New expressions of ultranationalist violence censoring Black women and migrants harken back to the Trujillo dictatorship. Anyone deemed a threat to Dominican values is a potential target.
April 11, 2024
Source: NACLA
“Could you please report this tweet! And if you have the space[,] share with others in your trusted circle of friends to do the same?” I received this text message after the Dominican ultranationalist group Antigua Orden Dominicana posted a tweet outing a queer couple in the country. Over the past decade I have become accustomed to these kinds of requests for support aft er ultranationalist groups catch wind of an individual known for their activism “in support of Haitians” or “espousing gender ideology.” The comments on the offending posts quickly become littered with death threats, racist and xenophobic epithets, and accusations of treason. Often, those who face surveillance and repression due to being identified through traditional and social media are racialized Black women and femmes
The Antigua Orden Dominicana (AOD) is an ultraright-wing, neofascist paramilitary group whose goal is to protect the Dominican Republic “at all costs.” Members of the movement don black combat boots and black military-style uniforms emblazoned on the arm with the Dominican flag and the words “Dios, Patria, Libertad,” (God, Country, Liberty). On Facebook, where AOD has more than 77,000 followers, the group has described itself as a nationalist movement “created for the expulsion of Haitians from Dominican towns and cities.” Over the past decade, AOD members—often while the Dominican national police look away—have regularly disrupted marches and vigils organized by feminist and antiracist groups to denounce human rights violations against Black Haitian migrants and dark-skinned Black Dominicans, women, and LGBTQIA+ communities. Most recently, in October 2023, AOD members threatened and harrassed participants at a vigil in Santo Domingo in solidarity with Palestinians.
Although AOD’s anti-Haitian, anti-Black, and homophobic intimidation tactics might at first appear to be the work of a fringe group, the paramilitary movement is in fact part of a larger historical and regional pattern of right-wing state and non-state violence, censorship, and threats against Black women and migrants over the past century. In recent decades, the Dominican Republic has seen a retrenchment of right-wing, fascist movements that increasingly depend on the solidification of neofascist paramilitary groups. While paramilitary groups were present during previous right-wing regimes and dictatorships, their presence today points to the new contours that shape repression against anyone deemed a threat to Dominican sovereignty.
As the Dominican Republic gears up for the 2024 presidential elections, the scapegoating of Haiti, Haitian migrants, and their descendants is expected to rise. Most recently, these disruptions have extended into educational spaces, where concerns about a bilingual children’s book written in Spanish and Haitian Kreyòl, as well as false narratives about erotic poetry being taught to children, have become lightning rods for the right wing to call for the banning of books and the firing of Black feminist educators. As Black, queer, feminist, and antiracist movements mobilize to denounce state and non-state violence, the number of threats and disruptions from right-wing groups such as AOD will only continue.
Black Dolls, Black Stories
In 2021, Ana María Belique, a Black Dominican woman of Haitian descent, published the bilingual children’s book La muñeca de Dieula, Poupe Dieula. The book, which tells the story of a girl whose mother sews her a Black doll, was part of larger project to enable Black women and girls to see themselves reflected in popular culture. In 2019, Belique and other members of the antiracist movement Reconoci. do launched Muñecas Negras RD, an initiative that creates Black dolls as a way to build intimate spaces of recognition while generating income for marginalized women. It was the beginning of what Belique dubbed pensamiento crítico bateyero, a Black feminist thought and praxis born out of the experiences of Black Dominican women and girls of Haitian descent from sugar cane communities known as the batey.
Women designers living in bateyes—who often face limited work opportunities due to the denial of citizenship to Dominicans of Haitian descent—carefully crafted each doll using locally purchased cloth, thread, and yarn (for the hair). While the first batch was primarily purchased by people living outside of the Dominican Republic, the next generation of dolls were gifted to children within the creators’ own community and sold in Dominican feminist spaces.
Muñecas Negras RD has provided a space for Black Dominican women of Haitian descent to speak about their experiences with gender and racial discrimination. As one of the founders, Maribel Pierre explained, “People think that when they call you Black they are offending you, not knowing that when they call you Black they are reminding you where you are from, who you are, who your ancestors are.” These sentiments, shared by many creators who participated in the making of the dolls, were the impetus for Belique to write La muñeca de Dieula. The story is inspired by one of the young girls of the batey who would often stand by the window to peak in and see what the older girls and women were crafting and discussing.
After the book’s release, Belique and the book’s illustrator and publisher, Michelle Ricardo of Proyecto AntiCanon, were set to present at the 2022 International Book Fair in Santo Domingo. On social media, AOD and its ultranationalist supporters soon began heralding Belique’s book as a sign of the Haitianization of Dominican society. They warned that the book was being read in public schools and teaching children Haitian Kreyòl. They also directly threatened Belique and Ricardo and called for the boycott of the book presentation at the fair, which led to the cancellation of the event. Instead, Ricardo read a poem about the intimidation and threats, which led to further intimidation and threats on social media.
