ABSTRACT
The numbers of Haitians asking asylum in the United States were relatively small. Yet to the Justice Department, the Haitian asylum seekers were a massive cloud looming on the southeastern horizon. At a closed, high-level meeting of the Immigration and Naturalization Service in 1978, Deputy Commissioner Mario Noto gave the order to “Actually Pain [sic] Out The Dimensions Of The Haitian Threat…. Volatile—show that these are unusual cases dealing with individuals that are threatening the community’s well-being—socially and economically.” 1 The capital letters in which his opening statement was transcribed convey the force of Noto’s conviction.
