NAMELESS NO LONGER
The world first saw Mirard Joseph onone of the worst days of his life.
On Sept. 19, 2021, he came to embody the plight of thousands of Haitian migrants after an image taken that day of his attempt to escape a U.S. Border Patrol (USBP) agent on horseback in Del Rio, Texas, spread across the internet and was broadcast on every major news network. While Joseph ran, clinging to plastic bags filled with food, the agent wrenched his shirt. The horse’s rein seemed to coil like a whip.
The image, captured by New Mexico– and Texas-based photojournalist Paul Ratje, stoked national debate over migration at the U.S.-Mexico border, enduring racism in American institutions, and the unique experience that Black immigrants face. Joseph, along with his wife Madeleine Prospere and their daughter, who just turned 2, had been living with some 15,000 other mostly Haitian migrants in makeshift
