A nonprofit organization representing the Haitian community in Springfield, Ohio, invoked a private-citizen right to file charges Tuesday against GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, over the increased chaos and threats the town has experienced since Trump first spread false claims about legal immigrants eating pets in Springfield during his presidential debate with Vice President Kamala Harris on September 10th.
More than 30 bomb threats were called into state and local government buildings and schools, prompting closures, and the assignment of additional law enforcement protection and security cameras.
Some of the city’s Haitian residents have also said they feared for their safety as public vitriol grew, and Mayor Rob Rue has received death threats.
Trump and Vance are charged with disrupting public services, making false alarms, telecommunications harassment, aggravated menacing, and complicity. The filing asks the Clark County Municipal Court to affirm that "there are probable cause and issue arrest warrants against Trump and Vance."
The lawyer for the Haitian Bridge Alliance says that the Trump/Vance campaign's refusal to admit the rumor has been repeatedly debunked shows their "persistence and relentlessness, even in the face of the governor and the mayor saying this is false, that shows intent,” Subodh Chandra said. “It’s knowing, willful flouting of criminal law.”
Springfield is home to 15,000 to 20,000 Haitian immigrants who have arrived over the past several years, in many cases after being recruited to local jobs and who have been granted Temporary Protected Status to be in the U.S. legally.