1001: Haiti | Out of the Loop

1001: Haiti | Out of the Loop

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[00:00:00] Jordan Harbinger: Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger Show. We decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker through long form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs, athletes, authors, thinkers, performers, even the occasional war correspondent, neuroscientists, real life pirate, special operator or astronaut.

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That'll help new listeners get a taste of everything we do here on the show. Just visit Jordan harbinger.com/starts, or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. By the way, all I'm not sick. I'm just doing this really early in the morning before a flight. This is my pre-flight voice. My guest today is Wolf Penfield from the Haiti Policy House in Washington dc.

I have been wanting to talk to y'all about Haiti and update you on what is going on there, and Haiti just seems like such an amazing place. There's a rich history. Of course we never really hear anything good about Haiti, not in the news anyway, don't get me wrong. This is not going to be a feel good episode either.

But we will dive into a brief history of Haiti. We'll discuss the roots of its current and past instability. Also, we'll touch on Haiti's neighbor, the Dominican Republic. You might know that place as the country where like half of New York is from Wolf. And I started with some history of Haiti, including a brief history of Haiti as a colony.

Independence from France, then getting screwed over by one country after another. The recent Kenyan police force traveling to Haiti to take on the crazy gang, supposedly will also unpack the downfall of the most recent government with the president was assassinated in his own bedroom. And explore the breakdown of rule of law in Haiti.

Take over by these terrifying gangs and more. Alright, let's get back in the loop on Haiti with Wolf Pam Field. I think before we dive into Haiti, tell us. A little bit about yourself because I think one of the dangers I ran into was I was looking for a Haiti expert, and I found a lot of people that probably never lived in Haiti, probably haven't been there in a long time, might not have even ever been to Haiti.

I kind of wanted to avoid that, and then when you came recommended, I was like, all right, this guy speaks with some authority. So tell us.

[00:02:27] Wolf Pamphile: Tell

[00:02:28] Jordan Harbinger: us why.

[00:02:28] Wolf Pamphile: No, thank you. Listen, I appreciate it because it is a thing whenever you see some Haiti experts on TV or radio, any podcast. Yeah. It's some of the time it's like somebody who's not in Haitian or haven't been to Haiti in the past 30, 40 years.

Mm-hmm. For me, I was born and raised in Haiti in a city called Caucasian, which is the north side of the island, and I left Haiti when I was 14. My family and I moved to Brooklyn. I mean, it was right after the Kuta with President Jambe Jambe.

[00:02:58] Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. We would say Risid if people, people following along at home that don't speak French Risid or Aris Tide, as you might hear on YouTube, which is not correct.

Aris.

[00:03:07] Wolf Pamphile: Aris. Aris. Yeah. Lot of different ways, but Haitian we just say, right, 'cause of the French. Yep. I got you. You

[00:03:15] Jordan Harbinger: moved to Brooklyn as one Does as many Haitians have done. Many Haitians, f Flatbush,

[00:03:18] Wolf Pamphile: Brooklyn in fighting by this. Watching from f Flatbush, Brooklyn lived there for 18 years and then I moved to DC last year to launch Haiti Policy House.

[00:03:27] Jordan Harbinger: What was it like growing up in Haiti back then? Because I, when I started researching Haiti, I was like, oh, this place hasn't been stable since, and I was like, checks, notes, 1750 or whatever. I mean, it's just been like one thing after another. Yeah, but since before America was a country, basically.

[00:03:44] Wolf Pamphile: Okay, let's put it this way.

There are different realities in Haiti, right? Different situations. If we're talking about portal brands. Then there's always something happening. But the city that I grew up in, unless there's something catastrophic or something really egregious happening, you won't really know that there are, um, situations going on.

Port-au-Prince is always some kind of like a protest or crimes. There's always some kind of high crime rate, almost like any other big city. Mm-Hmm. And growing up in Haiti, went to school by myself since I was 10. When you say by yourself, you mean like walking to school alone? Yeah, walking to school by myself.

Actually, I, the day I actually started going to school by myself, I escaped. I was waiting for the guy to come pick me up and I just took off. So ever since then, my mom was like, oh, you know what? You survived, so let's keep you going. You escaped what? The school bus basically? No. So they hired somebody to come take me and then take me to school.

Oh, I see. And then as we were waiting, I told 'em I can't go. And she's like, no, just wait for him. You know? My father was like a free ma, so one of his brothers would come pick me up. So he's like, nah, um, just wait for him. Um, brother Caesar's coming and then I just looked left and right, looked at the gate and I just took off.

I was like, okay. And when I gotta to school, I was happy. Next thing you know, my mother came in crying. The brother Caesar came in crying. You know, it's like, where is he? They thought I got kidnapped. Right? But you know, I'm 10. So in my head I'm thinking, I'm in school. I'm fine. Everything is okay. Oh my, you're poor mom.

But that to say things were safe, we didn't have to worry about kidnappings until like early 2000, like 2007, 2008, that's when kidnapping started coming around. More popular.

[00:05:20] Jordan Harbinger: Okay. But

[00:05:20] Wolf Pamphile: we didn't have to worry about that growing up. It was just a, you know, peaceful time. Relatively peaceful time. But we had a election prior to that.

That's first I can remember, right? The same month I was born was the month that they were overthrowing IT So there was a lot of chaos going on. And then fast forward, he came back a couple times, but We'll, we'll

[00:05:39] Jordan Harbinger: get there. We'll get there. Yeah. 'cause you, you hear about kids going to school in Haiti and I think I'd read something like.

This is again, Porto Prince, the Capitol kids would have to go through people's homes because everything's so packed in, it's so densely populated. They would walk through people's homes because if you went in the streets, it was dangerous with gangs or whatever. And so kids are talking about like, people would just let school kids walk through their house, go into the neighbor's window, and then out the kitchen and then into the next neighbor.

And that, just like, that to me sounds like a war zone.

[00:06:12] Wolf Pamphile: I mean, I'll say this, there is some level of exaggeration there. Okay. There are these neighborhoods that are densely populated. Yeah. And they have this, um, layout called means a hallway. Mm-Hmm. So the houses, they're so close to each other. So the street you walking in, or the path you're walking in is pretty much like a hallway.

Right. So when there's, say like somebody there, you can take the main road or you can go through the Kwa. Which means like you walking through, you mean you could walk through somebody's house if they really wanted you to? Mm-Hmm. But it's just very close. You can touch both sides if you really wanted to.

I see. Just like a hallway

[00:06:48] Jordan Harbinger: that makes more sense than somebody crawling through your kitchen to get to school. I think they were just trying to avoid main roads from the sound and they say now it's even more unsafe, and kids just stopped going to school in Port-au-Prince. Yeah. Which makes sense. Yeah.

