New Castro, same debates on Cuba policy

Members of Congress used Fidel Castro’s resignation Tuesday to reaffirm their old calls for either an end or a continuation of the current U.S. hard line against Cuba, suggesting U.S. policy is unlikely to change overnight.

Anti-embargo lawmakers called for the Bush administration to immediately review its policies, while others such as Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.), a Cuban émigré whose family fled the Castro takeover of their country, cautioned that little would change with Fidel Castro in the background and his brother Raul formally governing the country.

{mosads}“He doesn’t need these titles; the source of power is him,” Diaz-Balart said in an interview Tuesday.

Castro’s resignation comes at a critical time for his country, still transitioning from the loss of Soviet subsidies during the Cold War, and for a trio of Cuban-American GOP lawmakers representing South Florida that includes Diaz-Balart and his younger brother Mario.

Democrats for the first time have solid challengers running against both of the Diaz-Balart brothers and fellow Cuban-American Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.

The Democratic line is that Castro’s exit gives people reason to be excited about potential change in Cuba and that these people will therefore be more apt to elect lawmakers with different ideas about how to approach the nation and focus on local issues.

The Florida Democrats have argued that younger generations of Cuban-Americans are more concerned about bread-and-butter issues like healthcare and housing, issues their current representatives in Congress have neglected.

One pro-embargo advocate, however, however, said the headlines about Castro could help the three Cuban-American incumbents by placing the emphasis back on foreign relations with Cuba.

“I would venture to say that the attention and the focus on Cuban policy will actually increase, and that only benefits Lincoln, Mario and Ileana, simply because they have the track record and the consistent, well-stated positions,” said Mauricio Claver-Carone, who leads the pro-embargo U.S.-Cuba Democracy Political Action Committee. 

Claver-Carone’s PAC has funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars to Democrats and Republicans in Congress to keep in place hard-line trade and travel policies that are supported by the three incumbents.

The Democrats running in those three Miami-area districts hold similar views to their GOP opponents on the embargo but favor relaxing restrictions on travel and remittances.

“Clearly, something happened in Cuba,” said Democratic strategist Joe Garcia, who is running against Mario Diaz-Balart in the 25th district along the southern coast of the state. “Without question, it presents an opportunity for change. … It offers an opportunity for U.S. policy to reach out and foster civil society.”

But the three candidates also continued to emphasize that the races are very much about local issues.

“Havana is very important, but in my particular district I have eight or nine cities that we need to make sure that we take care of locally,” said former Hialeah Mayor Raul Martinez, who is running against Lincoln Diaz-Balart.

Ros-Lehtinen’s opponent, businesswoman Annette Taddeo, said: “Even though Cuba is very important to our community, there are so many other issues that are very important to our community.”

Robert Muse, an attorney specializing in trade relations with Cuba, said he doubts the events in Cuba will have much effect on the races for Congress. Those races, however, could affect the embargo debate, he said, by electing to Congress Democrats who support keeping trade sanctions against Cuba in place.

“What’s been historically a Republican pro-embargo position is becoming increasingly bipartisan,” Muse said. Electing a pro-embargo politician like Garcia to Congress would only validate the embargo, he added.

In recent years, efforts to weaken those sanctions have been defeated, most notably last year when many Democrats voted against an amendment offered by Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), the powerful chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, that would have made it easier for U.S. farmers to sell goods to Cuba.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (Fla.), the House Democrats’ chief deputy whip, helped defeat Rangel’s amendment.

On Tuesday, she said there would be no reason to change U.S. policy toward Cuba until that country’s government changes its policy.

“If the policies of political oppression and human rights abuses outlive Fidel, there is no cause for celebration and certainly no cause to revise American foreign policy,” Wasserman Schultz said in a statement.

Anti-embargo politicians on Tuesday signaled they would try to re-open the debate. They argued that the U.S. has little influence over Cuba given its current hard line.

Rep. James McGovern (D-Mass.) organized a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice calling for her to review the current policy as a result of Castro’s decision. The bipartisan letter, signed by 104 lawmakers, noted that Castro relinquished his position voluntarily and peacefully.

“The Cuban government, under a new leadership, is reportedly already considering changes in the economic arrangements on the island to give the Cuban people a long-sought improvement in their living standards,” the letter said. “Our policy leaves us without influence at this critical moment, and this serves neither the U.S. national interest nor average Cubans, the intended beneficiaries of our policy.”

Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.), the acting chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, announced in a statement he would hold hearings to determine what impact Castro’s retirement could make on the island.

“This development may provide an opportunity for the United States to inject creativity and fresh ideas into that policy to better achieve our common goal of bringing freedom to the people of Cuba,” Berman said.

However, lawmakers on the other side of the Cuba debate were not convinced that Fidel Castro’s influence would wane just because he decided to relinquish his title.

“[Roman Emperor] Caligula named his horse [an] ambassador. The power isn’t in the title. … Only freeing all the political prisoners and establishing the basic rights of multiple political parties, labor unions and free press will [lift the embargo],” said Mario Diaz-Balart.

Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte told reporters on Tuesday that it was unlikely that the embargo would be lifted “anytime soon.”