US wants Haitian migrants’ ‘whipping’ lawsuit against it thrown out

The U.S. government will hear about its motion to dismiss a lawsuit brought against it on behalf of Haitian migrants who said they were inhumanely treated by border agents at the U.S.-Mexico border in 2021 at hearing on Thursday, Aug. 29. The lawsuit filed by the nonprofit Haitian Bridge Alliance alleges abuse by U.S. border agents on horseback and other mistreatment.

President Joe Biden and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas are among the defendants in the case.

The suit claims that migrants saw “officers on horseback using reins as whips against people in the river” on Sept. 19, 2021. However, those accusations were refuted by a photographer who took pictures of the agents appearing to use their reigns as whips. The photographer said he did not witness any “whipping,” and a subsequent investigation by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol “found no evidence that agents struck any person with horse reigns.”

The probe did find “failures on multiple levels of the agency, a lack of appropriate policies and training and dangerous behavior by several individual agents.” Four Border Patrol agents were disciplined as a result of the incident.

The suit also said that 15,000 Haitians who crossed the southern border were forced to live outdoors without proper food or conditions under an international bridge in Del Rio, Texas.

The plaintiffs argue Title 42, which stopped asylum-seekers from entering the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic was “unfair and unjust.” The Biden administration lifted Title 42 in May of 2023.

The U.S. federal government’s motion to dismiss was filed on June 10, 2023, and stated: “While all other suits regarding Title 42 order have long been dismissed as moot, plaintiffs seek to continue their litigation over these past events and policies.”

Director of the Justice Action Center Karen Tumlin, who helped with the lawsuit, called Biden’s policies other than Title 42 “anti-Haitian.”

“Anti-Haitian immigration policies such as the asylum ban, adopted by the Biden administration in 2023, and ongoing deportation flights back to danger continue to deter Haitian nationals from seeking asylum in the United States,” Tumlin said.

The lawsuit states that Haitian migrants’ constitutional rights to due process were violated and it seeks compensation for legal fees.