The MacNeil/Lehrer Report; Interned Haitians

ROBERT MacNEIL: Good evening. Today a federal judge in Miami heard final arguments in a case aimed at freeing all the Haitians now held in detention in this country. Some 2,000 Haitians are under detention, and they claim the United States government is treating them more harshly than any other refugee group. Many of those detained have been in the United States for as long as 10 months. They say that detention has become indefinite imprisonment and that they're denied ordinary recourse to the laws of the country. The federal government on the other hand says the Haitians are illegal immigrants and will be detained until they agree to return to their own country. Tonight we look at life in one of the main Haitian detention camps, and examine what to do about the refugees held there. Jim?

JIM LEHRER: Robin, Haitians began leaving their country in large numbers 10 years ago, most coming to the United States, some to escape poverty in the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere where the annual median income is $200, the illiteracy rate 80%. But many sought political refugee status claiming their escape was from the repression of the Haitian government under Jean Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier. The U.S. government rejects the political claim, saying the Haitians are economic refugees. As a result, Haitians who enter illegally are either deported or have their status tied up in law suits and other legal proceedings. Nobody paid much attention to the Haitians until two years ago when the number coming here stepped up dramatically -- 1,000 to 1,200 a month according to the Coast Guard then -- and there was tragedy. Many Haitians died at sea in a series of shipwrecks off the Florida coast, their bodies washing up later on beaches. Last October the Reagan administration set out to stop the Haitian influx. Coast Guard cutters began intercepting the Haitian refugee boats and forcing their return to Haiti. Also, those who did slip in were put in federal detention centers pending resolution of their legal status. Two thousand Haitians are now being held at 14 different facilities around the country. The second largest of those is in Florida where reporter June Cross went with independent producer Phil Garvin two weeks ago.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: In South Florida the detention center for illegal immigrants is set 25 miles west of Miami on the edge of the Everglades. This desolate area was once the site of a missile base that has been converted to a prison, commonly called Krome after its location on Krome Avenue. Although there are some Cubans and other nationalities here, the vast majority are Haitians. More significantly, many of the 600 Haitian inmates have been here over eight months while non-Haitians tend to be released or deported after a brief stay. The secure compound consists of a large building with rows of bunks upstairs and open space with chairs on the lower level. The federal government has spent $900,000 making improvements. These open pavilions which shelter the inmates are part of that. With three meals a day, the Haitians are well-fed, but they claim the water they drink is murky and that many have become ill from drinking it. But for the inmates of Krome the overriding problem is that they're in jail, can't get out, and have no immediate prospects for freedom. Although they had anticipated the possibility of brief detention, longer-term imprisonment has deeply affected them.

1st REFUGEE [through translator]: We came here seeking our freedom from the regime in Haiti and we never envisioned the situation we are in here because we are not criminals, we're not mean and we're not thieves. And the days that we are here are multiplying into months and maybe years, and we don't know why.

2nd REFUGEE [through translator]: It is not a good thing to be here because all the Haitians will go crazy. There are some that have been here for nine months, nearly a year, and the immigration authorities won't tell us anything, nothing about when we might get out.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: More than anything the Haitians want to know what's going to happen to them. This uncertainty causes stress and discouragement. Many say that if they knew they would get out after a year and be free in the United States, they could cope with being imprisoned for awhile.

3rd REFUGEE [through translator]: I've developed a mental problem. Frankly, if I stay here any longer I will become crazy.Really. When I was in Haiti I had never been confined to a concentration camp. That's why I'm becoming more or less alienated here. Sometimes I feel excited or nervous. I think I will hit one of my companions or friends. It gives me a pain in the head. At night I can't sleep.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: He explained that he had never felt these violent moods prior to being incarcerated here. Some of the imprisoned Haitians with psychological problems have been seen by a crisis unit of Miami's New Horizons Mental Health Center whose director is Dr. Claude Charles.

