According to Donald Trump, in Springfield, Ohio, immigrants are eating the dogs and cats. This is a lie.
During the debate between himself and Kamala Harris on September 10, Trump said, “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs of the people that came in; they’re eating the cats they’re eating—they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.”
In reality, this is a rumor that started with a woman named Anna Kilgore in Springfield reporting to the police that her cat Miss Sassy went missing and that she suspected her Haitian neighbors had stolen and eaten her cat. White supremist groups in Springfield spread the rumor on X and right-wing social forums until it reached Ohio Senator JD Vance, who happens to be Donald Trump’s running mate. Meanwhile, Kilgore found Miss Sassy in her basement a couple days after filing the report.
To be clear, this debacle isn’t about a cat: it’s about immigrants. The moderator during the debate said, “We are going to get to immigration and border security during this debate, but I would like Vice President Harris to respond on the economy here” before Trump talked about pet eating. The reaction to this comment consisted of Vice President Harris laughing, although she still heard him out. Harris was most likely questioning if he was actually serious.
The aftermath of Donald Trump saying this has caused chaos. Numerous immigrants in Springfield have been threatened, multiple schools received bomb threats, and one university had to move online and canceled all campus events until Sept. 22.
Springfield has a large Hatian community thanks to local manufacturing replacing its shrinking native population with Haitian immigrants. While there hasn’t been any official government program to bring more Haitians to Springfield, both Springfield’s mayor and Ohio’s governor have encouraged migration and have helped newcomers get settled. Around 15,000 Haitians have settled in Clark County (where Springfield is located) over the past three years, and all of them are in the US legally under Temporary Parole Satus.
In an ABC interview, Ohio Republican Governor Mike DeWine said, “Springfield has really made a great resurgence with a lot of companies coming in. These Haitians came in to work for these companies, [and] what the companies tell us is that they are very good workers. They’re very happy to have them there, and frankly, that’s helped the economy.”
There have been tensions between the new Haitian immigrants and the natives. The newcomers have had trouble switching from their native Creole to English, and several of their customs are unnerving to natives. In August, tensions started to boil when a Haitian immigrant crashed into a bus and killed a native boy, 11-year-old Aiden Clark. The pet-eating hoax is seen by many locals as just the problem coming to a head.
In the same ABC interview, DeWine said, “When you go from a population of 58,000 and add 15,000 people onto that, you’re going to have some challenges and some problems.”
While there are issues in the town, people eating pets is not actually one of them. Still, Trump keeps repeating and perpetuating this lie. Vance came to his aid (in a way) and said that although the claim is false, the damage these immigrants are doing is a real thing and justifies perpetuating the hoax.
In an interview with Dana Bash on CNN, Vance said, “If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of American people, then that’s what I’m going to do.”
While Vance spreads his claims about eating cats and dogs, no one’s eating much in Springfield right now, as the grocery stores have been shut down after threats of mass shooting over the immigrants who shop there.
It’s unclear how these recent events will impact November’s election, though immigration is one of the top issues across the US in 2024. In Colorado, 1 out of every 10 people is an immigrant to the US. For their part, Frederick High students don’t believe the rumor.
“No, I don’t believe it,” said freshman Ana Sliger. “There are a lot of people with pets in Ohio, and if this were true, we would have heard about it before [the debate].” Freshman Shelby Hott agrees: “Ohio isn’t a disaster zone or apocolypse land. There are grocery stores and farms. Why would you risk eating a pet and getting caught when there’s food everywhere?”
