Mildred Trouillot-Aristide (born 1963) is an American lawyer who married

Jean-Bertrand Aristide Jean-Bertrand Aristide (born 15 July 1953) is a Haitian former Salesian priest and politician who became Haiti's first democratically elected president. A proponent of liberation theology, Aristide was appointed to a parish in Port-au-Prince in ...

, the former President of

Haïti Haiti (; ht, Ayiti ; French: ), officially the Republic of Haiti (); ) and formerly known as Hayti, is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and ...

, in 1996. Mildred Trouillot grew up in the

Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

. Both her father, Emile, and mother, Carmelle, were natives of Haïti. He left Haïti in 1958, she in 1960. They found work in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, where Emile worked in a steel factory. Carmelle worked as a laboratory technician. Mildred graduated from

St. Barnabas High School Saint Barnabas High School is an American all-girls, private, Roman Catholic high school located in the Woodlawn Heights section of The Bronx, New York. It also borders the southeastern section of the city of Yonkers in neighboring Westcheste ...

City College of New York The City College of the City University of New York (also known as the City College of New York, or simply City College or CCNY) is a public university within the City University of New York (CUNY) system in New York City. Founded in 1847, Cit ...

, and the

University of Pennsylvania Law School The University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School (also known as Penn Law or Penn Carey Law) is the law school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is among the most selective and olde ...

. She practiced commercial litigation for the

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

law firm of Robinson, Silverman, Pearce, Aronsohn, and Berman. She met Aristide at a lecture he gave in 1992. In 1994, she went to work for Aristide's government in exile in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

as a speechwriter, as well as doing legal work. They married on January 20, 1996, in a simple ceremony in

Port-au-Prince Port-au-Prince ( , ; ht, Pòtoprens ) is the capital and most populous city of Haiti. The city's population was estimated at 987,311 in 2015 with the metropolitan area estimated at a population of 2,618,894. The metropolitan area is define ...

. It was a controversial marriage in Haïti. Aristide was elected president while he was a

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

priest, and had given up the priesthood by the time he married Mildred. The couple have two daughters, Christine Aristide, born in November 1996, and Michaelle Aristide, born in 1998.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Trouillot, Mildred Living people 1963 births Date of birth unknown New York (state) lawyers First Ladies and Gentlemen of Haiti University of Pennsylvania Law School alumni City College of New York alumni American people of Haitian descent Haitian people of Mulatto descent People from the Bronx