Dr. CLAUDE CHARLES, mental health center director: We do think that those people are suffering from what we call confinement syndrome. And the confinement syndrome is all the problems related to one fact, a basic fact. When you are putting people in jail, if it's a criminal or somebody who committed a felony, that person knows why he is in jail or why she is in jail. If you want to work with such an individual there is a basis, there is a common ground where you can interact and move from there because the person knows he is paying for something he has done against the law or against society. But those Haitian people who have been coming here in search of better opportunity because they have learned that America was a country of opportunity and America was a land extending a welcome to everybody suffering -- "all the masses yearning to be free" -- and those people are put in that concentration camp. They don't know why, so therefore those people are broken down, and all their problems will be related to that perception of the fact they are subjected to some abuses, to some violations, and they are being rejected and they have been discriminated against, and therefore you have the cycle of problems.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: For those who haven't actually developed mental health problems, there is the problem of extreme boredom. Although a small percentage get a dollar a day for work around the compound, for most there are very few activity programs. And there is no interest in the games that have been set up. There are English classes offered, but they are sparsely attended because the Haitians don't know if they will ever get a chance to use the new language. This refugee, however, knows enough English to have understood a camp official during a recent incident.

2nd REFUGEE [through translator]: They don't think of us like human beings here. I remember one time someone from the immigration office came into the barracks and said to the interpreter that he wanted to talk with the Haitians, and that all the Haitians who were upstairs should come down. And then he told the interpreter, "Tell the shit to sit on the floor."

MacNEIL [voice-over]: In Miami's Little Haiti, where thousands of Haitians have settled in the last 10 years, there's increasing concern over the plight of relatives and friends in the detention camp. A vital link between the camp and the community in Miami is the Sunday radio program called Radio Soleil, Radio of the Sun. Besides music and general information, Radio Soleil broadcasts messages from the camp. Often a new arrival in the camp would want relatives to know he's in the United States, but he may not know how to reach them directly. In this case he can write a letter to Radio Soleil and announcers will read it over the air. Tuned-in relatives can then contact him in the camp. For Krome inmates Radio Soleil provides information about life in Little Haiti and examines the politics which are keeping the Haitians in the camp for so long. No other immigrant ethnic group has had to sustain such indefinite imprisonment.

2nd REFUGEE [through translator]: I understand they must control the number of immigrants per year here. That's okay. But we've already been in jail for nine months. They must tell us that for the amount of time we've been in prison that we are done. They must make a decision.

4th REFUGEE [through translator]: In my opinion, if they don't want us they should send us back right away. They shouldn't punish us like that. This place is punishment. Me, I'm here for eight months so far. It's hard. I left my kids, my mother and my father in Haiti.

2nd REFUGEE [through translator]: It makes me sick when my lawyer tells me that the immigration authorities are working to try to have me sent back to my country after having kept me in prison for nine months.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: If the refugees are not deported and are instead free to join others in Little Haiti, they will face some of the most severe unemployment of any place in the country. A Haitian social service agency, known as HACAD, tries to help. Roger Biamby is its director.

ROGER BIAMBY, HACAD director: The unemployment rate in the Haitian refugee population is in excess of 80%. It's extremely difficult to place Haitians into jobs. There are many problems confronting them. First and foremost is the language barrier. Many employers are willing to hire Haitians, but because of their lack of language skills that has been an impediment.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: But the Haitian community is prepared to help its own. The owner of a local grocery store, Henri Calla, is one of those who is ready to provide support for the refugees.

HENRI CALLA [through translator]: Even if the government does not support the new refugees, we are prepared to take care of them ourselves rather than let them live in the inhumane conditions of the camp.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: And many of the Krome inmates have relatives in Miami who are prepared to take them into their households. One of these is Martine Sansarik, a seamstress whose brother is in the camp.

MARTINE SANSARIK [through translator]: If my brother were here with me I would be able to take care of him. When I realized that he was at Krome going through all kinds of hardship, and knowing that I'm here in Miami and living in a house where he could be living with me, where we could eat together, I think it is awful that they keep him there.

