Connecting the Local and the Global: Lessons Learned from the Bush Administration's Treatment of a Haitian Tree Shaker, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide

Connecting the Local and the Global: Lessons Learned from the Bush Administration's Treatment of a Haitian Tree Shaker, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney* The following Essay was originallypresented as a speech at a symposium held on March 6, 2004, at the University of California at Berkeley, School of Law (Boalt Hall). Congresswoman McKinney asserts that the alleged involvement of the Bush Administration in the ouster of President JeanBertrandAristide of Haiti on February 6, 2004,1 while following a historical patternofAmerican interventionistpolicy in Haiti, is contraryto true American values and the values of African Americans in particular. McKinney makes a plea for all African Americans to become informed about American foreign policy and hold their leaders accountable in effectuating a more humane foreign policy that is inextricably linked to the well-being of African-American communities right here at home. Nowhere do we see the impotence of black leaders and black people played out before our eyes and those of the world as we now see in the case of 2 Haiti. Few in the black community advocated for the investigation into the * Fourth Congressional District Representative from Georgia. Congresswoman McKinney became Georgia's first African-American congresswoman in 1992. She served in the House of Representatives from 1992 until 2002. During this time, Congresswoman McKinney was a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. Her colleagues in the 103d Congress elected her secretary of the freshman class, and she was the first freshman representative to head the Women's Caucus Task Force on Children, Youth and Families. She participated on the powerful and prestigious Armed Services Committee and was also a key member of the International Relations Committee, serving as Ranking Member on its International Operations and Human Rights Subcommittee. In 2004, Congresswoman McKinney was re-elected to the House of Representatives. 1. For more information on the events surrounding this incident, see infra notes 14-29 and accompanying text. See also Barbara Lee, PreemptingDemocracy: The Bush Administration vs. the World, 7 AFR.-AM. L. & POL'Y REP. 29 (2005). 2. See supra note 1. AFRICAN-AMERICAN LAW & POLICY REPORT [VOL. VII:41 U.S. involvement in the Haitian incident. This apathy is especially disturbing considering the Bush Administration's hostility towards progressive black leaders. In fact, the current administration has used black faces to promote policies that have devastated the black community in the United States and abroad. Black leaders and black people have not always been this impotent-as evidenced by the involvement of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) in response to the 1991 coup d'etat in Haiti. By examining the connection between this history and current domestic problems in black America, we can understand the need to support the Tree Shakers of the black community. In the past, the CBC played an instrumental role in supporting Aristide's popularly elected government in Haiti. You will recall that the United States and Haiti were in this position before, when in September 1991, General Raul Cedras stole power in a coup 3 against the democratically elected priest, JeanBertrand Aristide. In response, the CBC alongside Haitian Americans in York, and elsewhere worked non-stop to restore Father Aristide Florida, New 4 power. to It is important to note that the CBC's involvement in Aristide's reinstallation transpired within the context of the largest expansion of the CBC since Reconstruction.5 The Republican Justice Department had just overseen the forced drawing, by southern legislatures, of districts that would allow rural Blacks to finally elect candidates of their choice. Black voters, with a massive turnout, had voted George W. Bush's father, George H.W. Bush, out of the White House and elected Bill Clinton instead. Thus, the stage was set for a massive shift in U.S. policy toward Haiti, leaving the Republican antipathy for Aristide behind. This shift so infuriated at least one small group in white America that, in the Florida redistricting lawsuit against Congresswoman Corrine Brown's district, Johnson v. Mortham,6 the plaintiffs wrote that the increased strength of and for that reason, the CBC had actually changed U.S. policy toward Haiti, 7 among others, the size of the CBC had grown too large. 3. See PAUL FARMER, THE USES OF HAm 182 (1994). 4. See, e.g., Merle English, Thousands to Rally, NEWSDAY (New York), Sept. 29, 1992, at 7; Mitch Gelman, City's HaitiansHope; Long for a Quick 'Endto the Suffering,' NEWSDAY (New York), Sept. 19, 1994, at A05; William Reed, CongressionalBlack Caucus Presses ForAristide's Return To Haiti, NEW YORK VOICE INC. (Harlem), at http://static.highbeam.com/n/ newyorkvoiceincharlemusa/april 131994/congressionalblackcaucuspressesforaristidesreturnt/ (last visited Mar. 12, 2005). 5. Ronald Smothers, Black Caucus in Congress Gains in Diversity and Experience, N.Y. TIMES, Nov. 10, 1992, at A17. 6. 915 F. Supp. 1529 (N.D. Fla. 1995). See also Johnson v. Smith, No. TCA 94-40025-WS, 1994 WL 907596 (N.D. Fla. July 18, 1994) (holding that a preliminary injunction enjoining Florida's use of a congressional redistricting plan would be disruptive and against public interest). 7. See Kevin Cooper & Kevin Merida, New Suit Galvanizes Black Lawmakers, WASH. 2005] CONNECTING THE LOCAL AND THE GLOBAL The Florida plaintiffs' brief points to the effectiveness of the larger, stronger, younger CBC that entered Washington with an agenda grounded in the needs of black people. The fear described by the writers of the brief also illustrates what is possible when black America has authentic leaders, wellplaced in politics. Eventually, as a result of the strength of black leaders at that time, General Cedras was escorted out of Port-au-Prince, 8 thereby forcing the leaders of Front pour l'Avancement et le Progres Haitien (FRAPH), 9 the CIA-inspired Tontons Macoutes' 0 replacement, to flee to the United States, the Dominican Republic, and other places. With most of his term spent out of office, Aristide triumphantly returned to office on October 15, 1994. Upon the expiration of his term, Aristide left office in 1996, and was succeeded by Rene Preval. Aristide remained out of office until November 2000, when he was re-elected. President Aristide was serving the fourth year of his second term when the 2004 coup d'6tat occurred. There are a number of disturbing facts surrounding this most recent coup d'6tat, particularly the apparent involvement of the United States. At the time of the coup, the Steele Foundation, a private security corporation, was charged with providing presidential security.1 1 The Steele Foundation, headquartered in the Bay Area, is reportedly very close to the Pentagon with its former leader coming directly from the Pentagon's Office of Intelligence. Interestingly, this organization maintains a (...truncated)