Springfield Probing Secret Corporate Plan That Brought in Haitians

Trump and Vance haven't talked about it, but the city has been investigating businesses that wooed Haitians

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Springfield, OH, Mayor Rob Rue, right, speaks with CNN’s Dana Bash on Sunday. (Screengrab / CNN video.)

Two months ago, Springfield, OH, Mayor Rob Rue said the city could have handled its Haitian influx if officials had known that a “network” of unidentified businesses was working to bring in immigrant workers.

“[T]here are companies that knew they were going to make an effort to bring individuals who were crossing the border,” Rue said at a City Commission meeting in July.

He said that the city, with federal and state agencies, is now investigating that effort. And he said he would ask the city’s legal department about regulating out-of-town limited liability corporations (LLCs) allegedly exploiting the influx by purchasing residential properties and jacking up rents.

If the city had been able to plan for the arrival of more than 15,000 Haitians, Rue said, it could have prevented landlords motivated by “greed” from displacing longtime residents and charging higher rents to new Haitian arrivals. Some landlords allegedly cram excessive numbers of tenants into individual units.

The city has been dragged into the presidential race after former Pres. Donald Trump last week amplified false and unfounded stories about Haitians stealing and eating pets. His running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-OH), had focused on the influx two months ago and then added the false pet stories to his complaints.

Despite the city’s denials of the Republican claims, and its pleas to end the rhetoric, the Republican ticket has doubled down, drawing threats to the small city. Schools and public buildings have been evacuated in the past several days.

The targets of the right-wing ire are the Haitians themselves or Pres. Joe Biden and Vice Pres. Kamala Harris for legalizing the entry of some asylum-seekers, including Haitians. The administration extended Temporary Protected Status for Haitians earlier this summer.

But little of the debate has addressed why Springfield specifically would get such a burdensome number: An estimated 15,000 to 20,000 Haitians coming into a city that previously counted just under 60,000 residents.

One answer, city officials have suggested at recent meetings, is that area businesses brought the Haitians in, blindsiding a city that had no warning to ramp up or secure the resources needed to serve its new residents.

Rue discussed the ongoing investigation of a secret effort by companies to bring in immigrants at the July 2, 2024, City Commission meeting. Some of his remarks were previously reported by local media and a few alt-right outlets. But the role of business has been largely overlooked in the discourse around the presidential race.

“The problem,” Rue said, “is we’re not getting — and didn’t five years ago get — the opportunity to plan.”

After a fatal school bus crash caused by an unlicensed Haitian driver who was in the country legally, the city last year created a group to study a range of immigration issues. One was driver education, but another was the exploitation of Haitian labor.

In July, Rue said the group includes state and federal agencies and is “investigating” what an audience member at the meeting described as “the people who planned this.” Rue suggested that the group was already bringing recruiting efforts to light:

“My beef, in the beginning of this research, was the fact that there was businesses that knew that this was a trend that was going to happen based on government, federal government regulation, and there was a pipeline of working that needed to be filled in the state of Ohio and other states, where individuals, where companies [sic] asking for jobs. Because of that, there are companies that knew they were going to make an effort to bring individuals who were crossing the border based on federal regulations that they could do that.”

The Springfield News-Sun reported in July that Rue claimed that a “network of businesses knew what was coming.”

At a June meeting, Rue denied that the city government was bringing in immigrants. A meeting attendee asked, “Are you aware of organizations that are doing that? Because I’m aware of one.”

Rue responded: “One of the committees that we have is investigating these things. It’s an investigative committee looking into what you’re talking about.”

A far-right Canadian outlet last week interviewed a Springfield man identified only as Sean, a supervisor at a Dole plant, and claimed that they had discussed “ads online, in French, enticing workers to come to some of the factories in this industrial park” where the Dole facility was said to employ some Haitians.

City officials have not identified any companies under suspicion of involvement. Dole, which has an infamous history of exploiting workers, would not comment, the Canadian outlet said.

Had Springfield known about efforts to bring in immigrants, Rue said, the city would have hired extra police and firefighters and other municipal workers. At the same meeting, Assistant City Manager and Director of Economic Development Tom Franzen said, “​​We’re late to the game compared to adding housing like some of our neighboring communities.”

The immigrant surge has taxed a number of civic services, ranging from health care to education. But perhaps no aspect is more contentious than housing.

And there, too, Springfield officials say, it’s not that Haitians are doing anything wrong. In fact, there are concerns that they’re being exploited, packed illegally into overcrowded apartments.

Rue has referred to the “greed” of “opportunistic” landlords, who allegedly tossed out longtime Springfield tenants in order to hike up rents on new Haitian residents. That, too, Rue said, the city could have avoided.

Had the city known, Rue said, officials could have protected both newcomers and longtimers, “making sure that our individuals who are already living here and faithfully paying rent, were not being displaced because of the greed of landlords. We would have been ahead of that or at least tried to combat it or organize something.”

Rue offered more specifics at the June 4 meeting:

“There was a concern about landlords moving folks out of their house who have been there a very long time, basically opportunist landlords taking advantage of folks, moving lower-paying tenants out because they can make a higher rent… The problem is, because of the way the system is, in that somebody can come in, buy 25 properties and change them [to accommodate more tenants], because they want to.”

And it’s not just any landlords. 

At the July 2 meeting, one resident accused “out-of-town LLCs” of buying up residential properties and hiking rents. City Commissioner Bridget Houston said, “You’re exactly right with the LLCs.”

When the resident said, “We need to have the ordinances effectively oversee them and stop them from doing the things they’re doing that are detrimental, negative, to the city,” Rue said, “I’m going to ask about it, ask our Law Department to research what those opportunities are” to stop the LLCs.

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