Dr. CHARLES: Those in the camp, what is perceived now as an accident or some mistreatment is in fact a treatment. It has been carefully premeditated and planned to destroy the morale of those people, to bring them to the point that they cannot cope anymore, and at that particular moment they will give up. The treatment was to discourage those people first in order to force them to sign for voluntary return in Haiti, and also, that type of treatment will bounce back as rumor in Haiti and discourage also the potential candidates toward migration. So when those people in Haiti who are potential candidates to come to America will learn what is the treatment done to those who arrive in those conditions, they will think twice, and maybe they will decide not to take the risk or to take the trip.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: The Immigration and Naturalization Service says that the flow of Haitian immigrants into the United States has been almost completely halted, but Haitians themselves say this is not the case. While few are being caught and sent to the Krome camp, an unknown number come by air or sea and avoid capture. This young woman arrived here in early April and lives illegally in Miami. She agreed to speak with us so long as we concealed her identity.

5th REFUGEE [through translator]: It's true. I know I violated the law, but I had to do it. I just couldn't live in Haiti anymore. The way I got a visa -- a false, a forged visa -- was that my fiance got it for me. He paid for it. You understand? You have to pay $1,500 to $2,000 to get visas. To get this money there are some people who sell their homes for $1,500 or $2,000 just to pay for the trip.

Dr. CHARLES: For the past two years and up to now there was a saying in Haiti, and the people were saying that everything is better than staying and continuing living under the Duvalier dictatorship in Haiti. And by everything they were including the fact that they knew that if they are arrived in America they would be put in jail.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: In Haiti, the young woman told us, people believe that the camp is like a boarding house where you can get three meals a day. She knows now that it's really a jail, but the camp was not a serious deterrent before she left. Now she has a new problem. How can she get a job without residency papers and a work permit?

5th REFUGEE [through translator]: Well, I've been looking into that, trying to find out how I can get papers. I've been told that I can get them if I pay for them.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: Meanwhile, Miami's Haitian community, increasingly supported by blacks, Cubans and others, is becoming restless over the continued imprisonment at Krome. At the Haitian Refugee Center, director Father Jean Juste held a press conference.

JEAN JUSTE: It is very dangerous. The Haitian community cannot take it anymore. Haitians are getting crazy. Last night there was a Haitian at the Krome camp, himself he lost his mind, stripped off his clothes, and they took him away. And there other Haitians were losing their mind, in Puerto Rico and all over. In Miami, Florida, at the New Horizon Crisis Center, there are more Haitians who are turning crazy. How long can we take these things? We need the church leaders; we need the organization -- international, national and all over -- to stand up and make President Reagan understand that this assassination of innocent people cannot take place anymore.

MacNEIL [voice-over]: At Krome camp, both the men and women periodically stage hunger strikes. During our filming the women had been on hunger strike for eight days. For this reason we were unable to film inside the women's compound. There are only about 50 women in Krome now, and even if their husbands are also in the camp, they are segregated. When they try to talk through the fence, guards break them up.

On Sunday, April 25th, supporters staged a rally outside the gates of Krome camp. The protestors have vowed to keep the heat on the Reagan administration until its policy of detaining Haitians who enter the country illegally is reversed. Will camps like Krome eventually deter further Haitian immigration? Is there anything that can discourage these refugees? Perhaps the words of the recently arrived young Haitian woman tell it best.

5th REFUGEE [through translator]: They will always take the risk. You see, for the Haitian in Haiti, the United States is the paradise, the promised land, the place where they will find enough to eat, a place to get a good job. For all this they must come. One cannot stop them.

LEHRER: For answers to the Haitians' questions and complaints, we have the number-three man at the Justice Department, Associate Attormey General Rudolph Giuliani. And Mr. Giuliani is very much involved in Reagan administration policy on immigration generally, the Haitians particularly. Mr. Giuliani, why are these people being held for so long in these camps?

