This Wednesday, at one minute after midnight, 348,000 Haitian immigrants will be at risk of being thrown into the jaws of hell. That is when the U.S. will officially end Temporary Protected Status for these immigrants, giving the U.S. legal cover to send them back to a country that has been transformed into a living hell… a hell ultimately “Made in USA.”^1 2I

The accompanying box provides links to some of the many articles we have run that explain how Haiti became so decimated and how the whole system of U.S. imperialism is responsible. This has gone through many phases of coup d’etats, puppets, U.S. invasion and occupation, and all the rest. The most essential fact about Haiti today is that, as a result of these centuries of naked plunder, there is no effective government there that is even “keeping the peace.” The country is run by gangs, who are estimated to control over 90 percent of the capital. These gangs prey on the masses of people, especially women, carrying out sex trafficking and extortion. Note: the State Department of the same administration that is so intent on shipping these Haitians back maintains a “Do Not Travel” designation for Haiti. 

The nearly 350,000 Haitians who have been working in the U.S.—in the health care industry, in the jobs that native-born citizens won’t take, in the factories that pay little—and who now have extensive ties here… they will all become “fresh meat.” 

There has always been a special contempt for Haiti on the part of the U.S. ruling class. This dates from when Haitians “had the nerve” to not just launch but to win the only successful slave revolt in history against the most powerful European nations of the day, in a war that took more than 12 years to win. The U.S. slaveholders—and the whole of the U.S. ruling class of the day, for slavery was the very heart of American wealth—feared the “contagion” of this struggle spreading to the enslaved Black masses in the U.S. So the U.S., along with the European powers, did everything they could to isolate Haiti. As time went by the U.S. found other means to carry forward this oppression.

Today’s MAGA fascists outdo their ancestors. During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump and Vance knowingly slandered Haitians for supposedly eating the pets of the communities they were living in. They knew this was a lie, and still they persisted, for they wanted to dehumanize the Haitians in the eyes of citizens. The MAGA fascist government has now made a particular point of forcing Haitians to wear ankle bracelets in the period before TPS expires. Ankle bracelets! WTF!! Do you think this is somehow not intended to conjure up the leg irons put on slaves back when these Trumpers claim that America was “great?” 

Then there are all the people who thought that by voting for Mamdani, New York could become a safe haven for immigrants. Voting for Mamdani was the no-cost way to resist fascism—to “Trump-proof” New York, according to Mamdani himself. In fact, Mamdani ordered the city to withdraw the valid work authorizations for Haitians affected by the order. He offered some city services, but this was effectively a big shrug-off. If you are one of those people who supported Mamdani as some kind of answer, it is time and past time to draw the appropriate lessons about believing the promises and posturing of even the most “radical” representatives of this system. And it is also time to actively struggle against this horror that is going down and that “voting for a socialist” could not and did not prevent.

The history of Haiti holds many lessons. Two are the most important. The first is that unless and until the system of capitalism-imperialism is overthrown, the masses of oppressed will be put through different versions of hell, each one more grotesque than the last. The second one, as we said earlier, goes all the way back to over two centuries ago, at a time when those who ruled Haiti were locked in struggle with each other over who would control the world’s most lucrative slave colony. In the breach created by that struggle among the slaveholders, a revolutionary force and leadership emerged among the slaves that was able to break through and lead the only successful slave revolution in history. 

Today those who rule over us are also sharply split, and battling among themselves. But now there is a different revolution on humanity’s agenda—one that the slaves of that time could only dream of—a revolution to break all the chains of exploitation and oppression and get to a whole new era of human society. And there is the leadership for that revolution in Bob Avakian, who has brought forward the science and the strategy for that revolution, and beyond that for a radically new society on the road to real and full human emancipation.

At a time of increasing barbarity and erupting crisis, this is where our sights must be set and where our actions and efforts must lead.