Let's back up a little bit because the brief history of Haiti would be well placed here. Mm-Hmm. Haiti starts as essentially a colony of,

[00:07:08] Wolf Pamphile: of France, correct? Well, at first it was the Spanish and then France took it over from the Spanish because you know, Christopher Columbus came in at first from Spain and then French took it over.

What they decided, the French would have the side that is currently Haiti, and then the Spanish would have the side that is currently Dominican Republic, which is why one half speaks French, the other half speaks Spanish. And then right around 1790 this rumbling of revolution to Celebr came into the picture.

Deline, all these guys came up. And the next 14 years they fought the French for independence.

[00:07:41] Jordan Harbinger: Like this was a horrific conflict. I read something like 200,000 people died. Yeah. Both French and Haitians, locals, I guess you would say Natives, uh, if you can use that word. And the French ultimately retreat, but 200,000 people, I mean that is, that's horrific.

[00:07:57] Wolf Pamphile: Yeah. The French took a devastating blow, to be honest. Yeah. They took a devastating blow. The Haitians really, because it essentially, Haitians have lived on this island for, you know, centuries. They know it back and forth, and the French never really got used to the territories. So Haiti is after their advantage.

And when it came down to it, it was just a matter of who was willing to fight longer than the other. Mm-Hmm. And when you put the possibility of freedom as a goal or as a reward, then people are gonna fight to the end to get to that. Mm-Hmm. And I don't think France was ready to fight as long as it.

Needed to, to keep that fight. And just that the Haitians wanted more than that. So

[00:08:39] Jordan Harbinger: yeah. The French had been what? Taking slaves then from Africa and dropping them off in Haiti and essentially using it as, uh, agricultural colony. What were they producing? Their sugar cane and stuff, or, or, so

[00:08:51] Wolf Pamphile: Haiti as they call it, back in the day, it was, um, lapel descent tea, which means the Pearl of the Caribbean or the Inis.

Mm-Hmm. And because it was one of the largest producers of coffee sugar, and it was one of the largest producer for France and around the world, essentially. Right? Mm-Hmm. That lasted all through the 18 hundreds. Even in the early 18, like 1820s or so, when Greece became independent, when they were fighting for independence, they reached out to Haiti for support, and Haiti didn't have any money, so they sent them like 25 tons of coffee.

Like, Hey, we don't have any money, but we have a lot of coffee, so sell this, buy guns, get your independence. And that's how Greece was able to. Fight for their independence as well. Huh? So, Haiti produced a lot of coffee, a lot of sugar cane. A lot of sugar in general, and that's what it was known for back in the days.

[00:09:41] Jordan Harbinger: That's amazing. The whole revolution there was quite really kind of gross. It, there's a really good video on YouTube about Haiti from real life law. We'll link to that in the show notes of people are interested. But it's a lot of deep history on Haiti and the Dominican Republic actually. So this leads to the French indemnity.

Can you tell us about that? 'cause that is sort of one of these turning points where you go, oh, they got free. Okay, do, do, do. Everything should be more or less on the up and up after that. And it's like, eh, we're gonna shackle you for the next 200 years.

[00:10:10] Wolf Pamphile: And this is the a bit of a, I guess, part of history that it was hard for people to understand.

Mm-Hmm. Because essentially French saw Haitians or the slaves as properties. You know, if you lose your property. You want to be compensated for it. So what they wanted was when Haiti became free, they said that they wanted to be compensated for every single person that was free. So slave owners in there, they send in their kids, their spouses.

We had to pay them for the property that they lost. Wow. And it was called the, the Haiti debt. And if you look up the Haiti debt, it's, it even comes up in, in, uh, stories like, uh, camp Monte Cristo when they're talking about the Haiti debt that they were benefiting from. And they were looking forward to getting back.

And that really shackled Haiti. It took Haiti about 122 years to pay that back. So from eighteen oh four, a hundred twenty two years later, it's like, what? Early 19 hundreds?

[00:11:07] Jordan Harbinger: Yeah.

[00:11:07] Wolf Pamphile: Like World War. I was, you know, getting ready to start when Haiti finished paying that debt off.

[00:11:12] Jordan Harbinger: Yeah.

[00:11:12] Wolf Pamphile: And so you think about 122 years of not making any progress and having to pay friends back.

And as soon as you're about to start again, something else comes up.

[00:11:21] Jordan Harbinger: And one of the ways I found this quite interesting, if you look at the island of Espanola, which is where Haiti is on one side, and the Dominican Republic on the other side, if you look at that from space, like a satellite photo. Yep.

Haiti has basically no trees and I, I mean relatively speaking, the DR is just like this really well forested area. I don't know what's on the border, maybe some towns, but there's tons and tons of trees and I wondered why that happened. I thought maybe y'all built a ton of buildings outta wood, but it turns out that Haitians cut all the trees down because they paid part of the debt to France in timber and they cut almost all the trees down in the whole country over that 122 year period.

It's really kind of horrific actually. Yeah.

[00:12:03] Wolf Pamphile: So things kind of spiraled, right? You can only produce so much coffee, you can only produce so much sugar cane. And then second that you are paying that debt off while trying to build a country. Mm-hmm. Building schools, hospitals, roads, everything else. At the same time when the same timber that you're selling off you giving to friends, you're also using it to cook.

'cause back then we didn't have any, you know, gas or electricity, things like that. So even when the debt was done, to this day, we're still using, to some extent, people are still using wood or charcoal to make charcoal to cook with. I mean, I've used them when I lived in Haiti to cook. So it's one of those, I guess, lack of technology that's really bringing the country down in a way that is destroy the environment.

Some sections of Haiti do have large vegetation, but on a macro level, the compared to Democrat Republic, it's not the same level. There've been programs to reforestation, to plant trees, but it's just been very sporadic. So it hasn't caught on.

[00:13:06] Jordan Harbinger: It's hard to replace a hundred years of deforestation Exactly.

In a short period of time when there's also instability because it's not like even after that debt was paid off, which by the way, that wasn't just paid to France. I, I started looking at this, Citibank ended up Mm-Hmm. Which is an American bank. Ended up with this debt due to, I don't know, the way the banks do things, buying stuff, moving stuff around.

So the US is complicit here too. This is in the early 19 hundreds. Exactly. And then the US invaded Haiti in 1915, actually invaded the Dominican Republic in 1916. So basically invaded the whole island. I'm not totally sure why that happened. Maybe you can tell me.

[00:13:40] Wolf Pamphile: So essentially Haiti saw a wave of early migrants to Haiti, right?

