October 24, 1891 - Rafael Trujillo
His three-decade grip on the Dominican Republic was sustained through a security apparatus designed specifically to eliminate dissent, and the scale of state violence — tens of thousands killed or disappeared — reflects how thoroughly that apparatus was deployed. The 1937 massacre of Haitian migrants along the border, ordered by Trujillo and carried out by the Dominican Army, stands as one of the most deliberate acts of ethnic killing in twentieth-century Latin American history, with death tolls estimated between 17,000 and 35,000. Few rulers outside of wartime contexts managed to maintain both the duration and the brutality that defined what Dominicans came to call simply El Trujillato.
From Wikipedia
Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina ( troo-HEE-yoh; Spanish: [rafaˈel tɾuˈxiʝo]; 24 October 1891 – 30 May 1961), nicknamed "El Jefe" (Spanish: [el ˈxefe]; lit. 'The Boss'), was a Dominican military officer and dictator who ruled the Dominican Republic from August 1930 until his assassination in May 1961. He was the 36th and 39th president from 1930 to 1938 and again from 1942 to 1952. He also served as the first generalissimo, the de facto most powerful position in the country at the time from 1930 until his assassination. Under that position, Trujillo served under figurehead presidents.
Trujillo's 31-year rule, the Trujillo Era (Spanish: El Trujillato or La Era de Trujillo), was one of the longest for a non-royal leader in the world, and centered around a personality cult of the ruling family. It was also one of the most brutal; Trujillo's security forces, including the infamous SIM, were responsible for many murders. Estimates for the number of deaths under Trujillo's regime range from 25,000 deaths and disappearances to over 50,000 deaths. In 1937, 17,000 to 35,000 Haitians were killed by the Dominican Army under Trujillo's orders in the infamous Parsley massacre, which continues to affect Dominican-Haitian relations to this day.
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