Overview:
A new report from NYU’s Global Justice Clinic exposes systemic rights violations against people of Haitian descent in the Dominican Republic, following a mass deportation policy launched in late 2024.
A new report from the Global Justice Clinic at New York University details alarming patterns of human rights abuses committed by Dominican authorities against Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian descent, as the government ramps up deportations under a policy enacted in October 2024 that calls for at least 10,000 Haitians to be deported a week.
The 42-page report, titled “Racial Profiling & Mass Deportation: Rights Abuses of People of Haitian Descent in the Dominican Republic,” released last month, accuses the administration of President Luis Abinader of implementing racially discriminatory practices, including arbitrary detentions, violent raids, and the separation of children from their families.
According to the report, Dominican officials have deported over 180,000 people to Haiti between October 2024 and March 2025—a figure that could exceed 360,000 by year’s end if current trends continue. The report also extensively documents that people are being targeted based on their skin color or perceived Haitian origin.
Authorities have been reported to storm homes in the middle of the night, detaining entire families without warrants or due process, in clear violation of international law. In one instance, a young Black Dominican man was detained by the Dominican Army and asked to pronounce “perejil,” the Spanish word for parsley, employing the arbitrary identification tactics used to identify Haitians in the 1937 Parsley Massacre.”
“The Dominican Republic, like the U.S., is using illegal means to conduct massive deportations. The deportations are based on cynical calculations by political leaders that hateful, misleading scapegoating of immigrants will excite their base,” said Brian Concannon, executive director of the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti.
The mass expulsions come at a time when Haiti is facing a worsening humanitarian crisis, with more than one million people internally displaced amid gang violence and political instability.
“These mass expulsions not only violate the rights of Dominicans of Haitian descent and Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic,” the report states. “They also put people’s lives at risk due to the rampant insecurity and violence currently in Haiti.”
Some of the most egregious violations outlined in the report include racial profiling, where Black individuals, including Dominican citizens, are being detained even with valid documents; family separations, where children have been deported without guardians; and targeting pregnant and postpartum women during raids. The report also includes accounts of physical abuse, detentions in overcrowded facilities, and a lack of access to basic necessities like food and water.
“Racial Profiling and Mass Deportations provides an antidote to this misconduct by carefully analyzing the deportations in light of credible facts and well-established international and Dominican Republic law,” Concannon said.
“The essential point is that the Dominican government must uphold the dignity and rights of Haitians within its borders, but that respect starts with the Haitian state doing its part,” said Johnson Bélance, a human rights advocate based in New York.
Bélance, originally from Ouanaminthe, studied and lived in the Dominican Republic for nearly 14 years before returning to Haiti in 2018. He currently resides in the U.S. and is a member of the Nou Pap Dòmi grassroots movement..
The clinic also criticized the Dominican government’s use of militarized border enforcement, racialized policing, and a failure to provide legal recourse to those detained.
The report urges the Dominican Republic to halt the current mass deportation program, end racial profiling in migration enforcement, and restore pathways to legal status for Haitians. It also calls on the U.S. government to stop supporting Dominican security forces allegedly involved in the abuses.
“When Haiti fails to protect and document its citizens, it makes it easier for others to dehumanize them,” Bélance said. “True protection requires both nations to act responsibly—one by respecting rights, and the other by ensuring its people are not abandoned.”
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