glaring examples of knowledge suppression in the United States.” “For decades,” he notes, “the United States refused to recognize Haiti’s independence, deliberately isolating the country economically and politically. The United States and other Western powers were terrified of Haiti’s revolution, fearing it would inspire enslaved people throughout the Americas to demand freedom.” As C.L.R. James wrote in his classic 1938 history of the Haitian revolution, The Black Jacobins: “The revolt is the only successful slave revolt in history, and the odds it had to overcome is evidence of the magnitude of the interests that were involved.” A 2008 collection of the letters and speeches of Haitian revolutionary leader Toussaint L’Ouverture points out, “His formulation of the relation between liberty and equality is radical and uncompromising: liberty and equality are inseparable.” As Hagopian concludes, “Toussaint L’Ouverture, the leader of the Haitian Revolution, spoke these words in 1802 after being abducted by the French, which resonate with today’s attacks on Haitian immigrants and the growing resistance: ‘You have cut only the trunk of the tree of liberty. It will spring up again for its roots are numerous and deep!’ ”

Elsewhere on our website this week, Mike Ervin looks at the continued stigmatization of mental health care; Glenn Daigon wonders if 2024 will be the biggest year ever for ranked-choice voting; Arvind Diliwar examines Chase Bank’s investments in Elbit Systems, a weapons manufacturer in Israel; and Jake Whitney interviews a former Trump supporter who is now co-chair of “Republicans for Harris” in Florida. Plus Ed Rampell reviews the new biopic about World War II photojournalist Lee Miller; Eleanor Bader reviews a new book titled Abolish Rent; and longtime peace activist Ted Glick pens an op-ed that looks at the differences between potential Trump and Harris Administrations on the future of Palestinian rights and self-determination.

Please keep reading, and we will keep bringing you important articles on these and other issues of our time.

Sincerely,

Norman Stockwell
Publisher

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