The Rise of Neofascist Groups—and Their Repression
Groups such as AOD argue that the Dominican Republic is a sovereign nation that has a right to defend itself from accusations of human rights violations such as racism, xenophobia, homophobia, or misogyny. In addition to the recent assault on Palestine solidarity demonstrators and backlash against La muñeca de Dieula, far-right groups have repeatedly leveled threats and aggression against human rights defenders, disrupting events including rallies denouncing statelessness, artistic anticolonial performances, human rights commission hearings, and a vigil after the police murder of George Floyd in the United States. While the majority of these events took place in Santo Domingo, far-right groups and individuals have also disrupted educational panels held in New York City, where AOD has a presence.
These kinds of self-identified nationalist disruptions have been on the rise over the past decade. Amaury Rodríguez, a Dominican author and translator whose work highlights Dominican, Caribbean, and Latin American history from below, notes: “The use of repressive forces to squash social protest has become commonplace.” The presence of neofascist paramilitary groups is part of the new contours shaping the repression against anyone deemed a threat to Dominican values. For the human rights activists documenting how threats that emerge in the virtual world spill into physical spaces, the proliferation of nationalist and fascist groups on social media platforms such as Facebook has become increasingly concerning.
In December 2016, at an Inter-American Commission on Human Rights session in Panama City, several Dominican human rights organizations provided a report on the increasing threats of violence against human rights defenders, in particular members of social movements and organizations speaking out against racist and xenophobic government policies. The report detailed how right-wing, self-identified nationalist groups were creating videos and posts online that sought to expose what they referred to as anti-Dominican propaganda. Members of the Dominican civil society delegation listed a series of intimidation tactics, which they put in the context of a long history of threats and physical violence experienced by human rights defenders in the country. They also noted that they had documented and shared their concerns with Dominican authorities, who had not responded to their reports. Since then, at least one of the members of the delegation left the country over concerns for herself and her family.
Civil society groups have continued to call attention to unchecked far-right violence. In October 2022, participants in the jornada anticolonial suffered physical aggression at the hands of AOD, which had called on its members to disrupt the event. For nearly two decades, various social organizations have participated in a series of events each October to denounce national celebrations that glorify Christopher Columbus, colonization, and slavery. In a press conference after the incident, civil society organizations called on President Luis Abinader to demand that groups such as AOD halt their threats and physical aggressions. Despite formal complaints submitted to the prosecutor’s office, there have been no formal investigations or responses from the state.
A Long History of Censorship and Threats
Threats against human rights defenders, and particularly Black women and femmes, are happening alongside an increase in repressive policies that respond to a fear that antiracist organizing and so-called gender ideology threaten racial harmony and Christian patriarchal values across Latin America and the Caribbean. While there has been a rise of right-wing conservative movements across the hemisphere in recent years, the right has held almost uninterrupted power in the Dominican Republic for almost a century. This current moment might look different, but a look back at this past century reveals what many have deemed the continuation of Trujillismo.
In 1930, Dominican dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo came into power after a military coup he helped lead against President Horacio Vásquez. While anti-Haitianism in the Dominican Republic predates the Trujillo dictatorship, it was during his reign that anti-Haitian discourse peaked and turned into genocidal violence. Trujillo orchestrated the 1937 Haitian Massacre by ordering soldiers and enlisting civilians to target Haitians, Dominicans of Haitian descent, and dark-skinned Black Dominicans along the Haitian-Dominican border. To date, there has been no public apology by the Dominican government for this massacre of more than 17,000 Black people. Trujillo was also responsible for the 1960 murder of the Mirabal sisters, who were involved in the June 14 Revolutionary Movement against his dictatorship. The Mirabal sisters’ assassination made them symbols of popular and feminist resistance.
In 1961, Trujillo was assassinated, and political unrest ensued until the election of democratic liberal Juan Bosch Gaviño, who entered office under the Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD) in 1963. Bosch’s rule came to an end, however, seven months after he took office. He was ousted in a coup by military generals sympathetic to the Trujillo regime who were concerned about Bosch’s radical support for labor rights and the poor. Bosch’s exile was followed by further unrest and the United States’ occupation of the country in 1965. Bosch ran again for president in 1966 against Trujillo’s former puppet president Joaquín Balaguer Ricardo, who, over the next 30 years, would hold onto power at all costs. Balaguer’s presidency between 1966 and 1978 is referred to as Los doce años (the 12 years) when it is estimated that more than 1,200 people were murdered by Balaguer’s paramilitary group, known as La Banda Colorá. He returned to power in 1986.