From different parts of the world. We're talking about migrants from, uh, the Middle East, migrants from Europe, and. When they arrived to Haiti, they started building businesses. And that's something you can look up in the New York Times, you'll see the US occupied Haiti in 1915 mm-Hmm. In the years leading to that, you saw like business owners who were American citizens were asking the US to intervene in Haiti because they were facing unfriendly or disadvantageous business practices.

Mm-hmm. Things that were affecting their businesses. So around that time, like, uh, in. 1915, the US came in and then with the mono doctrine, and they did not want any European countries to come into the region to do any administration for any countries like Spain or France to come back to do any of that.

Right. Okay.

[00:14:39] Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. So the Monroe Doctrine was kind of like, why are all these European powers building colonies right near us? We should probably sort of Exactly. Not do the same thing, but at least keep them out of our backyard. That was the Monroe Doctrine. Exactly. If memory serves.

[00:14:51] Wolf Pamphile: Okay. So the US came in and the first thing they did was they went to the treasury in Haiti, and then they loaded all the gold that wasn't a treasury.

And within a few days that goal was in the federal building in, in New York City, wall. Street Street. Oh my gosh. And that was never paid back. Wow. So we just looted Haiti. So imagine Haiti finished paying that debt in the early 1900, like few years before that. Then at 1915, right when they were about to start again, the US came in and then took all that.

[00:15:21] Jordan Harbinger: Geez.

[00:15:21] Wolf Pamphile: So it never really got the chance to, no. To even get started,

[00:15:25] Jordan Harbinger: this is like every time Haiti got off the ground and onto one knee, somebody came by and kicked y'all down again over and over for centuries. Like I'm not usually a blame foreign powers for your country not developing like I am. And I'm very much like, oh, America bad.

We get it. We're the bad. But Haiti's one of those examples where it's like the whole fricking world has ganged up on Haiti at one point or another and taken a shot at it. It's really, really unfortunate. There's almost nobody who's gone through that in the Western hemisphere quite like y'all. It's really something.

[00:16:01] Wolf Pamphile: And when you really think about it, the question is why. Right? And the why is. I mean, the US is the oldest country in the Western hemisphere and Haiti is second.

[00:16:11] Jordan Harbinger: Hmm.

[00:16:11] Wolf Pamphile: The US was free in 1776 and a couple years later, the Haiti was free in 1804. So there's no other countries can say that. And the second oldest country after the US is also a black nation.

So, and you have rebellion sort of popping up in the us like the Nat Turner Rebellion. Mm-Hmm. And Latin America. So there was a clear message to make sure that this country does not become like a, a model or a template for success.

[00:16:37] Jordan Harbinger: A portion of the revenue from this episode goes to the children of Haiti.

Speaking of which, we'll be right back.

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You can find the course@sixminutenetworking.com. Alright, now back to out of the loop on Haiti with Wolf Penfield. 'cause it would be scary if. Every place that had brought in slaves from Africa suddenly had an uprising and then became independent and successful. So it, there was almost a vested interest in like making sure it looks like a terrible place to live, or is a terrible place to live.

'cause that wasn't the end of it. I mean, it looks like, and we'll get onto modern stuff here in a second, but Haiti had brutal dictators. So there was a police state essentially until 1986. This is like some cold war shit, right? This is police state. Until 1986. There was a coup that ended that, or it could very well still be a police state that was pro-US anti-communist.

They killed like 60,000 people with secret police. Basically anybody who looked like they might want something that's not an authoritarian regime. Yep. And it was just like it Father passed it down to his son. I mean, this is like not a place that you would wanna live in. In the eighties, from the fifties to the eighties,

[00:20:29] Wolf Pamphile: in the fifties, the Deval regime came into power with f Deval.

He was not a Papa Doc, so a lot of people would know that name, Papa Doc, baby doc, father and son. And there are a lot of Netflix series about him as well. And essentially he came into power because he stayed in power because right around the Cold War, the US needed some kind of a dictator or leader that could counteract Russia and communism and as many people as he killed, no one ever really went against him because he was fulfilling that need for the us.

He changed the constitution to become president for life. And then right, right after he passed away, his son came into power also president for life. And that went on for over 20 years. Hmm. And in the late eighties there was a big coup in the maku, which were, you're talking about the private police. They call him the to.

They essentially were part of the army. Well, there was the army, but at the same time the MKU was essentially responding directly to the president. So it was like a presidential guard situation. Exactly. But they were like very, very, um, it started in the rural areas. So he empowered the rural areas saying like, Hey, this take whatever is yours, you are not in power.

They've been holding you down for so long. Now it's your time to rise. Here are guns, machetes and everything. Rule for me. Protect me. I will be your champion. And that's how the MACO thing spiral. Then it become this whole massive maligned power going on around Haiti.

[00:22:00] Jordan Harbinger: Okay. So you said you speak French, but it's not quite the same as French and France, correct?

[00:22:07] Wolf Pamphile: Well, no. So Haiti has two official languages. There is the Haitian Creole. And then there's French. French, just like the language in French, it's the same thing. That's what we learn in school. We also learn Creole in school. But I would say about, I mean I'm ballparking here, but I would say roughly 70% of the population doesn't fluently speak French.

Okay. Wow. However, it is a language, what they call it, language of business. Okay? So when you go to a bank, when you having a business deal, when you meeting someone like a dinner or something like that, they most likely gonna go on to speak French. Hmm. However, the same person that speaking Creole, who's you buying food from in the street, is not going to understand French and vice versa.

Somebody who speaks French. I mean, if you're born in Haiti, you could understand, but somebody who's coming from France to Haiti is necessarily gonna go into understand Creole. That also creates an issue because if every day when I go home, I'm speaking English, or I'm speaking Creole. But when I get to school now, day one, I have to learn in French.

I've never spoken in French a day in my life, but I have to learn what is a table? What is this and what is that? And then have start to think in French. And now that kid is already at a disadvantage from day one. And it C is a mix of languages. You have Spanish, you have English, you have African languages, and essentially that's what a Creole is.

There are multiple different types of Creole. There's a Louisiana Creole, there's a Creole in different countries. But in Haiti it's specifically the Haitian Creole is what Haiti has.

[00:23:43] Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, it's, it's fascinating. It's such an interesting language. 'cause yeah, it is kind of like this mix of various languages.

There's no way, I mean, you could, it would be really hard to study that unless you lived in that particular place. It would be very tricky, I think, to pick up. Certainly not standardized. So Dominican Republic right next door, I mean same island border, pretty open until recently. This is a complicated relationship too, right?

Because I know that many Haitians have died at the hands of Dominicans and vice versa over the last few hundred years.

[00:24:16] Wolf Pamphile: Yeah, so the relationship with Haiti and Dominican Republic is very complicated, but it's also, it's simple, but also very complicated in a sense, right? You have this island where we share a border with, with the immigrant public, a lot of trade during the day.

