For decades, politicians of both parties have bemoaned the U.S. immigration system, which virtually everyone says is broken. Attempts at comprehensive reform have failed, and public outrage and partisan rancor have reached fresh heights in the past two years as cities and towns struggle to accept immigrants.
Amid high emotions, Republican-run states bused newcomers to Democratic-run cities. The presidential election has now turned the spotlight on a city whose newest residents are in the country legally.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and his running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, have jumped on debunked rumors that Haitian migrants are eating their pets in Springfield, Ohio.
The bottom line is that immigrants come and stay in this country through a variety of methods and programs that are not easily captured or acknowledged in political rhetoric. But the fearmongering about immigration is almost as elderly as the country itself.
Many ways to come to the USA
The roughly 15,000 Haitians who live in Springfield are in the U.S. legally. Most of them have momentary protected status that allows them to stay and work. Trump and Vance have failed to make that distinction, which many critics see as part of Trump’s long history of targeting black people. Last weekend, the Republican presidential candidate said at a rally in Las Vegas that the city had been “taken over by illegal immigrants.”
Trump would not be able to legally deport Haitians with protected status.
His supporters, such as Vivek Ramaswamy, have falsely claimed that the federal government transported Haitians to Springfield’s doorstep. In reality, legal migrants or asylum seekers must pay for their own transportation. The Haitian population there grew largely because of migrants going where they could find family, shelter and work.
The benefits of immigration
Historically, immigrants or people with momentary protected status have come to the United States to work. They often take jobs that Americans refuse to do, filling a labor shortage as older generations retire and fewer children are born. And the cultural, economic and religious identity of many American cities has been shaped by immigrants.
“Most Americans are immigrants at heart, and so it’s always kind of crazy when that’s questioned and the idea arises that immigration is not a strength,” said Oklahoma City Republican Mayor David Holt.
One in five Oklahoma City residents is Latino, Holt said, and the restaurants and petite businesses they run have become a staple in the city of about 700,000. Thousands of Vietnamese immigrants flocked to the city in the 1970s and 1980s, and today their community a few miles west of the state capital is known for its bustling markets and numerous restaurants.
“Their culture and their food have become an integral part of what makes Oklahoma City unique,” Holt said.
Following the evacuation of Afghanistan in 2021, Holt welcomed more than 2,000 Afghan refugees into the city. One of them, Feroz Bashari, swore Holt in for his second term as mayor.
Bashari was the spokesman for the Afghan government before the US withdrawal. When the government was overthrown, he fled with his family.
“A friend of mine who was here before me told me it was a nice place to live and raise children,” Bashari said. “It’s a conservative place, they believe in God, they are very religious. They have almost the same religious culture as us.”
Immigrants can revitalize sparsely populated neighborhoods and run-down streets by opening businesses and paying taxes. Miami’s Little Havana, San Francisco’s Chinatown, or Chicago’s Polish Triangle are popular tourist attractions. But immigrants also change the fabric and culture of a city and country in ways that longtime residents find tough to cope with.
The complications of immigration
A census conducted between July 2022 and July 2023 found that Ohio’s foreign-born population included 5,442 people from Haiti. In comparison, Florida and New York had populations of over 370,000 and 119,000 Haitian-born residents, respectively.
Springfield authorities now estimate the number at 15,000 to 20,000. They say the scale of the influx, combined with the language barrier, has led to delays in accessing medical care, social services and using everyday government services such as obtaining a driver’s license. The number of traffic accidents resulting in death or injury has also increased, as has pressure on the housing stock.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine has close ties to Haiti. He has been there with his wife more than 20 times to support a tuition-free school named after their behind schedule daughter. DeWine, who was born in Springfield and has lived in the area his entire life, said the Haitians who have landed in the city are hardworking people and have helped fill labor shortages in factories and warehouses.
But he said the sudden influx of Haitians into a city of 58,000 has also strained the city’s resources. Some of those frustrations were expressed at a Springfield City Commission meeting last week.
One school bus driver said he and other bus drivers are forced to make evasive maneuvers every day to “avoid people who can’t drive.” One man told of a friend who was kicked out of his apartment by his landlord, who then tripled the rent. Other residents complained of overcrowded schools and an enhance in homelessness among longtime residents.
“I think there should be an ‘occupied’ sign here now,” said one man.
DeWine said at a press conference this week: “Yes, we face challenges.”
“But we will face these challenges,” he said. “Maybe we won’t overcome them overnight, but we will work on these challenges and problems.”
Earlier this month, DeWine announced that the city would receive $2.5 million for health care over the next two years.
Long fear of immigration
Trump claimed that immigrants caused the skyrocketing crime rates in cities like Springfield and Aurora, Colorado, although authorities in both cities have refuted that claim. Many studies show that crime is lower among immigrants than among natives.
Nearly 200 years before Trump and Vance stoked unfounded fears that Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, were kidnapping and eating dogs and cats, Chinese workers in California faced similar demonization. Many Chinese emigrated from the West in the 1850s—first to dig for gold and then to build the transcontinental railroad. Propaganda of the era stoked fears that the Chinese were a “yellow peril” who smoked opium and ate strange foods. This sentiment prompted Congress to pass the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the first law to restrict immigration based on ethnicity.
In 1924, the United States passed a comprehensive immigration law with a quota system based on country of origin. Immigrants from northern and western Europe were given a mighty preference. The intention was to limit the number of immigrants from Asia, as well as Jews and other refugees from Europe.
A fundamental change came in 1965 with the Hart-Celler Immigration Act, which abolished quotas and was designed to aid immigrants bring family members to the United States. This practice is known as chain migration and first benefited Europeans, but now it helps people from Asia and Latin America.
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This story has been updated to remove an incorrect reference that the Ramaswamy town hall meeting was sponsored by the Trump campaign.
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Graham Lee Brewer in Oklahoma City and Terry Tang in Phoenix are AP race and ethnicity writers. Associated Press writers Mike Schneider in Orlando, Florida, and Michael Rubinkam in northeast Pennsylvania contributed to this report.
