Asian American Organizations Issue Joint Statement in Support of Haitian and Black Immigrants

By Guest Contributor: GAPIMNY – Empowering Queer & Trans Asian Pacific Islanders

As Asian American organizations and communities, we express our unrelenting solidarity for Haitian and Black immigrants under attack at the Southern Border. We demand the Biden Administration immediately end the mass deportations of Haitian and Black immigrants. As we write this, the Biden Administration is forcibly returning over 10,000 Haitian asylum-seekers fleeing political destabilization, natural disaster, and severe poverty.

As Asian American and immigrant communities, we recognize the many complex drivers of migration. Many of us are here due to war, colonization, imperialism, poverty, and unsafe conditions in our nations of origin. We recognize the U.S. immigration system is rooted in white supremacy, benefits immigrants with wealth and education, and targets low-income immigrants who too often are migrating for survival. This reflection of white supremacy has led to the current humanitarian crisis at the Southern Border, and the deportation of Vietnamese refugees this spring who had lived in the United States for decades. We denounce both actions as racist and classist, and call on all Asian communities to recognize how these actions interconnect Black and Asian liberation.

We recognize the U.S. immigration system is rooted in white supremacy, benefits immigrants with wealth and education, and targets low-income immigrants who too often are migrating for survival.

GAPIMNY

The people of Haiti have endured generations of colonial and white supremacist violence. Following Haiti’s liberation from France, the Haitian government was forced to pay compensatory damages to France for more than 100 years for the economic loss of French plantation slave-owners. France placed economic sanctions on Haiti, severely restricting their ability to participate in the international economy. This historical context underpins the debt, poverty, and political instability of Haiti today. Asian nations colonized by France, England, Spain, and the United States similarly continue to feel the effects of colonial violence today.

Haitian deportations were exacerbated by the Obama Administration’s “metering system” and became worse under the Trump Administration through Title 42. The Biden Administration is now forcibly expelling over 10,000 Haitian asylum seekers under the authority of Title 42. We join those denouncing the Biden Administration’s actions as a violation of international law.

DEMANDS

We fully support the immediate demands of the Black Alliance for Just Immigration and call on the Biden Administration and DHS to:

  • Immediately halt expulsions to Haiti due to the ongoing political, climate, and public health crisis in Haiti
  • Grant humanitarian parole to Black asylum-seekers at the U.S./Mexico border
  • Stop expelling and deporting Haitian and other Black asylum-seekers
  • Revoke Title 42, which prevents asylum-seekers from making their asylum claims
  • End the metering system used to process asylum-seekers at the U.S./Mexico border
  • Honor international law, which under the principle of non-refoulment, forbids a country that is receiving asylum seekers from sending people back to the country they are fleeing where they would face torture, cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment or punishment and other irreparable harm

SIGNED

AAPI Women Lead
AAPIs For Civic Empowerment – Education Fund
Alliance of Filipinos for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (AFIRE Chicago)
Apex Express
API&
APIENC
Asian American Association of New Mexico
Asian American Federation
Asian American Feminist Collective
Asian American Resource Workshop (AARW)
Asians4Abolition
Asian Task Force Oklahoma
API Equality-LA
Baltimore Asian Resistance in Solidarity
The Banh Mi Chronicles Podcast
Blasian March
Can’t Stop! Won’t Stop! Consulting
Disability Visibility Project
East Coast Asian American Student Union (ECAASU)
GAPIMNY – Empowering Queer & Trans Asian Pacific Islanders
GYOPO
Hmong Innovating Politics
Keep Beyond
Militantly Mixed Podcast
Mixedpresent
Monsoon Asians & Pacific Islanders in Solidarity
The National Cambodian Heritage Museum
National Organiztion of API Ending Sexual Violence (NAPIESV)
Nikkei Resisters
Project Include
Q-Wave – Building Queer & Trans API Community Since 2004
Stop DiscriminAsian
Support the Democracy Movement in Burma
Xīn Shēng | 心声 Project

To add your organization as a signatory to this letter, access the sign-up sheet here.

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