A lot of money go back and forth between the two countries. However, the Dominican Republic has a lot of policies that are anti Haitian, not just some policy may be passed. They'd be like, oh, this is anti-human rights, or anti Pacific women, or things like that, or L-G-B-T-Q. But some policies are specifically anti Haitian.

Like for instance, in the 2010s, the, the Republic passed a law that said, let's say you were born in the Republic, right? But your parents or your grandparents were moved to the Dominican Republic illegally. Doesn't matter if they moved there 50 years ago and you now currently 60 years old or however old you are, you automatically no longer a citizen of that country.

Wow. These are people who've built their entire lives. Right. Maybe they've never even been to Haiti. Exactly. Right. They were born in the dr. Exactly. So now, and that doesn't mean you can take your wealth with you either, right? Whatever you've built businesses, homes, you have to leave all of that. And now they're currently most likely owned or taken over by the Dominican Republic government.

And back in the days, you know, there was a issue with, in the 1940s where the massacre happened between the Dominican Republic and Haiti, where the issue was the Dominican Thillo, the Dominican president Thillo didn't like that the population of the Korean Republic was getting darker skin tone, essentially.

Mm-hmm. And they went as far to say that they're going to cleanse. The country.

[00:25:56] Jordan Harbinger: Yikes. That's some Nazi sounding stuff right there.

[00:25:59] Wolf Pamphile: Yeah, essentially. So, um, back in the days the Dominican Republic had, I mean, I'm sure I'm gonna catch flag from Dominican bot for saying this. That's, I,

[00:26:08] Jordan Harbinger: I'm the one who's gonna catch the flag.

[00:26:10] Wolf Pamphile: They won't know how to reach you. Probably they, they're gonna come after me. Don't worry about it. But essentially there was some very close ties with the Nazi regime because they had similar ideas by keeping the population pure, keeping it white, keeping it non-black, non Haitian essentially. And then at the end, 15,000 Haitians died from a genocide that happened from the Dominican Republic.

[00:26:32] Jordan Harbinger: Tell me why the Dominican Republic is white and Haiti is black. Because, look, I'm just an outsider. I know that black people live in Haiti. Okay. That, that I get, I've got friends from the dr. I mean, they look all kinds of different, I mean, some of them look black, some of them look straight up Hispanic, some of them look Indian, some of them I can't put my finger on.

It's just a big mix. White though. I don't know, man. They don't look. Nobody's as pasty as me down there.

[00:26:58] Wolf Pamphile: So it's, you know, if we go back a little bit right. In terms of colonization Mm-Hmm. With France and Spain, the two have different policies in terms of how they interacted with the natives or the slaves who came into the country.

Right. France saw it as we're separate and we were never going to mix. Sure. There were still mulattos. Some people had relationships with slaves and they had kids, but on paper you are not going to mix with somebody who's black. And that's how it was. So fast forward to the, today, 95% of Haitians, 95% of the population in Haiti is black.

[00:27:35] Jordan Harbinger: Mm-Hmm.

[00:27:35] Wolf Pamphile: Now with the Dominican Republic, Spain had a different policy for Spain. They saw it as we're going to cleanse. We're going to give you all whiteness, we're going to give you, we're going to give you civilization in a sense, right? And we're going to cleanse you. So that's why on the other side of the island, even people who are darker, you can still sell kind of like a, like Southeast Asian or like a darker tone that's not exactly like West African tone.

Mm-Hmm. And that's essentially how it happened because they were the Spanish intermingled with the natives and also the Africans that were living there. And then that's how the skin tone became very different. So France, again, had different, very, very different policies in terms of like race mixing essentially.

[00:28:20] Jordan Harbinger: Gotcha. Then later on a century or two later, the DR says, Hey look, there's too many Haitians here. We're getting too dark. And then that's what kicked off this sort of. I guess genocide of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic. I know Haiti did invade the dr. I think that was a long time before that though, in the early 19 hundreds.

And that was also kind of brutal. And I think that was kind of the idea like, Hey, if we invade this other half of Hispaniola, we can use them to help pay this debt to France. I think that was part of the idea there too.

[00:28:47] Wolf Pamphile: Yeah, there are multiple different scenarios around that. Part of it said Dr had slavery at some point, and then they wanted to go back to free the slaves or abolish slavery.

Another part says strategically to prevent any incoming attack to Haiti, because France was still looming around, they needed to take over the other side of the island to protect themselves, to know what's what was happening. And there are many ways to look at it. I mean, historically, it's not clear as to why that happened.

But there are multiple plausible reasons as to why it went down. It could be for the death, it could be strategically to defend Haiti, or it could be to abolish slavery to the, on the entire island as well. I see.

[00:29:30] Jordan Harbinger: That makes sense. Mm-Hmm. And the Dominican Republic now I think is five to eight times wealthier than Haiti.

I looked up some stats. Haiti, 58% of people live on $3 a day, or less than $3 a day, I should say. Access to water. And electricity is more in line with what you might see in Africa in a place like Uganda. And this is sad, 'cause I know now the Dominican Republic is building a wall between these two. Right.

'cause there's, it's just a big land border, right? Or is there a river or something there? But the, it's pretty easy to get across from one to the other, correct?

[00:29:59] Wolf Pamphile: Yeah. So the river in between Haiti and Republic is called the Massacre River, which is where the genocide happened. Wow. And there is a wall that's been, well partly built recently.

Honestly that whole wall is pretty much like rhetoric for elections because it all started after Trump mentioned that he was gonna build a wall in Mexico. Um, like build a wall. Build a wall, and then Dominican politicians took up the same idea. And it started, you know, nationalizing, rallying people up.

Say We want to build a wall to keep the Haitians out, to keep the bad Haitians out. Right? And economically, the Dominican Republic is way further ahead than Haiti from a democracy standpoint. They have multiple elections back to back, no issues. But they haven't had the same issues that Haiti had. They've had to fight for their own freedom in a sense.

And they had also had to deal with some dictatorships as well, but it wasn't as in a way that it was intentional against them to prevent them from growing. And even now, the DR benefits widely from partnerships with Spain, the us. It's a major security partner with the US. And also the war against drugs plays a big role into that part, which creates a space for foreign investment.

Its the Dominican Republic where Haiti doesn't really have that, so,

[00:31:17] Jordan Harbinger: right. Yeah. Haiti's been too, too unstable to get foreign investment. Nobody wants to invest in a place that has tons of coups. I mean, actually dictatorships are pretty good for foreign investment because they're really stable. Well, until they're not.