Balaguer represented the continuation of Trujillismo through ongoing anti-Haitian rhetoric. Under his rule, Haitian migrants and their descendants faced racist and repressive tactics, until he finally, but reluctantly, left office in 1996. In that year’s elections, Balaguer’s support for the winning presidential candidate, Leonel Fernández Reyna of the Dominican Liberation Party (PLD), over a Black Dominican of Haitian descent, José Francisco Peña Gómez, paved the way for present-day racist, misogynistic, and xenophobic policies in the country. Throughout this century of repressive policies and violence, Black women and femmes have continuously been at the center of resistance movements—from the fight for agrarian reform that led to the death of revolutionary leader Mamá Tingó in 1974; to the human rights campaigns against anti-Haitianism and anti-Blackness led by the late activist Sonia Pierre; to the recent organizing by antiracist, feminist, and queer youth movements.
New Political Party, Same Right-Wing Policies
In 2024, the Dominican Republic will vote in presidential elections. Over the past four years, the country has been led by President Abinader of the Modern Revolutionary Party (PRM). When the PRM came into office for the first time in 2020, many welcomed the change after 16 consecutive years of rule by the PLD. In 2010, the PLD oversaw a conservative constitutional reform that introduced a full ban on abortions and same-sex marriage and brought an end to birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented migrants. Also, during the PLD’s time in the presidential office, in 2013, the Constitutional Court issued Ruling 168-13, an egregious judgment that retroactively stripped more than four generations of Black Dominicans of Haitian descent of their Dominican citizenship.
At the time, Abinader—already involved in politics and himself a descendant of Lebanese immigrants—had participated in an event called “Abrazos Solidarios” (Solidarity Hugs), denouncing the ruling. After a failed presidential bid in 2016, Abinader’s election in 2020 led many to be hopeful, as well-known figures from Dominican civil society joined the PRM as representatives in different ministries and government offices. However, as Rodríguez notes: “This new government turned out to be completely the opposite of what Abinader promised young voters, women, and progressives during his presidential campaign. Once in power, Abinader proceeded to take off his mask, a liberal facade, retracting his initial support for abortion and using xenophobic and racist anti-Haitian language to instill racial hatred and prejudice against Haitian immigrants and Dominicans of Haitian origin.” According to Rodríguez, Abinader’s government has enacted “a continuity of reactionary policies aimed at further marginalizing Haitian workers and their families in the Dominican Republic. In fact, the Abinader administration is twice as reactionary as it incorporates anti-Haitian racist laws and fascist violence into its repertoire of social control and neoliberal restructuring.”
Like the rising right elsewhere in Latin America, the current Dominican government similarly infringes on people’s rights, stoking anti-immigrant sentiments and trotting out discourses that malign the dignity of women, LGBTQIA+ people, and migrants. Abinader continues to engage in the age-old tactic of scapegoating Haitian migrants and their descendants for the ills of the country. He has promoted the building of a wall along the Haitian-Dominican border, and in September 2023, his administration fully closed the border in response to the development of an irrigation canal on the Haitian side of the shared Massacre River. Abinader argued that building this canal was detrimental to the Dominican environment and, in a show of force, stationed Dominican military officials along the border, preventing the movement of people and goods. As Rodríguez argues: “Abinader’s racist rhetoric and chauvinism—greatly magnified by traditional Dominican media—has created a dangerous climate for people of color in general including Black Dominicans, Haitian immigrants, Dominicans of Haitian origin as well as activists, independent journalists, educators, cultural workers, progressive and left-wing intellectuals. Under Abinader’s rule, the Dominican state is moving toward the establishment of an apartheid system that will further segregate people of Haitian origin regardless of whether or not they were born in the country.”
Abinader has also continued to use decrees to enable the profiling and removal of Haitian migrant laborers and their descendants. Among those targeted for deportation are pregnant migrant Haitian women, a practice fueled by fears that migrant women are taking over public hospitals and draining limited resources. In September 2021, Dominican authorities restricted migrant women’s access to the public health system to cases of emergency and began denying entry into the Dominican Republic of any pregnant migrant beyond six months of gestation. As media networks overflowed with videos and stories of pregnant women or mothers with newborn babies being escorted out of hospitals and detained by immigration officials, the Santo Domingo-based observatory for migrant rights in the Caribbean known as OBMICA denounced the “unprecedented violation of the fundamental right to health care.” Based on the Dominican government’s own accounting, authorities deported nearly 800 pregnant Haitian women between November 2021 and April 2022 alone, leading to condemnation from United Nations experts.
