"SPRINGFIELD, Ohio -- City Manager Bryan Heck fielded an unusual question at City Hall on the morning of Sept. 9, from a staff member of Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance. The staffer called to ask if there was any truth to bizarre rumors about Haitian immigrants and pets in Springfield. "He asked point-blank, 'Are the rumors true of pets being taken and eaten?'" recalled Heck. "I told him no. There was no verifiable evidence or reports to show this was true. I told them these claims were baseless."
By then, Vance had already posted about the rumors to his 1.9 million followers on X. Yet he kept the post up, and repeated an even more insistent version of the claim the next morning.
That night, former President Donald Trump stood on a Philadelphia debate stage and shot the rumor into the stratosphere. "In Springfield, they're eating the dogs," he said. "The people that came in, they're eating the cats. They're eating, they're eating, the pets of the people that live there. And this is what's happening in this country."
In an instant, the everyday struggles of an American city grappling with an influx of immigrants were transformed into a bombshell political message laser targeted at voters distressed by immigration.
It was the culmination of a spectacular collision of forces that thrust Springfield into the U.S. presidential election. Over the summer, outside neo-Nazi groups -- which specialize in exploiting local controversy to foment outrage about migrants -- had seized on a local controversy and fanned the narrative of pet-eating Haitians. Then the Trump campaign blasted those rumors to the world -- and kept pushing them even after they were exposed as lies.
Trump last Friday said he planned "large deportations" from Springfield -- whose Haitian community is overwhelmingly in the country legally. Vance said on Tuesday that Trump would like to visit Springfield at some point.
Attempts to contain the damage in Springfield were quickly overwhelmed despite city leaders' racing from meeting to meeting trying to stem the tide. The Ohio state police were called in to protect local children as they returned to school. Thirty-six bomb threats had been logged as of Tuesday evening.
"We're living the danger that misinformation and created stories leads to," said Heck, the city manager.
"We have told those at the national level that they are speaking these things that are untrue," added Springfield Mayor Rob Rue, a registered Republican. But he said claims have been "repeated and doubled down on."
Vance insisted on CNN this past Sunday that he had firsthand accounts of the incidents from constituents, but the media had paid no attention to migrant problems in American cities "until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes." He added, "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."
Springfield was a community with all the ingredients to be exploited in a close, fiercely fought national election.
It's in the middle of the middle of the U.S., with a name so generically American it was used in the classic sitcoms "Father Knows Best" and "The Simpsons." From the beginning, it was a place of immigrants: first the Irish, who traveled the road westward in the early 1800s, then the Germans, and eventually a wave of Black Americans fleeing the South.
This recent wave of Haitian immigrants was initially welcomed. The town's fortunes had declined alongside those of the rest of the Rust Belt, with the population dropping from 83,000 in 1960 to 59,000 in 2020. Haitians were fleeing danger in their increasingly lawless country, particularly after the assassination of their president in 2021. In Springfield, they were welcomed by evangelical groups and employers alike. Friends and family members followed loved ones there.
Estimates vary, but Republican Gov. Mike DeWine said roughly 15,000 Haitians immigrated to Springfield over the past four years. They were able to immigrate legally under a Biden administration policy granting Temporary Protected Status to Haitians, in a program created by Congress in 1990 to protect immigrants from places deemed too dangerous to return to.
The local economy boomed. Business owners said they were grateful to have workers eager to work long shifts and do what it took to meet production goals. New subdivisions sprung up in the cornfields outside town. New restaurants opened. The Haitian flag flew at City Hall.
Growth came with growing pains. The number of non-native English speakers in the public schools quadrupled to more than 1,000 children. The local clinic and hospital were overwhelmed with people fleeing a country where healthcare had been scant.
Traffic increased, as did frustration with drivers more accustomed with the chaotic streets of Port-au-Prince than the orderly grid of Springfield.
Then tragedy struck at the start of school in 2023. A minivan driven by a Haitian immigrant crashed into a school bus, injuring 20 children and killing Aiden Clark.
The man didn't have a driver's license that was valid in the U.S.
His death brought out conflict about immigration. City commission meetings once dominated by zoning petitions became extended public comment sessions on immigration. Suspicions grew about who might be benefiting from the migrant wave.
After one city commission meeting, an evangelical pastor named Carl Ruby, who ran an "immigrant integration" not-for-profit organization, sought out a local GOP leader who had criticized him online. Ruby said he shook the hand of Mark Sanders, who had become a leading critic in town of the influx of immigrants -- and wouldn't let go until he agreed to meet.
They met and drank coffee at Panera. Ruby offered to share tax documents for his organization that would dispel rumors he was getting rich from his nonprofit. He also said he didn't own rental properties or benefit from a local employment agency that has employed Haitians, as had been rumored. Sanders, who has likened Ruby to a "coyote" who makes money from helping people cross into the U.S. illegally, agreed to take down some of his online posts.
