About 200 Haitian immigrants intercepted along the Florida coast
line will be deported by the government, but the three Cubans who
were with them on the same water craft will not.
It’s not difficult to understand why.
Cubans have a strong political community in South Florida and,
as such, can make a case with politicians for why their brethren
should be allowed political asylum in the United States. Haitians
do not.
But this does not make them less worthy of the same asylum
offered to Cubans who flee and make it to American shores. If
anything, they are much more entitled to asylum on economic factors
alone. Cubans may be politically “oppressed” in the
Cold War-perspective the U.S. government still has of Fidel Castro,
but they are not impoverished. In Haiti, 1 percent of the
population owns 50 percent of the wealth; its people are suffering
from horrible living conditions.
To deny them entrance to the United States but allow Cubans in
just because they come from a communist country is wrong.
Of course, legal lines need to be drawn when it comes to
immigration ““ not everyone in the world is going to be
allowed free access to the United States. But it would not hurt the
government to consider exceptions for extreme cases like this
one.