That is true. Until they're not. Until they're not. But like, but like Hades had coup dictator, coup dictator, coup dictator comes back from before. Like that's a bit much, and it becomes hard to invest. And, but the building a wall, I mean, that's kind of a sad deal. You, you're almost gonna have a DMZ, like North and South Korea being built in 2024.

Uh, and you'd like to think we're over this nonsense. Or do you think the wall is just never gonna happen? It's gonna be like an election and it's gonna be a bunch of. Concrete? No, I mean

[00:31:57] Wolf Pamphile: they started the wall. To me it's a propaganda. Okay. PR propaganda, um, operation going on. Just because, I mean, even recently, the last election that's happened a few weeks ago, the issue with Haitians was used as a way to rally votes.

Whoever can go to like the toughest against Haitians usually would win. And the current president was reelected and his sense was we're going to deport every single Haitian. But the thing is, what most people don't know is that the whole deportation process, it's a racket in a way. If you are a Haitian person, whether or not you have your papers or not, we catch you on the street.

We just take you, we deport you. And then the same agent who's deporting you now charges you a thousand bucks to come back in. Then now they know you can get a thousand bucks. They're mostly gonna keep gonna take you again to deport you and then bring you back. So it's the whole racket that's happening at the moment and at the same time, sure there are Haitians in the, in the Dominican group that are illegal, but for a majority of the time it's most people have visas and it's just a matter of like sure intimidation.

A lot of Haitians right now are saying that they want to go back. They want to leave the republic because it becomes a place where if you have a business and somebody just comes in and then robs you, you can't go to the police because you're not respected. They're not going to listen to you.

[00:33:18] Jordan Harbinger: Huh. That's horrific.

Alright, so let's get more modern on the Haitian side here. A couple of years ago I heard that the president of Haiti was assassinated and it was almost, I mean, it was quite dramatic. It was almost par for the course for Haiti. But tell us what happened here, because it's still kind of an unsolved mystery, I think, at least according to news sources.

I assume you have a good idea who, whom you think probably did it, but I'm curious what went down with this.

[00:33:43] Wolf Pamphile: So the president Maiz came into power. He was, uh, had an election, not very popular, I mean, didn't have a huge turnout, but he still won the election. He campaigned on a sense it was called the, kind of like the plantain.

They call him the neck, which meant the guy who was going to plane like repopulate banana trees all around Haiti to feed people. And that's the campaign that he, he ran on. And when he came into power, he pretty much. Took money. Like a corruption Yeah, kind of way. He took money from the government. He took money from people that he wasn't in the same party with.

However, once he came in, he kind of like, Hey, I'm going to flip now. I'm going to be good. I'm going to report you guys. I'm going to shut that crime. I'm going to fight corruption. They're like, well, that's not what we gave you the money for. Hmm. And fast forward, you would see he had a huge amount of protest in Haiti.

He went after the private sector, which didn't go very well. And fast forward, you have, uh, this doctor in Florida who has this idea to take over the country,

[00:34:51] Jordan Harbinger: a doctor in Florida. Is he a Haitian guy that lives in Florida? He's a

[00:34:54] Wolf Pamphile: Haitian doctor in Florida. Okay. Haitian American doctor in Florida. And he had this idea to he's going to get a few mercenaries, fly into Haiti, arrest the president, and then take over power.

Wow. And then that plane slowly turned into, well, we're going to go into Haiti, arrest him, but wait, no, we're going to kill him. Wow. Taking Florida man to a whole new level. That's crazy. Exactly. Exactly. And so what they did was they reached out to somebody who had connections in Columbia and they recruited a few dozen mercenaries and they went to Haiti, well, they flew to, to Dominican Republic.

They stayed there for a couple of weeks, and then they went into Haiti and a lot of money went into this mission. To this day, they still can't find or not can't, but they still won't disclose where the money went. Wow. Because they had new cars that were bought in Haiti. They had new weapons, new equipment.

Now there's a security firm in Florida that also provided money to fund this operation. A lot of them were arrested already or have been convicted Sure. For life for multiple decades. And the night of, they show up to the president's house and said that they are DEA agents here to, or arrest the president for drug offenses.

And the police not knowing what's happening, the security guard not knowing what's happening. And there's also, uh, belief that the president's private security or security guards were part of it too, because. Out of all the people who were there, the president is the only one who got hurt. Oh, and who got killed, right?

I take that back. His wife got shot.

[00:36:28] Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, that couch. His wife

[00:36:29] Wolf Pamphile: got shot, but he's the only one who died and he was tortured before he died. They broke his arms, they broke his skull, they gouge an eye out. Geez. It wasn't like a just show up and then they just shot him like point blank. He actually suffered.

Geez. And they went into his room looking for a list. So he was putting together a list of drug dealers in Haiti that he was going to report to the DEA. And they went into the house looking for that list. And I mean, his wife speaks about this. She says when they went to the room, they were looking for a list.

When they found it, they called someone to confirm. He like, Hey look, we have the list. He's dead. Mission accomplished. And they left. And on their way out, that's when all help broke loose. Honestly, while he wasn't a popular president, a lot of people from the impoverished neighborhood really liked him because he's from that neighborhood.

He's from those, he spoke their language. They ador him in a way. And on top of that, you a foreigner committed to a country that killed all president.

[00:37:32] Jordan Harbinger: Yeah.

[00:37:33] Wolf Pamphile: It didn't go well for them. Well, most of them were captured. Some of them got were got away, but essentially they were all captured.

[00:37:38] Jordan Harbinger: Wow. That is a huge me, and there's this sort of ongoing investigation, but nobody's really talking about it for whatever reason.

Yeah. There's some suspicious circumstances around it. Like the Prime Minister was assigned and then this happens days later.

[00:37:52] Wolf Pamphile: Yeah. That's the thing too, because the person who was leading the, this operation to kill the president called the Prime Minister. Well, he was a prime minister at the time, but called them before and after the incident happened, and he's still not arrested.

There's still no evidence as far as like to say what exactly they talked about, but it is a pretty high suspicion, yeah. To say that this person who just did this called you. Right after this happened, what are you talking about? What was the composition

[00:38:17] Jordan Harbinger: like? Yeah, that's us

[00:38:18] Wolf Pamphile: to this. There's still a lot of mystery around this.

I still believe that there are more people out there who are responsible for this, but he did not have a lot of friends. He didn't have a lot of people to look out for him. Again, even people closest to him also turned on him as well. So

[00:38:33] Jordan Harbinger: once again, a portion of the proceeds from this episode go to the Children of Haiti.

We'll be right back.

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[00:39:50] Jordan Harbinger: This episode is sponsored in part by Midnight Burger. Midnight Burger is an audio drama podcast about the adventures of a time traveling dimension spanning diner.

