'For Jamie McGregor, a businessman in Springfield, Ohio, speaking favorably about the Haitian immigrants he employs has come to this: death threats, a lockdown at his company and posters around town branding him a traitor for hiring immigrants.'
'Mr. McGregor, 48, began hiring Haitians who had recently settled in Springfield. They now represent about 10 percent of McGregor Metal’s labor force of 330. Former President Donald J. Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, denounced the Haitians in Springfield with false claims that they were stealing and eating pets. The rumors fed growing resentment over rising housing prices, crowded clinics and a town whose character seemed to be changing. Mr. McGregor, who had publicly praised his new employees for their hard work and willingness to learn, became a target. They came by the hundreds — phone calls, emails and letters from white supremacists, neo-Nazis and other people they had never met. “The owner of McGregor Metal can take a bullet to the skull and that would be 100 percent justified,” said one message left on the company voice mail. “Why are you importing Third World savages who eat animals and giving them jobs over United States citizens?” another asked. “Stack all 20,000 Haitians inside Jamie McGregor’s factory at once and force him to praise the benefits of foreign labor while being crushed to death by Black bodies themselves being crushed to death,” another said. Mr. McGregor’s children and his 80-year-old mother began receiving hateful calls. “We’re being hunted like animals,” Mr. McGregor’s wife, Cameron, said.'