Springfield, Ohio, continues to deal with the fallout of becoming the unwanted focus of the 2024 election. The city evacuated two elementary schools on Friday and closed a middle school before classes even began, reports the Springfield News-Sun. The moves come a day after bomb threats were sent to multiple city agencies, including one that prompted an evacuation of City Hall, per ABC News. All this follows unfounded allegations that Haitian immigrants in the city were abducting and eating pets, a claim that Donald Trump promoted in this week's presidential debate.
Thursday's bomb threats included what the Hill describes as "hateful language" against the city's migrant population. (The city has indeed had a large influx of Haitians who have moved there legally to work in various industries, according to a city FAQ page.) Police and city officials say that the despite the widespread rumors, they have no actual reports about pets being taken. The site NewsGuard, meanwhile, interviewed two local residents central to a Facebook post that played a role in kick-starting the rumor. In it, a person wrote, "A neighbor informed me that her (daughter's) friend had lost her cat," adding that the cat was found hanging near where many Haitians live.
Did this actually happen? "I'm not sure I'm the most credible source because I don't actually know the person who lost the cat," Kimberly Newton, the neighbor in the above scenario, tells the outlet. She said she passed along the story she heard second-hand, adding, "I don't have any proof." The person who posted the rumor on Facebook, Erika Lee, said that she was "just trying to inform people, you know, again, not saying Haitians as a whole [are] bad." (More Election 2024 stories.)
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