Dominican Republic History Lesson

The Dominican Republic has rich indigenous roots as well as a more recent, often violent history of being colonized by Europeans. The first democratically elected president of the Dominican Republic is dramatically overthrown by a group of rebels in 1930. A man named Raphael Trujillo takes advantage of this moment and runs for president. He creates a secret police force to intimidate and assassinate all of his political rivals and their supporters. This is the start of one of the cruelest dictatorships in history.