According to Amelia Hintzen, fears of an increase in the number of Dominicans of Haitian descent were evident and documented as early as 1969, when the deputy secretary of the General Directorate of Migration wrote a memorandum to then President Balaguer about the “grave problem” of “the large number of Haitian nationals who have invaded our territory.” It would take another 35 years from the date of this memorandum for authorities to execute legal actions stripping the children of Haitian migrants of their Dominican nationality. In 2004, lawmakers passed General Law on Migration 285-04, which regulated the entry and employment of foreigners in the country. It also sought to end jus soli, the right to soil or birthright citizenship guaranteed by the Dominican constitution at the time, by expanding its definition of “in transit.” Under Law 285-04, all children born to “foreign mothers” must be handed a pink constancia de nacido vivo, certificate of live birth, as opposed to a white one for legal citizens. The newborns are then registered in the Foreign Registry Book, commonly referred to as el libro de extranjeros, the book of foreigners.
The 2010 Constitution enshrined these practices by redefining Dominican nationality. It continues to state that at least one parent must be of Dominican nationality in order for a child to be recognized as a Dominican national. In practice, however, the administrative staff of hospitals hold major discretion when determining whether a mother will receive a white or pink slip, based on their perceptions of the mother’s race and ethnicity. Through Dominican state policies and ongoing outcry from ultranationalists, anyone perceived to be a Haitian woman and their children become a threat to the Dominican nation.
Resistance: Glimmers of Hope
In late 2023, a defamation campaign against Lauristely Peña Solano, cofounder alongside Michelle Ricardo of the Proyecto AntiCanon that published La muñeca de Dieula, led to Peña Solano being ousted from the school where she taught. She was accused of having assigned her students “inappropriate” poetry readings. Feminist activist and lawyer Susi Pola believes that the far-right online smear campaign against Peña Solano was based on “fear and resistance to change from hegemonic conservatism” by the ultraright-wing sector concerned with her “gender ideology” discourse. In an open letter to the school’s families, Peña Solano notes that she has been harassed by ultraright-wing actors and their “bot army” for many years. These attacks were based on her community and human rights projects.
Peña Solano is just one of the most recent in a long list of Black and racialized women and femmes in the Dominican Republic who have been subjected to online defamation campaigns and threats of violence. In her open letter, she speaks directly to the parents: “It is very comfortable to want to clarify your intentions of not harming the school and its director, when they have clearly done everything to harm me, all in the name of good customs and morality, I remind you that throughout history the inquisitors, dictators, and fascists have used that same excuse.”
As Rodríguez notes, the far-right is not only looking to other Latin American and Caribbean spaces, but also actively engaging with far-right political parties beyond the hemisphere, such as Vox in Spain. “The emergence of the far-right and xenophobic Vox party in Spain has created ample opportunities for networking between Dominican center-right and far-right politicians and European rightists,” Rodríguez notes. Among the examples of these ties have been meetings between a Vox representative and Dominican lawmaker Omar Fernández, son of former President Fernández and a member of the center-right Fuerza del Pueblo party. These meetings are quite telling of the mindset of Dominican conservative politicians, who have the audacity to think it is not a big deal to meet or establish political ties with xenophobic, neofascist politicians who target immigrant communities in Spain, including those of Dominican origin.
Still, Rodríguez is clear: “Repelling the fascists is possible.” He points to the importance of a “strong left built on the basis of unity, democracy, and political clarity, in other words, a left that is anti-imperialist in outlook and is adamantly committed to combating all systems of oppression and exploitation including racism and the denationalization of Dominicans of Haitian descent, sexism, homophobia and transphobia.” Rodríguez highlights the important lessons learned during the leftist movement that emerged in the 1960s, which are contributing to the internationalism and anti-imperialism of groups such as the Movimiento Socialista de Trabajadoras y Trabajadores (Socialist Workers Movement, MST), and the myriad of antiracist, feminist, and queer collectives that continue to confront the current wave of neofascism.
These efforts take different forms. As Muñecas Negras RD expands across different bateyes in the Dominican Republic, for instance, they seek to create a space to highlight the work of Black women within their own communities in the past and present. They speak of the importance of recognizing their mothers and grandmothers’ labor as midwives in a context in which Black women are being denied access to birthing in hospitals. As the author and activist Belique explains: “At Muñecas Negras we try to break all social, racial, and gender stereotypes that represent us as inferior. Working with girls, adolescents and young people, we teach that blackness is beautiful, it is valuable, and that we are capable of creating beautiful things.” Muñecas Negras RD and bilingual books such as Belique’s La muñeca de Dieula represent a threat to neofascist groups’ conservative ideologies. They also provide glimmers of hope in resisting this most recent and dangerous iteration of the far right.