RUDOLPH GIULIANI: These people are being held because all of them have come into this country without a clear right to be here. The Immigration and Nationality Act provides -- mandates that if someone comes into this country without documents, in presumably illegal fashion, they should be detained until they demonstrate a right to be here, and that's for a very, very good reason. If you just permit people to come into this country and parole them, and they don't have a clear right to be here, nine out of 10 of them will never show up for a hearing. So what we essentially have inherited from the prior administration and from years of neglect is a situation where those on the outside of this country determine who does and does not come in. And you create a situation that is easily exploited.It was exploited two years ago by Fidel Castro when he emptied his jails in Miami. It's exploited by sea captains in Haiti who take money from these people and smuggle them in, and were doing it before the changes in policies that we affected where we've cut it down substantially. And you create a situation where we virtually have no control over our borders. And it's not just Haitians. The tape that you showed focuses solely on Haitians. It has a number of conclusions in it that just aren't so. They're not refugees. Whether you are or are not a refugee is something that determines --

LEHRER: Well, not legally. They say they're refugees.

Mr. GIULIANI: They say they're refugees. The report to the State Department under two administrations -- the papal nuncio in Haiti, who I met with four weeks ago, who was a critic of the regime in Haiti, and many others, many other reports, including the State Department's follow-up on the people who were returned there, say that in large part their claim of fleeing political persecution is not a correct one.

LEHRER: But my question was, why are these people being held so long, not why they're being held. We understand why they're being held. But why so long? Nine, 10 months, maybe a year, no resolution of their case, no parole, and the indication seems to be that they are treated differently -- Haitian refugees are treated differently than other refugees.

Mr. GIULIANI: That is not so at all. We hold in detention in any given year -- the year 1981, 260,000 people. You just showed a number of 2,000. That's a very, very small number. The vast majority -- the overwhelming majority of people held in detention are not Haitian. They are of other nationalities.They have brought legal challenges to the proceedings. Any one of those persons that is in detention is not in jail because any one of them can easily leave and go back to Haiti. They are not being held in the sense that someone would be held in a jail or in prison. The question is, do they have a legal right to be in this country or not? Until that right is determined in their favor, the law mandates that they be held in detention, and that's the reason for detention for the number that we have seen. A number of Haitians have been paroled. There are, in fact, over 100,000 Haitians that are illegally in this country right now. The Reagan administration is proposing to the Congress legalizing the status of those people. If we're going to do that, if we're going to legalize the status of Haitians and many others, possibly as many as six million people who are illegally in this country, we have to reassert control of our borders. Detention is a part of the United States' determining who comes into this country, not Fidel Castro, not sea captains in Haiti, and not individuals who would crash our borders.

MacNEIL: Mr. Giuliani, the people we've talked to who represent the Haitian point of view say that while the law provides that they can be detained or should be detained, the law also gives the attorney general discretion to parole these Haitians -- these people, and that in fact, in the case of other national groups -- Cubans, Iranians, Nicaraguans, Poles, Ethiopians -- the standard practice is to parole them. And the Haitians' complaint is they alone are singled out for this kind of detention, for prolonged, indefinite detention.

Mr. GIULIANI: Well, that happens to be absolutely untrue. In fact, the detention policy which was adopted in July of last year was one that was intended to apply to anyone who comes into this country without a clear right to be here. It is applied against anyone who comes into this country without a clear right to be here, and the statistics that I quoted to you -- in 1981, 260,000 people were detained, of which only a very, very small number were Haitian. Any one of those people can return to Haiti if they so desire; any one of those people can have an expedited hearing, if they so desire. The delays that have occurred have occurred solely because their lawyers have filed challenges, and in essence, delay works to the benefit of our relaxing our laws, and our just permitting them to come in.

MacNEIL: Isn't it true that while many of those other national groups are initially detained, they are very quickly disposed of, either by parole or by deportation or by being accepted legally into the country?

