SIDNEY — After former President Trump’s comment about Springfield’s immigrant population during a debate last week, state and local officials have said there has been an outpouring of misinformation about migrants and immigrants.
The difference between migrants and immigrants is that migrants are temporary, seeking only to work to make money to send home to their families. Immigrants are seeking more permanent living situations in another country.
According to Sidney city manager Andrew Bowsher, the population of migrant workers in Sidney is very small.
“We don’t have an approximate number, just because there’s really no tracking purposes.” Bowsher said. “So as far as we are fully aware the Haitians that are here within the state and just in general in the country, are here legally. They’re asylum and seeking from the federal government, and those were extended under the Biden administration, and obviously they are moving into communities that they see fit.
“As far as we’re aware, it’s a very small number, less than 25 and I use that number very loosely, definitely, because we definitely don’t have a specific count, but I cannot stress that it is nowhere near the amount of influx that is represented in Springfield.”
The Springfield News-Sun published an article on Sept. 10 discussing the rumors being spread about their Haitian immigrant population. Estimates for the number of Haitians who have immigrated to the city, most in the last four years, have ranged from between 12,000 and 15,000 people.
From the Springfield News-Sun, “Springfield Mayor Rob Rue said at a press conference Tuesday that rumors of pets or wildlife being eaten by Haitian immigrants were absolutely false, with zero verified reports of specific claims. He said Haitian immigrants had also not been reported to police to be squatting or littering in front of people’s homes.”
“Rumors like this are taking away from the real issues such as issues involving our housing or school resources and our overwhelmed healthcare system,” Rue said.
Mayor Mike Barhorst sent the Sidney Daily News an email exchange he had with a resident of Sidney about their concerns. In this email, he said he did not believe there should be any cause for concern with any migrant population in Sidney.
“There have been for some years temporary employees in Sidney doing jobs that no one here wants to do.” Barhorst said. “They are primarily from the African nations of Nigeria and Eritrea. They come on a six-month work visa, then return home and another group comes to fill those same jobs.”
“I believe that some of our residents have seen persons of color speaking a foreign language and assume they are Haitian. Most Haitians speak French (Haiti was a French colony). Most Nigerians speak one of several languages (Hausa, Yoruba, Igbo, Fulfulde, Ibibio, Kanuri, and Tiv). Most people from Eritrea speak either Tigrinya and Arabic.”
Barhorst also reminded this person of the history of this country, being founded by immigrants.
“Our ancestors all came to this country as immigrants. They all faced discrimination,” Barhorst said. “Most of my ancestors came here from Germany. They certainly faced discrimination. While we don’t like to talk about the discrimination, there are lots of examples. German books were burned on more than one occasion on the Courthouse lawn. The first Catholic church in Sidney was blown up.”
At the Meet the Candidates event hosted by the Shelby County Republican Party on Sept. 4, former Springfield-area state representative Kyle Koehler spoke about the influx of Haitian immigrants, becoming the topic of conversation for the rest of the event.
“City, county estate leaders are overwhelmed with complaints that they can’t do anything about fixing,” Koehler, who is running for a state senate seat, said. “Last month, the group calling themselves the blood tribe, marched past a jazz and blues festival in my town carrying large swastika flags and rifles.”
NBC News reported that Erika Lee, of Springfield, admitted to creating the Facebook post that the rumors were born from. Even after the confession, Ohio Senator and Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance has continued to spread false claims about the migrant population.
“If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do,” Vance said, quickly clarifying that he “created the focus that allowed the media to talk about this story and the suffering caused by policies.”
The Shelby County Republican Party said in a Facebook post it was going to try to have officials give updates on Springfield and Sidney’s immigration situation at a regularly-planned meeting on Tuesday night. Shelby County Sheriff Jim Frye was scheduled to talk on the topic at the meeting.
Reach Sidney Daily News reporter Anna Edmiston at 937-538-4825.