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Amarilys Estrella is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Faculty Affiliate of the Center for African and African American Studies at Rice University. She is also a founding member of the collective We Are All Dominican.
“Could you please report this tweet! And if you have the space[,] share with others in your trusted circle of friends to do the same?” I received this text message after the Dominican ultranationalist group Antigua Orden Dominicana posted a tweet outing a queer couple in the country. Over the past decade I have become accustomed to these kinds of requests for support aft er ultranationalist groups catch wind of an individual known for their activism “in support of Haitians” or “espousing gender ideology.” The comments on the offending posts quickly become littered with death threats, racist and xenophobic epithets, and accusations of treason. Often, those who face surveillance and repression due to being identified through traditional and social media are racialized Black women and femmes
The Antigua Orden Dominicana (AOD) is an ultraright-wing, neofascist paramilitary group whose goal is to protect the Dominican Republic “at all costs.” Members of the movement don black combat boots and black military-style uniforms emblazoned on the arm with the Dominican flag and the words “Dios, Patria, Libertad,” (God, Country, Liberty). On Facebook, where AOD has more than 77,000 followers, the group has described itself as a nationalist movement “created for the expulsion of Haitians from Dominican towns and cities.” Over the past decade, AOD members—often while the Dominican national police look away—have regularly disrupted marches and vigils organized by feminist and antiracist groups to denounce human rights violations against Black Haitian migrants and dark-skinned Black Dominicans, women, and LGBTQIA+ communities. Most recently, in October 2023, AOD members threatened and harrassed participants at a vigil in Santo Domingo in solidarity with Palestinians.
Although AOD’s anti-Haitian, anti-Black, and homophobic intimidation tactics might at first appear to be the work of a fringe group, the paramilitary movement is in fact part of a larger historical and regional pattern of right-wing state and non-state violence, censorship, and threats against Black women and migrants over the past century. In recent decades, the Dominican Republic has seen a retrenchment of right-wing, fascist movements that increasingly depend on the solidification of neofascist paramilitary groups. While paramilitary groups were present during previous right-wing regimes and dictatorships, their presence today points to the new contours that shape repression against anyone deemed a threat to Dominican sovereignty.
As the Dominican Republic gears up for the 2024 presidential elections, the scapegoating of Haiti, Haitian migrants, and their descendants is expected to rise. Most recently, these disruptions have extended into educational spaces, where concerns about a bilingual children’s book written in Spanish and Haitian Kreyòl, as well as false narratives about erotic poetry being taught to children, have become lightning rods for the right wing to call for the banning of books and the firing of Black feminist educators. As Black, queer, feminist, and antiracist movements mobilize to denounce state and non-state violence, the number of threats and disruptions from right-wing groups such as AOD will only continue.
Black Dolls, Black Stories
In 2021, Ana María Belique, a Black Dominican woman of Haitian descent, published the bilingual children’s book La muñeca de Dieula, Poupe Dieula. The book, which tells the story of a girl whose mother sews her a Black doll, was part of larger project to enable Black women and girls to see themselves reflected in popular culture. In 2019, Belique and other members of the antiracist movement Reconoci. do launched Muñecas Negras RD, an initiative that creates Black dolls as a way to build intimate spaces of recognition while generating income for marginalized women. It was the beginning of what Belique dubbed pensamiento crítico bateyero, a Black feminist thought and praxis born out of the experiences of Black Dominican women and girls of Haitian descent from sugar cane communities known as the batey.
Women designers living in bateyes—who often face limited work opportunities due to the denial of citizenship to Dominicans of Haitian descent—carefully crafted each doll using locally purchased cloth, thread, and yarn (for the hair). While the first batch was primarily purchased by people living outside of the Dominican Republic, the next generation of dolls were gifted to children within the creators’ own community and sold in Dominican feminist spaces.
Muñecas Negras RD has provided a space for Black Dominican women of Haitian descent to speak about their experiences with gender and racial discrimination. As one of the founders, Maribel Pierre explained, “People think that when they call you Black they are offending you, not knowing that when they call you Black they are reminding you where you are from, who you are, who your ancestors are.” These sentiments, shared by many creators who participated in the making of the dolls, were the impetus for Belique to write La muñeca de Dieula. The story is inspired by one of the young girls of the batey who would often stand by the window to peak in and see what the older girls and women were crafting and discussing.
After the book’s release, Belique and the book’s illustrator and publisher, Michelle Ricardo of Proyecto AntiCanon, were set to present at the 2022 International Book Fair in Santo Domingo. On social media, AOD and its ultranationalist supporters soon began heralding Belique’s book as a sign of the Haitianization of Dominican society. They warned that the book was being read in public schools and teaching children Haitian Kreyòl. They also directly threatened Belique and Ricardo and called for the boycott of the book presentation at the fair, which led to the cancellation of the event. Instead, Ricardo read a poem about the intimidation and threats, which led to further intimidation and threats on social media.
