Should We Be Surprised that the Trump Administration Is Meddling in Haiti?
In addition to harassing Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, President Donald Trump is continuing the bipartisan regime-change operations of his predecessor in Haiti and preparing to use force and intimidation to eliminate any rebel threat against the pro-Western but unelected government in Port-au-Prince. The bullying tactics employed by the United States government may be masked in that it is allowing Kenya to lead the charge on the military maneuvers in the Caribbean nation that shares a land border with the Dominican Republic on the island of Hispaniola, but do not let that deception fool you.
The Joe Biden administration supplied over $200 million in American taxpayer funds to support the operation (some of this up to $300 million was used to supply weapons while other portions of it was raised to help train the Haitian police and military), but it also deployed Marines to secure the embassy and airlift non-essential personnel out of the country, as well as sent armored vehicles to aid former and unelected Prime Minister Ariel Henry’s government. There is also evidence to suggest that the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Miami-based Counter Terrorist Unit Federal Academy (CTU), as well as American citizen Christian Emmanuel Sanon, were involved in the assassination of President Jovenel Moise.
Although the Biden administration had its fingerprints all over the manipulation of Haiti that has led directly to the current crisis of gang violence and political instability, the Trump administration has now offered, through the Department of State’s Transnational Organized Crime Rewards Program, a $5 million bounty on any credible information that leads to the arrest of the main rebel leader Jimmy Cherizier (known as “Barbecue” or “Barbeque” by his critics). Since Cherizier has been sanctioned from the time of Trump’s first term in 2020 (under the Magnitsky Act), naturalized American citizen Bazile Richardson was recently arrested for evading the sanctions and sending money to fund his childhood friend, though the transfers were only a few dollars at a time (for example, $25 was sent to help him keep up on his phone plan and one was $50). Imagine being arrested as a supporter of terrorism because you transferred $25 to help a friend pay his or her phone bill. This is the United States’ foreign policy. Sometimes it is funding nations in slaughtering people, sometimes it is supporting coups against unfriendly governments, and other times it is bolstering governments in quelling rebellions. It is anyone’s guess as to which side the United States will fall on, as there is no consistency or principles. If you do the will of the federal government, you get rewarded, and if you oppose it, you get eliminated. This is typical imperialistic mentality.
Erik Prince, who founded Blackwater (now Constellis), has a new company, Vectus Global, to go around the world advising friendly governments on how to suppress dissenters and push American interests and maintain important resources under the United States’ sphere of influence (for example: Ecuador and the Democratic Republic of Congo). However, this new venture into Haiti has allowed the Trump administration to be able to have 200 American personnel (mercenaries) in the country while also refuting the claims that the United States is involved. Of course, despite the denial of “funding” or “providing oversight” to Vectus Global in Haiti, according to Romain Le Cour Grandmaison, leader of the Haiti Observatory at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, the company working militarily with the Haitian government would violate United States law without special permission from the Trump administration. Plus, since Blackwater has historically partnered with the Department of Homeland Security, Department of State, Department of Defense, and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and provided supplemental forces for missions in Afghanistan and Iraq, would it be unbelievable to think that the Erik Prince and Donald Trump were once again working together for an agenda in Haiti? Utilizing mercenaries for the purpose of bolstering a foreign government would provide plausible deniability for sinister agendas.
In addition to this, the Trump administration is losing its confidence in the current international effort to prop up the Haitian government, and it may be looking to replace Kenya’s leadership (the African nation has sent 1,000 police officers) and double the number of international police officers (with increased funding) through a new proposal (perhaps up to 5,500 international agents would swoop into Haiti), which may draw parallels from the Organization of American States’ (OAS) idea brought forth by Secretary-General Albert Ramdin (of Suriname). The United States’ plan, backed by Panama, would transform the Multinational Security Support mission into the Gang Suppression Force, and it would be led by a joint force of the United States, Canada, the Bahamas, El Salvador, Belize, Guatemala, and Jamaica (the latter five of which have also contributed police officers). Regardless, this shows that the United States is really leading the charge, even if it is pretending that the international community is doing so, and the fact that Haiti itself is left out of the discussion may only serve to strengthen the position of Cherizier, who has himself fought to prevent international meddling in his country.
Of course, Cherizier is labelled as a gangster, cannibal, butcher, and overall monster, but is any of this propaganda actually true? He began as the leader of the G9 Family and Allies, which is considered a federation of criminal gangs that were loyal to former Haitian president Moise and formed as a result of the assassination plot. G9 merged with other gangs to form Viv Ansanm (“Living Together”), and Cherizier is now the undisputed rebel leader trying to overthrow the Western-backed regime (the current unelected prime minister is Alix Didier Fils-Aimé, who replaced Michel Patrick Boisvert’s and Garry Conille’s brief runs that occurred after Ariel Henry resigned). As a former police officer himself, Cherizier claims that he saw firsthand how the government caused corruption and created the gangs as tools to do its “dirty work.” He argues that the government worked with the elites in Haitian society to extort civilians and cause chaos, and that his gangs are working to undo all of this.
He also interestingly pointed to the United States as one of the culprits in this because of its manipulation in the country, and he made it clear that the Transitional Presidential Council that is currently in power was the making of the United States (and the Caribbean Community, or CARICOM) and does not reflect the “will of the Haitian people.” He also denies having been involved in the 2018 slaughter of seventy-one people (with 400 houses being destroyed) in the Port-au-Prince neighborhood of La Saline, and although gangsters participated, he claims that he did not. He responded to the United States’ indictment against him by saying, “If the F.B.I. wants me, I’m here. I am willing to collaborate with them on one condition: There can be no lies told.”
On the other hand, the United States and most of the world is claiming that Cherizier’s gangs are targeting civilians, killing and raping women and children, and committing terrorist acts against government infrastructure. This has resulted in 1.3 million people being displaced and 3,100 people killed in just 2025 so far (these are United Nations numbers), and although Cherizier does not deny that violence is occurring, he would like to have negotiations and end the bloodshed. During their attacks, the gangs have allegedly been responsible for attacking police stations, hospitals, and neighborhoods, as well as kidnapping people, restricting travel through tolls and roadblocks, burning down houses, shooting at inbound aircraft at the airport, and capturing the majority of the capital city.
Can we know for sure which side is telling the truth? Of course, the Biden and Trump administrations, and the United Nations (and other organizations), which relies on the United States for funding, would argue that the rebel leaders against a government of their choosing are committing atrocities. Though, if Cherizier is not involved in the violence, it may prove that he is not an effective leader who can control the gangs. If the people who he leads are going rogue, it makes his case of revolution against oligarchs less likely. Even if he is interested in ending foreign intervention and cleaning up the Haitian government, perhaps his followers are not.
The truth is difficult to ascertain without being on the ground and witnessing it for yourself, but there is certainly motive for the United States government to spread lies and rally the rest of the world to quell the rebellion in a country that it has been meddling in for years. We can only hope that the United States leaves Haiti to deal with its own problems, but that scenario is highly unlikely. President Trump is turning out to be a globalist puppet who is caving to the interests of the deep state, neoconservatives, and the military-industrial complex, and because of that, we can expect more intervention and conflicts, including in Haiti.
Thank you for reading, and please check out my book, The Global Bully, and website.