2/28/22

By Sarah Towle

WITNESS RADIO: Episode 11

Listen here: A Tale of Two Presidencies: Proof that #ImmigrationISaBlackIssue

The past two years have brought the world changes never imagined: a global pandemic; the lockdowns and the losses; the border closures and the politics of avoiding illness, even death.

But throughout it all, there is one thing that hasn’t skipped a beat: the US Deportation Machine.

This episode's featured guest is Thomas Cartwright, a member of the leadership team of Witness at the Border. Tom dedicated his time during the past 24 months of the global pandemic to collecting, compiling, and communicating data that the US government would prefer you did not know.

When Trump strong-armed the US Centers for Disease Control into hacking Title 42 of the US public health code to close the southern border to migration, thereby ending Witness's long-term vigil to end Trump & Co's Migrant "Protection" Protocols, aka Remain in Mexico policy, Tom's witness did not stop.

Rather, he took it digital. Sadly and inexplicably, he discovered that little changed under Biden.

On this US Black History Month 2022 installment of Witness Radio, Tom gives us a Tale of Two Presidencies in numbers that reveal the scope of the expulsions of Haitians under Biden as well as the scale of the deportation flights to Africa under his predecessor, proving that, indeed, immigration is a Black issue.

Additional reading:

ICE Air Monthly Flight-Report, Thomas Cartwright, Witness at the Border

How Can You Throw Us Back? Asylum Seekers Abused in the US and Deported to Harm in Cameroon, Human Rights Watch

Amazon Co-owns Deportation Airline Implicated in Alleged Torture of Immigrants, Sam Biddle, The Intercept

Biden has deported nearly as many Haitians in his first year as the last three presidents – combined, Tom Ricker, Quixote Center