ORLANDO, Fla. — As more American citizens continue to be evacuated from Haiti, an Orlando church is helping the city's large Haitian population confront the ongoing turmoil.

Saturday night, the Florida Division of Emergency Management announced 21 additional people landed in Orlando from Haiti, marking a total of 35 evacuees.

Senior pastor David Pironneau at The Kingdom Church’s Creole campus says it’s important for the Haitian community to know they are supported, especially during times like these.

“With all the turmoil and chaos we know that there’s a lot of people that’s been coming here (...) they left the country because of all the chaos, so we’ve been attending to their needs,” he said.

Associate pastor Marc Antoine has lived back-and-forth between Haiti and the United States. He left Haiti as a kid, but moved his family there in 2015.

“It was really a God-led decision. If you’re familiar with the story of Nehemiah biblically, Nehemiah leaves Persia where he was living to move back to Jerusalem to help rebuild the walls of his city, and that story really inspired me. Just the history of Haiti, all the challenges, I wanted to contribute back to my home country,” said Antoine.

Antoine spent seven years in the country as a bi-vocational missionary. 

Part of his mission work included business development for citizens and using it as a tool to create jobs and provide income.

Out of concern for his safety, though, in 2022, Antoine returned to the states.

“In 2021 the president was assassinated and after that assassination things really started to spiral out of control with kidnapping, lots of gang violence, lack of government structure so that’s what has really caused this current situation that we’re in now,” he said.

Antoine says while the turmoil in Haiti is not new, one way to make change is advocacy and providing support.

“I think it’s important to say that the ones being rescued, the ones you see in helicopters being flown out those are the very privileged ones who can afford to pay for that kind of service, unfortunately majority of Haitians have no option,” he said. “The airport is still closed. People can’t get in, people can’t get out.”