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You can find and listen to Midnight Burger, anywhere. You'll listen to podcasts, or just go to We open@ix.com. If you like this episode of the show, I invite you to do what other smart and considerate listeners do, which is take a moment and support our sponsors. And I mean, look, I understand if you just don't like children and especially ones that are in need over there in Haiti, then you skip the ads.

You don't support the sponsors. I get it. You heartless bastard. But for the rest of you, all the deals, discount codes and ways to support the show and the children of Haiti are searchable and clickable over at Jordan harbinger.com/deals. Thank you so much for supporting those who support the show. Now for the rest of my conversation with Wolf Penfield, I know I mentioned before that Haiti is one of the most densely populated countries in the world.

I think it's the most densely populated country in the Western hemisphere, which makes it much more vulnerable to natural disasters along with the deforestation issue. There's no trees to stop storms and keep things from eroding and things like that. A lot of people probably heard about in 2010, there was this massive.

Earthquake that also created a power vacuum in chaos. Do you remember the damage on that? I mean, I, I don't have figures for this, but I just remember hearing about how massive and horrific it was.

[00:41:45] Wolf Pamphile: Yeah. It was a horrible day. It was a horrible day because in the blink of an eye, over 300,000 people died.

And I mean, not to count people who died after from complications and injuries and things like that. Right. 300,000 people. I mean, almost half of the haes population resides in Port-au-Prince, which makes it a island of 11 million people. And I'll say about 40 to 50% of them live in Port-au-Prince. Wow.

It's packed. They're not properly built. And this lack of infrastructure, lack of laws to prevent people from building a certain way. Building codes, building codes, people are more conscious of that now because they see the devastation that can come from an earthquake. But still, back then it was just nothing that we've ever thought of.

Mm-Hmm. You know, we've had hurricanes, we've had all types of things, but an earthquake was something that I've never in a million years thought about. But yeah, it killed a lot of people. It said Haiti back, I think like decades. Mm-Hmm. From that devastation

[00:42:47] Jordan Harbinger: I heard a lot of kids were orphaned and essentially like sold to people or taken away from people 'cause they were just left without parents.

I mean, it's just like a really. Super. Well, it's horrifying situation I think

[00:43:00] Wolf Pamphile: run around that. I can't say that for sure that a lot of kids were sold or Okay. Things like that. 'cause I don't have the facts, but what I can say is that there are people who were arrested right around that time because they saw it as a vulnerable time to go in and then abduct kids from Haiti.

And there were people who went in saying that they want to adopt kids and then essentially they were just trying to take them to traffic them. Yeah. So there were actual arrest around that. Yeah. But as far as like selling or anything like that, it just wasn't as clear. But I do know there were people arrested for child trafficking.

[00:43:35] Jordan Harbinger: Child trafficking. Yeah. That's what I heard. I guess I just assumed that trafficking involved, selling them. But you're right. I guess that there's a distinction there. Okay, so let's talk about the gang warfare, because I hear that there's like roadblocks and checkpoints so that goods can't go from the port to cities.

You hear about all these kidnappings, like they'll grab 19 missionaries or whatever and try and hold them for ransom. Why are the gangs in charge? What happened here?

[00:43:58] Wolf Pamphile: So back in, um, when Ari seed came into power, he pretty much rallied the gangs to support him, right? And he provided weapons to a lot of the inner cities, provided weapons, um, money as his quote unquote army in a way similar to what the did with the, with the macOS.

And, um, fast forward. Now, when he left, that method became a blueprint for both politicians that followed him and also the economic sector, like for the private sector. And essentially the gangs similar to what's happening in Africa or around the world where there's like proxy wars happening. The gangs became proxy armies where they were fighting for people.

If I'm a senator and I have X, y, Z plan, I just say, Hey, they send weapons. Go against this other gang who support that Senator. Wow. Or if I have a business, and let's say I'm in bottling business and there's a new competition on the market that's potentially could put me outta business. Say, Hey, go put this guy to business, burn his trucks, burn everything, prevent him from selling anything, geez.

And support me. So now we have two camps that are flying in weapons to support these gangs. And this time we have this monstrous issue now where they all are now self-sufficient in a way

[00:45:20] Jordan Harbinger: That's crazy. I thought the gangs just arose on their own out of desperation. I didn't realize politicians and business people were actually funding them and arming them to wield them against their competitors.

That's a really bad idea. I mean,

[00:45:33] Wolf Pamphile: actually right now there are dozens of business wealthy billionaires in Haiti who are sanctioned by Canada, the United Kingdom, the US for that specific thing. Those sections started happening in 2022. Right when things started spiraling. And it's a known fact to see countries actually implementing sanctions against people, against former senators, against current senators, against politician, and also wealthy business owners.

You would like, oh, why this person who worked billion being sanctioned by Canada for human rights issues. Yeah. And then when you really dig deeper, that's essentially if you are providing weapons and drugs to these gangs and they're killing people, but your business is profiting, you know, essentially that's how we got here.

[00:46:20] Jordan Harbinger: So it seems like some of these folks have lost control of these gangs because they're not just fighting the bottling company or the rival senator, right? They're kidnapping missionaries. There's a guy they call barbecue. I assume it's not because he makes great chicken. Tell me about this guy.

[00:46:34] Wolf Pamphile: Barbecue is a well former police officer, and he was fired after a massacre that happened in, in a small neighborhood called Las Saline, where 70 people died, around 70 people died.

And he was one of the lead police officers that oversaw this operation and he was fired. And essentially he started the gang called, I'm not sure how to say it, English, but he started that gang. And then fast forward, he rallied all of them together and barbecue got his name from Burning Houses and burning people, quote unquote making barbecue out of them.

Ugh. And that's. Pretty much how, you know, he got his fame. He's not really eating them, is he? Or is that part of it? I don't know. You don't know? I don't know. Honestly, it's all a fear. They speak about that. 'cause you know, that's the worst thing that could possibly happen to a human. Right. One of the worst that could possibly happen.

So they use that as like a fear tactic to scare people. But I don't, I don't believe that they actually Okay. Eating people.

[00:47:33] Jordan Harbinger: But I think it's just called G nine, right? Isn't that GNF Just G nine. G nine, yes. G nine, yeah. Yeah. So G nine, whatever that is.

[00:47:38] Wolf Pamphile: There's G nine and then there's G Prep. They used to fight against each other, but now they're all friends

[00:47:43] Jordan Harbinger: crazy.

And thousands of people are getting killed in this gang warfare. Recently there was a missionary, and I think his wife, and they were young and they grew up, I think in Haiti, or at least he did, and they were killed outside of a church and just what looks like a random robbery. So these gangs are not, it's not like they're under the control of the person who's funding and arming them, and they, they just sit around waiting for orders.