The two men haven't spoken since. "I think he believed me, but I don't think it fits his narrative," Ruby said.
He's not interested in another get-together.
"Logic and truth just don't matter at this point to that group." Sanders, a retired engineer, had started working as a school bus driver to comfort his daughter, who had been scared to get back on the bus after Aiden Clark's death.
He said he would be open to another meeting because he believes he can show ways that the Haitians have hurt the city. "I can show you the detriments," he said.
"Show me the benefit."
Springfield's growing tensions caught the attention of outside hate groups, seeking division to exploit.
White supremacist groups have been active in towns across the U.S. this summer, inserting themselves into hot-button societal debates over immigration, Gaza and gay rights, according to the Anti-Defamation League. On Aug. 10, a group wearing ski masks and carrying swastika flags and rifles marched in Springfield. The ADL identified them as Blood Tribe, a growing neo-Nazi group.
On Aug. 27, during the routine public-comment portion of the Springfield City Commission meeting, a man identifying himself as a Blood Tribe member said: "I've come to bring a word of warning. Stop what you're doing before it's too late. Crime and savagery will only increase with every Haitian you bring in."
Rue, the mayor, interrupted him, saying "You sound threatening to me," and asking police to peacefully remove him.
And recently, roughly 20 individuals claiming to represent the Proud Boys marched in the town.
Much of this had gone on without the rest of the U.S. noticing. That was about to change.
The cat-eating rumors, started with a post by a Springfield woman on a private Facebook page, turned out to be third-hand and were subsequently disavowed by the original poster, according to NewsGuard, a company that tracks online misinformation.
After Vance's tweets on the morning of Sept. 10, Springfield Mayor Rue called a press conference that afternoon to try to contain the damage.
He also was faced that evening with the pain that Vance's tweet was causing locally. Along with promoting the pet-eating rumor, Vance's post had said a Springfield "child was murdered by a Haitian migrant who had no right to be here."
That night, Nathan Clark -- the father of Aiden, the boy who had been killed in the bus crash -- spoke during the public-comment portion of the Springfield City Commission meeting. Visibly shaking, he referenced GOP politicians, including Vance, and said they had used his son's death "for political gain."
Hours later, Trump uttered the line that launched countless memes. He was called on it in the moment, when ABC debate moderator David Muir said his outlet had checked with Springfield's city manager and found there were no credible reports of pets being harmed by immigrants.
Trump responded that the city manager would be expected to say that, but he'd seen people saying the opposite on TV.
"It is depressing as a fact checker," said Bill Adair, founder of the fact-checking website PolitiFact and a professor at Duke University.
But, he noted, "lying is really an economy.
Politicians lie because they think it pays off."
The morning after the debate, parents in Springfield kept their children home en masse. Several schools, City Hall and the state motor vehicle offices in Springfield were forced to evacuate after receiving bomb threats.
Vance, meanwhile, has continued to defend his claims.
A Vance spokesperson on Tuesday provided The Wall Street Journal with a police report in which a resident had claimed her pet might have been taken by Haitian neighbors.
But when a reporter went to Anna Kilgore's house Tuesday evening, she said her cat Miss Sassy, which went missing in late August, had actually returned a few days later -- found safe in her own basement.
Kilgore, wearing a Trump shirt and hat, said she apologized to her Haitian neighbors with the help of her daughter and a mobile-phone translation app.
In recent days, many in Springfield have gone out of their way to show support for their Haitian neighbors.
Still, the local Haitian community is on edge.
Stanley Thelusma, 24, who arrived in Springfield in July from Haiti, sought a peaceful spot at Snyder Park on Tuesday afternoon, studying a biology textbook. He wasn't far from a pond where Haitians had been rumored to have taken some of the park's geese and slaughtered them.
It's a rumor the state wildlife division found no basis for. Similarly, the mayor said the sheriff had checked 11 months of 911 calls and found no evidence of animal abuse among the Haitian community.
Thelusma said he had hoped to continue his medical studies in Port-au-Prince but that he and his parents decided to come to Springfield because of the threat of violence from gangs.
Now he is in a nursing degree program part-time at Clark State College. And he works four days a week as a forklift driver at an Amazon facility 30 minutes away, earning $19.50 an hour.
"I don't know why people are talking about immigrants eating cats, some pets," he said. "It's totally false."" [1]
You are expected to say that.
1. Told Pet-Eating Was Untrue, Trump Team Spread It Anyway --- Springfield, Ohio, officials informed Vance's staff rumors were baseless. It didn't matter, and now the town is in chaos. Maher, Kris; Bauerlein, Valerie; Hobbs, Tawnell D. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 19 Sep 2024: A.1.
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