The Rise of Neofascist Groups—and Their Repression
Groups such as AOD argue that the Dominican Republic is a sovereign nation that has a right to defend itself from accusations of human rights violations such as racism, xenophobia, homophobia, or misogyny. In addition to the recent assault on Palestine solidarity demonstrators and backlash against La muñeca de Dieula, far-right groups have repeatedly leveled threats and aggression against human rights defenders, disrupting events including rallies denouncing statelessness, artistic anticolonial performances, human rights commission hearings, and a vigil after the police murder of George Floyd in the United States. While the majority of these events took place in Santo Domingo, far-right groups and individuals have also disrupted educational panels held in New York City, where AOD has a presence.
These kinds of self-identified nationalist disruptions have been on the rise over the past decade. Amaury Rodríguez, a Dominican author and translator whose work highlights Dominican, Caribbean, and Latin American history from below, notes: “The use of repressive forces to squash social protest has become commonplace.” The presence of neofascist paramilitary groups is part of the new contours shaping the repression against anyone deemed a threat to Dominican values. For the human rights activists documenting how threats that emerge in the virtual world spill into physical spaces, the proliferation of nationalist and fascist groups on social media platforms such as Facebook has become increasingly concerning.
In December 2016, at an Inter-American Commission on Human Rights session in Panama City, several Dominican human rights organizations provided a report on the increasing threats of violence against human rights defenders, in particular members of social movements and organizations speaking out against racist and xenophobic government policies. The report detailed how right-wing, self-identified nationalist groups were creating videos and posts online that sought to expose what they referred to as anti-Dominican propaganda. Members of the Dominican civil society delegation listed a series of intimidation tactics, which they put in the context of a long history of threats and physical violence experienced by human rights defenders in the country. They also noted that they had documented and shared their concerns with Dominican authorities, who had not responded to their reports. Since then, at least one of the members of the delegation left the country over concerns for herself and her family.
Civil society groups have continued to call attention to unchecked far-right violence. In October 2022, participants in the jornada anticolonial suffered physical aggression at the hands of AOD, which had called on its members to disrupt the event. For nearly two decades, various social organizations have participated in a series of events each October to denounce national celebrations that glorify Christopher Columbus, colonization, and slavery. In a press conference after the incident, civil society organizations called on President Luis Abinader to demand that groups such as AOD halt their threats and physical aggressions. Despite formal complaints submitted to the prosecutor’s office, there have been no formal investigations or responses from the state.
A Long History of Censorship and Threats
Threats against human rights defenders, and particularly Black women and femmes, are happening alongside an increase in repressive policies that respond to a fear that antiracist organizing and so-called gender ideology threaten racial harmony and Christian patriarchal values across Latin America and the Caribbean. While there has been a rise of right-wing conservative movements across the hemisphere in recent years, the right has held almost uninterrupted power in the Dominican Republic for almost a century. This current moment might look different, but a look back at this past century reveals what many have deemed the continuation of Trujillismo.
In 1930, Dominican dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo came into power after a military coup he helped lead against President Horacio Vásquez. While anti-Haitianism in the Dominican Republic predates the Trujillo dictatorship, it was during his reign that anti-Haitian discourse peaked and turned into genocidal violence. Trujillo orchestrated the 1937 Haitian Massacre by ordering soldiers and enlisting civilians to target Haitians, Dominicans of Haitian descent, and dark-skinned Black Dominicans along the Haitian-Dominican border. To date, there has been no public apology by the Dominican government for this massacre of more than 17,000 Black people. Trujillo was also responsible for the 1960 murder of the Mirabal sisters, who were involved in the June 14 Revolutionary Movement against his dictatorship. The Mirabal sisters’ assassination made them symbols of popular and feminist resistance.
In 1961, Trujillo was assassinated, and political unrest ensued until the election of democratic liberal Juan Bosch Gaviño, who entered office under the Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD) in 1963. Bosch’s rule came to an end, however, seven months after he took office. He was ousted in a coup by military generals sympathetic to the Trujillo regime who were concerned about Bosch’s radical support for labor rights and the poor. Bosch’s exile was followed by further unrest and the United States’ occupation of the country in 1965. Bosch ran again for president in 1966 against Trujillo’s former puppet president Joaquín Balaguer Ricardo, who, over the next 30 years, would hold onto power at all costs. Balaguer’s presidency between 1966 and 1978 is referred to as Los doce años (the 12 years) when it is estimated that more than 1,200 people were murdered by Balaguer’s paramilitary group, known as La Banda Colorá. He returned to power in 1986.