They cause pure chaos in the meantime. Yeah,

[00:48:05] Wolf Pamphile: well, right now, I mean, the gangs are on their own, essentially. I see. Right. Whatever was started by politicians or business elites, it's no longer that it's kind of spiral into its own thing. And where the gangs have their own operations, they have their own drug trafficking routes from Latin America into Haiti that they're monitoring gun trafficking, routes, human trafficking as well.

The one thing that's bubbling under the surface is like the black market organs that are being sold from Haiti. Wow. And you see people go missing and they show up with missing body parts. It's kind, it's a little, it's it's scary, but they have their own ways of generating income and they also do a lot of kidnapping where somebody like the, the missionaries that we're talking about that were held by, um, OSA and he's on the top 10 for the FBI at the moment, and he recently did a interview with CNN where he showed his house, this

[00:48:58] Jordan Harbinger: most wanted guy did an interview with CNN.

Yeah.

[00:49:01] Wolf Pamphile: Wow. They drove to his house, he showed them around the neighborhood, and there he is on CNN giving up an interview. But the thing is Vita Long, which makes him even more of a daring individual or even crazy because he controls the same neighborhood that the US EMBAs Embassy is in. Even recently, I mean, the two young missionaries that died a few weeks ago in Haiti.

They were like early twenties. Yeah, they died. He pretty much helped negotiate to get them back because he's that guy. Wow. And it's in a sense that you can't really maneuver without, in a way negotiating with them. But I mean, I'm very interested to see how this will end, to be honest with you, because this can be a way where the gangs, you know, you're forced to negotiate with gangs or, yeah, in a way trying to live life with them as like a norm.

And I would say most Haitians are looking forward to this chapter ending.

[00:50:00] Jordan Harbinger: What is the path out of this? 'cause a lot of people have opted to immigrate, right? They go to Columbia or they go to the Dominican Republic, first and foremost, right? 'cause it's on the same island. They immigrate, they go to Columbia.

A lot of people go from Columbia. And then through the Darien Gap and through Panama. Up through Mexico and into the United States, or they, if they can get access to a boat, they just try to go to Florida or wherever as well. And you get to the United States. But for those who aren't, I mean, the whole country can't leave.

Now. They got this Kenyan police force coming in. What's the deal with this? Because I, I think a lot of people haven't heard about this. And also, do you think it's gonna work?

[00:50:35] Wolf Pamphile: I mean, in a situation where there's only, there aren't that many options to begin with. Right? So in March, the former Prime Minister went to Kenya to sign that same agreement with the Kenyan police and the Kenyan president.

And on his way back to Haiti, the gangs locked him out there, said The airport is closed, the ports are closed, you're not coming back. And he was forced to resign from that. And since then, we didn't have a Prime Minister. And, uh, fast forward, they established this, um, transitional council, they call it the Presidential Council, where major political parties came together, la nine of them.

It's a big deal actually for Haiti. It's a very big deal in the sense that you have nine groups that were previously against each other and had selfish reasons to exist or to move their own way. And now they all agreed to work together for Haiti to move forward. Right? And they all voted together. They all recently, they voted for a new prime minister.

Now, Mr. Kni, who just started this week, and that's a big deal because it wasn't just one person making the decision or it wasn't the US or Canada making the decision saying like, this is who we want to be president. But you guys or this group of nine people, I mean, two of them don't have voting rights, but at least they're part of the table, the conversation and say, this is who we want to govern Haiti temporarily until we can get to elections.

[00:51:57] Jordan Harbinger: So tell me about this Kenyan police force that's going into Haiti. I.

[00:52:02] Wolf Pamphile: So the Kenyan police force, previously we had the right after REC, there was a minister, which was a UN peacekeeping mission that went into Haiti for similar reasons for to deal with the gangs, to deal with instability. And fast forward, we're right back where we are today.

The former Prime Minister asked the international community for support and the US didn't want to get involved. The UN said they're not sending soldiers. Mm-Hmm. So essentially, Kenya volunteered to lead this mission in a way. It's not a UN mission, but it's a un. The UN gave like a step of approval, so like, Hey, we acknowledge this mission, you can move forward, but we're not liable for anything in a sense, which is what makes it very complicated.

Because essentially, yeah, the people leading this mission is Kenya and other smaller countries that are contributing soldiers to it as well. Well, it's still a bit unclear what the goal actually is. What they actually will be doing. The one thing that is clear is that they won't be going to fight the gangs directly.

Oh, they won't? Okay. They won't. And they are going to protect critical infrastructures from what's been relayed to us. They're going to protect critical infrastructure while they allow the Haitian police to focus directly on the gangs themselves. That tactic may change eventually, I'm not sure, but currently that's the message that they're putting out, is that they won't be the leading force against the gangs and they won't be the ones going through the small neighborhoods and dealing with the terror there.

Who's gonna do that? That's a good question because essentially from a security perspective, right? One of my colleagues was giving a presentation the other day. His name is, um, Jeff Ski. Jeff Ski, and he, he made a good point. He said, Haiti currently has an army.

[00:53:45] Jordan Harbinger: Mm-Hmm.

[00:53:46] Wolf Pamphile: There's a police force. They're capable of hindering this situation if they had the proper equipment and enough people to do it right.

However, we're spending over $500 million to bring Kenya into Haiti to train them to deal with Haiti's gangs. And when they leave, the Haitian Police and Nation Army is still understaffed, are still not trained. So why not focus directly on that and to have a sustainable, gross, sustainable, equal sustainable development is security.

So that's what a lot of Haitians are upset about, to be honest, because they're like, well, we are here. Why can't you invest in us instead? Yeah. You know, now will this work? It's yet to be seen. But a lot of us are optimistic and you know, it is one of the avenues to dealing with the gangs. It may not be the most ideal, but at the crossroad that we're in right now, it is one of the best solutions that we have to move forward with,

[00:54:40] Jordan Harbinger: man.

So when's the last time you went back to Haiti? 'cause it seems like it's quite dangerous. I don't know. I mean, are you afraid to go back? Is it safe to go back or is it mostly Port-au-Prince?

[00:54:50] Wolf Pamphile: I'm not afraid to go back to Haiti. I didn't grow up in Porter Rince. My father's from Port-au-Prince. Right. But I'm not afraid to go back to Haiti.

I can go to, to my town anytime. The last time I went was in 2014. Well, like I said, most of my family left Haiti. So if I visit Haiti is mostly gonna be like a, you know, on my own or for business reasons. Yeah. There's no fear to go to Haiti. Because it's not, I don't know. It's a territory that I know. I mean, I'm not going to be stupid.

