12,009: NYTimes.com Article: In Florida, a Limbo for Haitians Only(fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Dan Craig <dgcraig@att.net>


In Florida, a Limbo for Haitians Only
May 13, 2002
By DANA CANEDY with ERIC SCHMITT

MIAMI, May 12 - Hedwiche Jeanty sleeps on a cot next to
strangers, wears the same clothes for up to five days and,
he says, eats food that is often stale off plates that are
never quite clean. Most days, he just sits, worrying about
the future.

Mr. Jeanty's life might not seem surprising for a man from
Haiti, an impoverished country in perpetual political
turmoil. But he is living in those conditions in Miami.

Mr. Jeanty and nearly 300 other Haitians seeking political
asylum in the United States have been held in detention
centers for more than five months, under a Bush
administration directive that does not apply to refugees of
any other nationality.

"I haven't committed any crime in the United States," said
Mr. Jeanty, 22. "I'm feeling humiliated." Speaking by phone
from the Krome detention center, he said he had fled Haiti
last December to escape persecution for denouncing the
government.

The order from the Immigration and Naturalization Service
requires officials here to detain Haitian refugees with
plausible asylum claims. All others are sent back to Haiti.
The order applies only in South Florida and is a departure
from a policy that favors releasing refugees to relatives
or sponsors while they pursue asylum claims in immigration
court.

The agency says the new policy is necessary to deter
thousands of Haitians from taking to sea in rickety rafts
and flooding South Florida, or dying en route.

But the office of the United Nations high commissioner for
refugees says this approach violates international norms of
refugee law. Several civil rights advocates and a growing
group of lawmakers from both parties say the policy is
discriminatory.

A suit filed on March 15 in federal district court here
seeks to force the government to release the detained
Haitians and to stop considering race and nationality when
adjudicating cases. Immigrant rights groups plan to hold a
demonstration in Miami on May 20, when President Bush
visits for Cuban Independence Day.

Representative Carrie P. Meek, a Florida Democrat with one
of the largest Haitian constituencies in the country, says
the new order also shields Gov. Jeb Bush from an influx of
Haitian refugees in an election year. Governor Bush, the
president's brother, has denied any connection between his
office and the new policy, and recently said the order
should be rescinded.

"Haitian refugees should not be treated any different from
refugees of other countries," said Katie Muñiz, a
spokeswoman for Governor Bush. "If the refugees prove to
the I.N.S. that they have a well-founded fear of
persecution, they should not be detained."

The United States has a history of creating immigration
policies that favor one nationality over another. Since
1966, the Cuban Adjustment Act has allowed Cuban immigrants
to apply for permanent residence. The policy was modified
in 1995 after a flood of refugees reached the United States
and now dictates that Cubans picked up at sea be sent back,
and those who make it ashore be allowed to stay. No other
class of refugees receives such a preference.

The new policy took effect on Dec. 14, 11 days after the
Coast Guard rescued 167 Haitians from a boat off Florida.
They were taken to Miami, where they were permitted to
apply for asylum.

At the time, the number of Haitians intercepted at sea was
rising steadily. The Coast Guard picked up 350 last
November alone, compared with 96 in the three previous
months combined.

The influx was fed by rumors spreading in Haiti that the
United States needed workers to help rebuild the World
Trade Center, and that the Coast Guard was no longer
stopping boats from landing in Florida, said Cmdr.
Christopher B. Carter, the chief of the Coast Guard's
migrant interdiction division.

After consulting officials from the White House, the State
and Justice departments and the Coast Guard, the
immigration service's acting deputy commissioner, Peter
Michael Becraft, ordered agents in South Florida to detain
all Haitian refugees, even those arriving at airports.

The order had its intended effect, at least initially. The
Coast Guard picked up no Haitians in January and February,
but 427 in March and April. Most were sent back to Haiti.
Only 11 Haitians have reached Florida this year by boat,
Coast Guard officials said.

Justice Department officials who oversee the immigration
service declined to comment, as did the White House, citing
the lawsuit. But in an affidavit, Mr. Becraft argued that
the new directive was not a formal policy change but merely
an effort to "adjust its parole criteria" that subjected
Haitians to a more restrictive "case-by-case review."

About 270 Haitian men, women and children are being
detained. Officials say that since December, 36 have been
released for humanitarian reasons, including pregnant women
and unaccompanied minors.

The treatment of the refugees has drawn sharp criticism
from the Congressional Black Caucus and the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Two
Republican House members from Miami, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen
and Lincoln Diaz-Balart, also oppose the policy.

Sister Jeanne O'Laughlin, president of Barry University in
Miami Shores, has offered to have the refugees paroled to
the care of the university. "What worries me is that
because they're in a maximum-security jail, they are
treated as criminals when they are not," said Ms.
O'Laughlin, who two years ago intervened in the case of the
young Cuban refugee Elián González.

The strains of detention are wearing heavily on many of the
refugees.

Laurence St. Pierre, 27, is being detained at Turner
Guilford Knight Detention Center, a maximum-security jail
here. In a shaky voice, she said that what troubled her
most, besides the food, the lack of information about her
immigration status and an inadequate supply of things like
shampoo and sanitary napkins, was that no one seemed to
make a distinction between her and the criminals with whom
she is housed.

"Instead of getting better, everything has gotten worse for
us here," Ms. St. Pierre said in Creole, through an
interpreter.

Ms. St. Pierre, who fled for Miami on a boat last December,
said she wavered between being angry and sad about how
Haitian detainees are treated compared with those from
other countries. "I see many women from other countries
arrive here and be released after a few days. I wonder why
Haitian women are not being released?"