Mr. GIULIANI: Well, most of them are very easily disposed of in the sense of a proceeding because they don't block the proceeding. They don't raise challenges to it. They either voluntarily return or they proceed to a hearing because they feel they have a justifiable case that they can make. The delays since we have been in office and instituted proceedings for hearings have been solely caused by legal challenges.At one time there was a court order preventing us from voluntarily returning people to Haiti because the claim was made in this very lawsuit that these people were coerced into voluntarily returning. The judge who took control of that case appointed a special master who interviewed the people who had asked to go back and found that they had indeed fully and willingly wanted to go back, and we were permitted to return them.There is an awful lot of distortion and an awful lot of emotion that's involved in this. But what it really comes down to, it is a small part of the problem that has grown up in this country where in the year 1980 more people came into the United States, legally and illegally, than ever before in our history, including the period of the great migrations back in 1900, 1910, 1920. I hardly have to tell you that our economy is not what it was in 1900, 1910 and 1920.We have an obligation to the unemployed in this country to reassert control of our borders, to return control to the United States, and to have an orderly process, namely the quota, for people coming in in order to obtain jobs.

LEHRER: But Mr. Giuliani, I would think that if a Haitian were sitting here he would say to you, please tell me how 2,000 Haitians in various camps around the country are going to dislodge an economy involving 220 million people.

Mr. GIULIANI: Of course 2,000 Haitians will not dislodge our economy, and that's the fallacy in focusing so heavily and emotionally on this one group. They are part of -- when you enforce the law, you have to enforce the law evenhandedly and across the boards. The legalization proposal that the President has submitted to Congress would legalize the status of some six million -- approximately six million illegal aliens, whether they are -- whether they are Haitian, whether they are Mexican, whatever their nationality. By the same token the enforcement program has to be applied against everyone, whether they are Haitian or whether they are something else. You are focusing just on Haitians.

LEHRER: Exactly --

Mr. GIULIANI: We have to deal with 950,000 people who come into this country illegally, of which the Haitians are a small part.

LEHRER: Right, but let's talk about that small part for a moment, and the word parole. First of all, for the record, I think we need to establish that the court challenges and the legal proceedings that these people are instituting are very legal.I mean, in other words, they're exercising their rights under U.S. law, right?

Mr. GIULIANI: They have an absolute right to do what they're doing --

LEHRER: Challenge --

Mr. GIULIANI: Right, to raise these proceedings, but then again, we can't allow them to use that as a way to gain entry if they don't have a legal right to be here, because if we do that, control of how you come into this country rests outside the United States and not with the lawful authorities.

LEHRER: But let me stay on track for a moment. Under the rules, these people who have been in here for nine months, 10 months -- let's say they're there because they've decided to challenge the U.S. policy. In other words, they say they're political refugees; you say they're economic refugees. They're trying to prove through the courts or whatever that they are in fact political refugees and have a right to stay here. Doesn't the attorney general have the right to at least let these people out of that camp while that legal issue is being resolved?

Mr. GIULIANI: That is precisely what was done a year ago, two years ago during that period that you were showing where this migration became totally out of control. People were paroled. Those that were paroled didn't show up for hearings. They had effectively gained entry into the United States without regard to lawful authorities, and without our having any control over who comes in and who doesn't come in.

LEHRER: Well, in a word, then, you're convinced that if those 2,000 people were let out while their cases were being resolved, they would not show up?

Mr. GIULIANI: I'm not convinced of that at all. What I'm saying is that if we abandon the policy of enforcing the law, we would not only have to let out those 2,000 people; we wouldn't be able to hold anyone --

LEHRER: No, but my point is -- my point is --

Mr. GIULIANI: -- that comes in, and we're talking now about 900,000 people, not 2,000. We can't treat the Haitians any better or any worse than the others, and --

LEHRER: And your position is thatyou're not treating these Haitians any worse?

Mr. GIULIANI: Absolutely not. They are being treated precisely the same way as other groups are being treated who come into this country illegally. There was a change in policy in July of last year, and a lot of the confusion here comes from comparing what happened before to others to what is happening to the Haitians afterwards, and they're all being treated in precisely the same way.

LEHRER: We have to leave it there. Robin?

MacNEIL: Mr. Giuliani, thank you for joining us. Good night, Jim.

LEHRER: Good night, Robin.

MacNEIL: That's all for tonight. We will be back on Monday night. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.