America’s Special Envoy for Haiti Daniel Foote has resigned from his position, U.S. officials confirmed Thursday. The anonymous officials had direct knowledge of the matter, but were not authorized to publicly discuss personnel matters according to Reuters news service.
“I will not be associated with the United States inhumane, counterproductive decision to deport thousands of Haitian refugees and illegal immigrants to Haiti,” Foote wrote in his resignation letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The letter was dated Wednesday, and obtained by the Washington Post and other news sources.
One of the anonymous officials said Foote had consistently sought greater oversight of Haiti policy, and that the administration did not believe his requests were appropriate. “Our policy approach to Haiti remains deeply flawed, and my recommendations have been ignored and dismissed,” Foote wrote in the letter.
He was appointed to the special envoy position in July, following the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse. His departure leaves a sudden void in America’s policy toward Haiti.
“The people of Haiti, mired in poverty, hostage to the terror, kidnappings, robberies and massacres of armed gangs and suffering under a corrupt government with gang alliances, simply cannot support the infusion of thousands of returned migrants lacking food, shelter, and money without additional, avoidable human tragedy,” Foote wrote. “Surging migration to our borders will only grow as we add to Haiti’s unacceptable misery.”
The White House responded to the resignation during Press Secretary Jen Psaki’s daily briefing. Clips from the briefing can be found in the video above.
“There have been multiple senior level policy conversations on Haiti, where all proposals, including those led by special envoy Foote, were fully considered in a rigorous policy process,” Psaki said. “Special envoy Foote had ample opportunity to raise concerns about migration during his tenure. He never once did so.”
Foote’s resignation as Special Envoy comes as the camp where more than 14,000 migrants waited along the Texas border has shrunk dramatically. Meanwhile, the camp across the Rio Grande in Mexico is growing, as is the police presence.
Migrants found state police trucks spaced every 30 feet or so between their tents and the water’s edge. Despite this, dozens of families opted to hustle into the river and cross into the U.S. at a point where there was only one Mexican municipal police vehicle around.
According to the Associated Press, the Mexican authorities’ operation appeared designed to drive the migrants back across the river into Texas. A fence line and the line of state police vehicles funneled the migrants back to the crossing point they had been using all week.
But on Tuesday the Associated Press reported Mexico had begun busing and flying Haitian migrants away from the U.S. border, signaling a new level of support for the United States.