By now, we've all heard former president Donald Trump's comments about immigrants "eating the dogs" and other pets during the presidential debate earlier this month. On Wednesday afternoon, Congressman Clay Higgins, who represents Louisiana's 3rd District in the US House of Representatives, posted to X from his official congressional account, "Lol. These Haitians are wild. Eating pets, vudu, nastiest country in the western hemisphere, cults, slapstick, gangsters". The chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus and Democratic Representative of Nevada Steven Horsford, called on the House Committee on Ethics to investigate Higgins' post. Horsford also pushed for the House to censure Higgins over his comments, but the matter cannot be acted on immediately, as the House has finished voting for the month of September. Higgins told CNN he did not regret his comments.
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| Clay Higgins, alongside the tweet he made earlier this week |
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| Clark County, Ohio, where many Hatians have been settling in recent months |
With the increase of attention to this small county after Trump and Higgins' comments, many wonder why Haitian immigrants are in Springfield, Ohio. In short, there are no government programs sending the immigrants to Clark County. Officials and Springfield residents claim that employment opportunities and word of mouth drew an increase of immigrants to the city, but no one knows why so many went to Clark County specifically. According to another CNN article, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine said businesses in the area are grateful to have a growing labor force as Springfield has made a resurgence recently, with many new companies coming in.
Sources:
https://www.axios.com/2024/09/25/clay-higgins-haitians-censure-tweet-house-democrats
https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/25/politics/clay-higgins-deletes-post-haitian-migrants/index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/19/us/springfield-ohio-haitians-immigration-cec/index.html
6 comments:
I believe that it is absolutely outrageous that someone so high up in our government is speaking in such racist terms, with such a disregard for others. He is treating the Haitian immigrants as if they are sub-human, calling them "wild" and "nasty." America has somehow been fighting the same battle against racists for decades and it is horrible to see that it is not getting better. We recently learned about how the founding fathers intended for elected officials in government to be more educated and make better decisions than the populace, however this is clearly not what is happening in our government today, and that needs to change. Someone who is part of making the laws and decisions that effect all of us should not also be someone who clearly is vehemently racist towards everyday people. On top of this, I also think it displays a larger problem, I had not even heard of this incident until reading this post, yet this seems like such a scandalous thing to say, that Higgins should be getting ostracized in the media, yet he isn't, proof that there are enough people in this country who agree with him. Basically, voters need to be more aware of what is going on the country and I think more people need to call Higgins out for what he did, so that men like him cannot continue to be elected into office.
It is shocking that anyone would say something like this but for it to be a political official is the most shocking. He is dehumanizing Haitian immigrants with his comment and does not even feel bad about it in the slightest. He even had to be forced to remove his post but did not feel one bit remorseful about said post. The fact that this was said by a representative in our government is appalling especially with the way he reacted after being called out for his racist post. Everyone should be conscious of what they post but especially political figures because they are supposed to be leaders. I agree with Camille's comment about how I had never heard of this incident until reading this post and this story should be bigger in the media.
It's very gross that in our politics, racist comments such as that made by Higgins are tolerated. I think that it raises a lot of questions on why these very officials are being given the platform to sew this hateful language in the first place. Moreover, by your analysis of his later posts stating he would tweet another outrageous thing and it doesn't matter because of "freedom of speech", is relevant to this conversation. Of course, freedom of speech is viable in most cases; however obviously, purposefully hateful, and racist comments should have SOME form of repercussions beyond just a vague, and not enforced "censorship"---his position should be at stake, just as if he were an employee violating rules of expression within a companies name--- he is grossly misrepresenting the U.S. as an official figure, with his behavior. I think the validity of an official who would believe such untrue statements, and who would further the targeting of the Haitian/Immigrant community at large, should be questioned beyond the current state of speculation in congress and the media. There is too much tolerance for this stuff, and it has been exasperated over the past few weeks
At this point it's unsurprising that more Republicans are jumping on the "bandwagon" created by Vance and Trump as they hope to capitalize on the media focus and publicity from such comments. One of the most outrageous parts about it is that a man of such high power is able to spout racist and targeted hate speech that is borne of lies and conspiracy. Government officials like Higgins, Vance, and Trump are a major reason why the US government is painted as a racist body in the past and recently.
It's shocking that an individual with such a high political status in our country will openly post racist remarks without regret. His comments towards his post, such as "I can put up another controversial post tomorrow if you want me to" and "It’s not a big deal to me" really highlight his immaturity, and I feel that his justification that he can make whatever racist remarks he wises due to freedom of speech is disgusting. Yes, freedom of speech is granted to all U.S. citizens under the First Amendement of the Bill of Rights, however if it were up to myself, I feel some form of consequence should be directed towards those such as Higgins, who abuse their freedom of speech to discriminate against other Americans in a world where we strive to accept all. Until this post, I had not heard of Clay Higgins or this controversial post, causing me to believe that instances like these should be more publicized, as they have to ability to influence public opinion.
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