Peter Deutsch: “I too join with my colleague in supporting this resolution, but also speaking out really to help educate our colleagues…”

“I too join with my colleague in supporting this resolution, but also speaking out really to help educate our colleagues in the country about the 200th adversary of Haitian Flag Day. It is a significant event, the bicentennial of the second oldest republic in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti, that joined the United States in seeking its freedom from European colonialists in the early 1800s. The Haitian people have fought for 200 years, have been part of a movement towards democracy not just fighting side by side with Americans but side by side with other Western Hemisphere countries in seeking their own democracy. We have had a community also in south Florida as well as throughout the country that has grown and prospered and, in fact, many of their friends and relatives today still seek that opportunity that all of us have sought in the United States of America. Today, we have Haitian-Americans that are detained in Krome, in prison really, in the United States, in Miami-Dade County, some of whom, by court order, have been ordered to be released, and yet Attorney General Ashcroft has prevented their release by categorizing Haiti as a terrorist State at this point in time.”