Balaguer represented the continuation of Trujillismo through ongoing anti-Haitian rhetoric. Under his rule, Haitian migrants and their descendants faced racist and repressive tactics, until he finally, but reluctantly, left office in 1996. In that year’s elections, Balaguer’s support for the winning presidential candidate, Leonel Fernández Reyna of the Dominican Liberation Party (PLD), over a Black Dominican of Haitian descent, José Francisco Peña Gómez, paved the way for present-day racist, misogynistic, and xenophobic policies in the country. Throughout this century of repressive policies and violence, Black women and femmes have continuously been at the center of resistance movements—from the fight for agrarian reform that led to the death of revolutionary leader Mamá Tingó in 1974; to the human rights campaigns against anti-Haitianism and anti-Blackness led by the late activist Sonia Pierre; to the recent organizing by antiracist, feminist, and queer youth movements.
New Political Party, Same Right-Wing Policies
In 2024, the Dominican Republic will vote in presidential elections. Over the past four years, the country has been led by President Abinader of the Modern Revolutionary Party (PRM). When the PRM came into office for the first time in 2020, many welcomed the change after 16 consecutive years of rule by the PLD. In 2010, the PLD oversaw a conservative constitutional reform that introduced a full ban on abortions and same-sex marriage and brought an end to birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented migrants. Also, during the PLD’s time in the presidential office, in 2013, the Constitutional Court issued Ruling 168-13, an egregious judgment that retroactively stripped more than four generations of Black Dominicans of Haitian descent of their Dominican citizenship.
At the time, Abinader—already involved in politics and himself a descendant of Lebanese immigrants—had participated in an event called “Abrazos Solidarios” (Solidarity Hugs), denouncing the ruling. After a failed presidential bid in 2016, Abinader’s election in 2020 led many to be hopeful, as well-known figures from Dominican civil society joined the PRM as representatives in different ministries and government offices. However, as Rodríguez notes: “This new government turned out to be completely the opposite of what Abinader promised young voters, women, and progressives during his presidential campaign. Once in power, Abinader proceeded to take off his mask, a liberal facade, retracting his initial support for abortion and using xenophobic and racist anti-Haitian language to instill racial hatred and prejudice against Haitian immigrants and Dominicans of Haitian origin.” According to Rodríguez, Abinader’s government has enacted “a continuity of reactionary policies aimed at further marginalizing Haitian workers and their families in the Dominican Republic. In fact, the Abinader administration is twice as reactionary as it incorporates anti-Haitian racist laws and fascist violence into its repertoire of social control and neoliberal restructuring.”
Like the rising right elsewhere in Latin America, the current Dominican government similarly infringes on people’s rights, stoking anti-immigrant sentiments and trotting out discourses that malign the dignity of women, LGBTQIA+ people, and migrants. Abinader continues to engage in the age-old tactic of scapegoating Haitian migrants and their descendants for the ills of the country. He has promoted the building of a wall along the Haitian-Dominican border, and in September 2023, his administration fully closed the border in response to the development of an irrigation canal on the Haitian side of the shared Massacre River. Abinader argued that building this canal was detrimental to the Dominican environment and, in a show of force, stationed Dominican military officials along the border, preventing the movement of people and goods. As Rodríguez argues: “Abinader’s racist rhetoric and chauvinism—greatly magnified by traditional Dominican media—has created a dangerous climate for people of color in general including Black Dominicans, Haitian immigrants, Dominicans of Haitian origin as well as activists, independent journalists, educators, cultural workers, progressive and left-wing intellectuals. Under Abinader’s rule, the Dominican state is moving toward the establishment of an apartheid system that will further segregate people of Haitian origin regardless of whether or not they were born in the country.”
Abinader has also continued to use decrees to enable the profiling and removal of Haitian migrant laborers and their descendants. Among those targeted for deportation are pregnant migrant Haitian women, a practice fueled by fears that migrant women are taking over public hospitals and draining limited resources. In September 2021, Dominican authorities restricted migrant women’s access to the public health system to cases of emergency and began denying entry into the Dominican Republic of any pregnant migrant beyond six months of gestation. As media networks overflowed with videos and stories of pregnant women or mothers with newborn babies being escorted out of hospitals and detained by immigration officials, the Santo Domingo-based observatory for migrant rights in the Caribbean known as OBMICA denounced the “unprecedented violation of the fundamental right to health care.” Based on the Dominican government’s own accounting, authorities deported nearly 800 pregnant Haitian women between November 2021 and April 2022 alone, leading to condemnation from United Nations experts.