Yeah. And then fly into Port-au-Prince and just be like, ah,

[00:55:19] Jordan Harbinger: you

[00:55:19] Wolf Pamphile: know? Yeah. But I'm from New

[00:55:22] Jordan Harbinger: York kidnap.

[00:55:23] Wolf Pamphile: Exactly. I'm from New

[00:55:24] Jordan Harbinger: York. Yeah.

[00:55:25] Wolf Pamphile: But I know a lot of people who still visit Haiti till this day. Like right now, there are people who are going to Haiti to visit family and coming back again, I'll say this, Port-au-Prince is geographically a very small portion of Haiti where the entire rest of the island are experiencing something completely different from what's happening.

There's no gang held territories as big as Port Princes. There's no barbecue and Caucasian. There's none of that. This whole situation only exists in port.

[00:55:55] Jordan Harbinger: It's really a wild tale and I'm, I, I'm hope I have high hopes, but you know, I'm ignorant and I'm looking at it from the outside. So tell us why we should be optimistic about Haiti, or maybe I should rephrase that.

Are you optimistic about Haiti? And if so, why?

[00:56:07] Wolf Pamphile: I mean, I'm optimistic about Haiti because when we think about Haiti, for me personally, I would say this, right? Uh, my mother was a school teacher in Haiti. My father was a construction worker and uncles. You asked him, when are you going back to Haiti? He's like, well, I would go back yesterday if I could.

And I'm optimistic because I truly believe in having in Haiti that my mother can go back to and my mother can retire and everybody's mom can retire too, and fathers can retire too. And essentially right now there's a new wave. There's new energy that's flowing into this space. Like for with Haiti policy house being in dc and we are forcing ourself to the table.

I. Where there are a lot of rooms where Haiti's being discussed, where Haitians are not invited and we're being very diligent to make sure that we know what's happening. In the same time in Haiti there are a lot of groups that are fighting for fairness, fighting against corruptions, and again, with this transitional presidential council too, it's like it's a major step forward where there's a consensus on what needs to happen.

We may disagree on how we get there, but we all agree that we need a better Haiti. And I don't think you can meet a Haitian that would always, that's going to say that they don't want what's best for Haiti. And this is a new time where back then you had one or two politicians who were leading and then you know, whether it's Iris T or, but now there's a consensus among all major political groups and that makes me optimistic what's happening.

Some people may call me naive. The older folks like would say, well, are you naive? We've seen this before. I'm like, all right, well, I've never seen it. I'm just gonna be optimistic. I'm going to move in the same space. I'm going to operate. I'm not going to let, uh, cynicism take over. Because once you start being, uh, you know, very pessimistic about the situation, that's when all the worst thing happens.

[00:58:00] Jordan Harbinger: Wolf, thank you very much, man. It's a, I really am grateful that you were able to explain all this. I think the situation, there's confusing for a lot of folks. The history is really important. I would love to visit Haiti someday, but yeah, maybe, maybe not right this moment, but certainly

[00:58:16] Wolf Pamphile: someday. Listen, if you want to, you can go to capitation right now and nothing will happen to you.

My wife will kill me. That's the problem. My wife will kill. I'm,

[00:58:23] Jordan Harbinger: I'm, I'm

[00:58:23] Wolf Pamphile: more afraid of her than I am of barbecue. You know what? When you're ready, let me know. I'll go with you. You

[00:58:28] Jordan Harbinger: got it, man. You

[00:58:28] Wolf Pamphile: gotta

[00:58:29] Jordan Harbinger: deal. Thank you. You're about to hear a preview of the Jordan Harbinger show, about the warning signs for Civil War.

[00:58:38] Trailer: There were times when I was writing that I myself started to get terrified. Is this right? Am I getting this right? Because what I'm saying is going to hit people hard. There have been hundreds of studies of civil wars, the group that tends to start these wars. Are the ones dominant groups that are in decline.

The group that has been politically, socially, economically dominant since the very beginning of this country. White Christian males for the most part, America's going through this radical demographic transition from a white majority country to a white minority country. White working class men have declined on most social and economic measures.

That hasn't happened with any other demographic group. And there's a subset of this population that's deeply resentful of that, that's deeply threatened by that and truly, truly believe that it's their patriotic duty to do something about this. January 6th was so public, it was so obvious. This is part of a far right white supremacist, non-federal government movement here in the United States.

We know that some of the far right militias, the Oath Keepers, the Proud Boys and the three percenters actively encouraged members to join the military to join law enforcement. If you continuously portray this as these are just crazy individuals, then you remain blind to what's actually the cancer that's growing slowly from within.

[01:00:14] Jordan Harbinger: To hear whether we are on the cusp of a civil war here in the United States. Check out episode seven 18 of the Jordan Harbinger Show. Thanks again to Wolf for coming on today. What a sharp guy, man. I'd love to see Haiti. Maybe I'll take him up on his idea to head down there. Jen would probably kill me though.

I'm actually more afraid of her than anybody named Barbecue. Barbecue. Ain't never seen my wife angry. Fun story. The former President, risid. I was back in my days in New York City working as a lawyer. I was doing my thing, talking to everybody in bars and whatever that I met. This was my social development decade, so to speak.

I met this like badass Marine special forces type guy, and he told me that in 2004, he was actually one of the guys that went to Haiti and took Risid outta the country, effectively forcing the guy to resign. And there were a lot of wild details. This was not some calm operation. There was smokescreen and tear gas.

They were wearing of course, gas masks and protection. And they said that at one point. They're bringing Aris D to the jet to exile him. They brought him to, uh, Central African Republic, CAR, and there's just these clouds of gas. Well, after the operation, of course, they're all safe. They decide to take showers.

I'm not sure how this works exactly, but there was some sort of pepper spray tear gas residue on their hair and body. So while they didn't get it in their eyes and on their face and skin and they were careful not to do that, well, you know, stuff drips from your body down to your nether regions in the shower.

So this guy said, it starts like a nice shower, feels good, you know, after an operation wearing a gas mask and all that gear. Then he feels a little tingle on his balls, followed by absolute fire for the next several minutes and screaming as tear gas residue from his hair and body drips onto his junk along with blazing hot shower water.

And he said it was the worst pain that he's ever felt in his life. And this is a guy who has been stabbed before with a knife during combat. So. Take that most likely useless information forth into the coming week here. Thanks to Wolf for coming on the show and breaking all this down for us. All things Wolf Pam feel will be in the show notes@jordanharbinger.com.

Advertisers deals, discount codes, ways to support the show and the children of Haiti. In this particular episode, I. All searchable and clickable at Jordan harbinger.com/deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show and consider supporting the children of Haiti as well. Also, our newsletter wee bit wiser.

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