Top congressional Democrats met Tuesday with Haiti’s newly inaugurated Prime Minister Gerry Cornille to urge additional U.S. assistance, days after a U.S.-backed international police force arrived on the Caribbean island to help rebuild a country that has been under siege by organized crime for months.
The Biden administration plans to provide $100 million to the mission, the largest U.S.-funded effort ever, despite Republican opposition. But Mr. Cornill told Democrats Tuesday that more money would be needed and soon.
“This is a critical point,” Mr. Cornill said in an interview Tuesday afternoon after a meeting with lawmakers and officials from international financial institutions. He expressed gratitude for the support already promised and stressed the urgent need for continued investment.
“We need funding to quickly build basic infrastructure, repair basic infrastructure, and make sure people have access to services,” he said.
“Haiti is a huge problem, and we’re trying to figure out what his priorities are, how to address security and economic needs, and make sure the money is actually there,” Rep. Sheila Scherpilus-McCormick, a Florida Democrat and the only Haitian-American in Congress, said in an interview. “We’ve been wrestling with Congress since October to make sure that the money is available, because we have a short window of time to succeed.”
Eight months after the United Nations authorized an international force to enter Haiti, the first troops from the Kenya-led Multinational Security Assistance Mission arrived on June 25 to try to quell the violence and retake the country.
In Washington, the new prime minister and cabinet members also met with Biden administration officials, including Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken. At each stop, Mr. Cornille, who briefly served as prime minister in 2011, detailed his plan to shed violence and corruption and reestablish democratic norms in the country. The interim government appointed by the commission plans to hold elections before its term expires on February 7, 2026.
“They want to create a situation where they can hand over to a new administration, but they need help,” said Rep. Gregory W. Meeks of New York, the top Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee. “They need resources.”
Democrats in Congress have lobbied the Biden administration to do more to support the Philippines, an island nation of more than 11 million people.
But the funding effort has run into opposition from top Republicans in Congress who say the mission’s specific goals and how to measure success are unclear. They remain wary of pouring millions of dollars into a country controlled by a gang with a long history of political corruption.
“It is deeply disappointing that the Biden administration has decided to withhold U.S. taxpayer funding for the botched Haiti MSS,” Idaho Sen. Jim Risch, the Republican ranking member of the Committee on Foreign Relations, said in a statement, using the acronym for the international police force. “I have made my grave and specific concerns about this mission very clear since last September. My concerns exist in part because of a long history of failed international interventions in Haiti that have wasted billions of dollars and worsened the plight of the Haitian people.”
Rep. Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican who chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee, condemned the deployment of Kenyan troops to Haiti, saying it leaves the African nation vulnerable to instability.
“On the day that 400 Kenyan police officers arrived in Haiti, the Kenyan parliament was overrun by protesters,” the two Republican lawmakers said in a statement. “As a result, the Kenyan military, under questionable constitutional authority, used live ammunition to repel protesters, killing more than 20 civilians. The administration must find other solutions to Haiti’s instability.”
The recent violence and unrest, especially in the capital Port-au-Prince, is the latest incident to disrupt social order in a country reeling from a series of crises.
Haitians are still recovering from a series of natural disasters, including devastating earthquakes in 2010 and 2021, but some areas are facing food shortages, cholera outbreaks and limited access to basic health care.
Instability reached a new high in 2021, when President Jovenel Moïse, who was elected in 2016, was assassinated at his home. No elections have been held since then and gang violence has been rampant. The United Nations estimates that about 80% of Port-au-Prince is controlled by gang affiliations.
Mr. Meeks and Mr. Cherpilus-McCormick said they were optimistic that the international police mission would succeed in putting Haiti on the path to stability.
“I think one of the important things, at least to me, is that the prime minister is not the kind of person America is looking to,” Mr Meeks said.
If Mr Connell can oversee the downfall of the gang and restore stability, “it will bring a completely different atmosphere to the island,” he added.
Ms. Cherfilus-McCormick said she hoped a meaningful demonstration of force against the violence would “motivate the Haitian people to also participate in the country’s transition to a stable democracy” and draw citizens back into the country.
“If we can help Haitians stay in Haiti, if we can help them actually thrive and leverage themselves, that would be another country we could engage with,” she said.
“We only get one chance here,” Mr. Cornill said. “And we can’t fail.”
Francis Robles Contribution Report.