According to Amelia Hintzen, fears of an increase in the number of Dominicans of Haitian descent were evident and documented as early as 1969, when the deputy secretary of the General Directorate of Migration wrote a memorandum to then President Balaguer about the “grave problem” of “the large number of Haitian nationals who have invaded our territory.” It would take another 35 years from the date of this memorandum for authorities to execute legal actions stripping the children of Haitian migrants of their Dominican nationality. In 2004, lawmakers passed General Law on Migration 285-04, which regulated the entry and employment of foreigners in the country. It also sought to end jus soli, the right to soil or birthright citizenship guaranteed by the Dominican constitution at the time, by expanding its definition of “in transit.” Under Law 285-04, all children born to “foreign mothers” must be handed a pink constancia de nacido vivo, certificate of live birth, as opposed to a white one for legal citizens. The newborns are then registered in the Foreign Registry Book, commonly referred to as el libro de extranjeros, the book of foreigners.
The 2010 Constitution enshrined these practices by redefining Dominican nationality. It continues to state that at least one parent must be of Dominican nationality in order for a child to be recognized as a Dominican national. In practice, however, the administrative staff of hospitals hold major discretion when determining whether a mother will receive a white or pink slip, based on their perceptions of the mother’s race and ethnicity. Through Dominican state policies and ongoing outcry from ultranationalists, anyone perceived to be a Haitian woman and their children become a threat to the Dominican nation.
Resistance: Glimmers of Hope
In late 2023, a defamation campaign against Lauristely Peña Solano, cofounder alongside Michelle Ricardo of the Proyecto AntiCanon that published La muñeca de Dieula, led to Peña Solano being ousted from the school where she taught. She was accused of having assigned her students “inappropriate” poetry readings. Feminist activist and lawyer Susi Pola believes that the far-right online smear campaign against Peña Solano was based on “fear and resistance to change from hegemonic conservatism” by the ultraright-wing sector concerned with her “gender ideology” discourse. In an open letter to the school’s families, Peña Solano notes that she has been harassed by ultraright-wing actors and their “bot army” for many years. These attacks were based on her community and human rights projects.
Peña Solano is just one of the most recent in a long list of Black and racialized women and femmes in the Dominican Republic who have been subjected to online defamation campaigns and threats of violence. In her open letter, she speaks directly to the parents: “It is very comfortable to want to clarify your intentions of not harming the school and its director, when they have clearly done everything to harm me, all in the name of good customs and morality, I remind you that throughout history the inquisitors, dictators, and fascists have used that same excuse.”
As Rodríguez notes, the far-right is not only looking to other Latin American and Caribbean spaces, but also actively engaging with far-right political parties beyond the hemisphere, such as Vox in Spain. “The emergence of the far-right and xenophobic Vox party in Spain has created ample opportunities for networking between Dominican center-right and far-right politicians and European rightists,” Rodríguez notes. Among the examples of these ties have been meetings between a Vox representative and Dominican lawmaker Omar Fernández, son of former President Fernández and a member of the center-right Fuerza del Pueblo party. These meetings are quite telling of the mindset of Dominican conservative politicians, who have the audacity to think it is not a big deal to meet or establish political ties with xenophobic, neofascist politicians who target immigrant communities in Spain, including those of Dominican origin.
Still, Rodríguez is clear: “Repelling the fascists is possible.” He points to the importance of a “strong left built on the basis of unity, democracy, and political clarity, in other words, a left that is anti-imperialist in outlook and is adamantly committed to combating all systems of oppression and exploitation including racism and the denationalization of Dominicans of Haitian descent, sexism, homophobia and transphobia.” Rodríguez highlights the important lessons learned during the leftist movement that emerged in the 1960s, which are contributing to the internationalism and anti-imperialism of groups such as the Movimiento Socialista de Trabajadoras y Trabajadores (Socialist Workers Movement, MST), and the myriad of antiracist, feminist, and queer collectives that continue to confront the current wave of neofascism.
These efforts take different forms. As Muñecas Negras RD expands across different bateyes in the Dominican Republic, for instance, they seek to create a space to highlight the work of Black women within their own communities in the past and present. They speak of the importance of recognizing their mothers and grandmothers’ labor as midwives in a context in which Black women are being denied access to birthing in hospitals. As the author and activist Belique explains: “At Muñecas Negras we try to break all social, racial, and gender stereotypes that represent us as inferior. Working with girls, adolescents and young people, we teach that blackness is beautiful, it is valuable, and that we are capable of creating beautiful things.” Muñecas Negras RD and bilingual books such as Belique’s La muñeca de Dieula represent a threat to neofascist groups’ conservative ideologies. They also provide glimmers of hope in resisting this most recent and dangerous iteration of the far right.
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Amarilys Estrella is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Faculty Affiliate of the Center for African and African American Studies at Rice University. She is also a founding member of the collective We Are All Dominican.
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