Advocate Articles

People-to-people travel has been one of the few successful elements of U. S current policy towards Cuba.  However, this category of travel has been under constant attack since its implementation by the Obama Administration in January 2012.

According to the Treasury Department, approximately 160 organizations were granted people-to-people licenses in the past year. Now about 140, a sizeable number, of those people-to-people travel licenses are languishing in the bureaucratic depths of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, pending renewal.   Twenty applications of the total 160 have been newly granted or renewed within the past month, but some very respectable organizations have been denied their renewal. In 2010-2011 we worked tirelessly to reinstate this category of travel, and we will not stand by quietly and watch it shrivel and disappear.

For many months—almost two years actually—we’ve focused on congressional action that would definitively end the ban on travel to Cuba; we felt that we had a real opportunity in the 111th Congress to radically alter the stale debate that had developed in Washington DC during the Bush Administration. We succeeded in changing the debate, but so far the policy has not changed. 

At the beginning of the year, as we began the second round of the 111th Congress, our campaign to lift the ban on U.S. citizens' travel to Cuba had come to a crossroads. In 2009, the "Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act," H.R. 874, introduced in the House of Representatives by travel champions Bill Delahunt (D-MA) and Jeff Flake (R-AZ), won strong backing, i.e. co-sponsorship, from an astonishing 180 representatives. Nevertheless, we weren't raising any celebratory mojitos. While the U.S. public was and is increasingly coming around to our viewpoint, we were still 30 or so votes short from being able to pass the Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act in the House. With no new co-sponsors in sight, it was time to consider alternative paths to a resounding "Travel for ALL!" victory.

Love, Loss, and Longing: The Impact of U.S. Travel Policies on Cuban-American Families (see the publication here) continues to raise awareness about the ban on travel to Cuba. Between March and November, 2008, LAWG Education Fund and the Washington Office on Latin America conducted educational sessions on ending the travel ban and showcased our publication in states as widespread as Virginia, Wisconsin, Massachusetts (two cities), Ohio (three cities), and California (four cities). We appeared on two cable television networks and several radio programs. The book is an extraordinary education and advocacy tool that connects your heart with your understanding of the false rationale behind the travel ban.

Contact us at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it if you are interested in setting up a forum and book party in your community. Listen to an interview on Pacifica Radio with Mavis Anderson and author Dr. Jeanne Lemkau from a recent book tour in California here

We are hopeful that, under a new administration, compassion will win out and the ban on family travel and remittances will quickly end. Then our task remains to re-claim the right of all Americans to travel freely to Cuba to engage with our Cuban neighbors. Help us in this task by signing up for Cuba policy e-mail alerts.

Cuba: A Step in the Right Direction

After years without any positive change in U.S. policy toward Cuba, the House Appropriations Committee recently demonstrated support for alleviating the inhumane restrictions on trade and travel to the island.

On June 25th, the committee passed the Financial Services Appropriations bill with a provision that will ease travel for Cuban Americans who want to travel to the island to visit family. The bill also increases agricultural trade between the United States and Cuba.

The provision was presented by the chairman of the Financial Service subcommittee Congressman Jose Serrano (D-NY), and is a small step in the right direction of ending travel restrictions for all Americans. The specific provisions include:

• Allowing Cuban Americans to travel to Cuba to visit family once a year rather than once every three years.
  
  
• Expanding the definition of family to include aunts, uncles, first cousins, nieces, and nephews.
  
  
• Tweaking the “cash-in-advance” regulations to allow agricultural goods to leave U.S. ports for Cuba prior to receiving Cuba’s cash payment; title is transferred after the cash is received in the seller’s account.

Typically, the next step after committee approval would be for the bill to move to the House floor for amendments and a final vote. However, because this is an election year, it is difficult to determine whether the legislation will even make it this far. Democrats in Congress are likely to hold up current appropriations bills in favor of re-writing them in early 2009 under a new (and potentially Democratic) administration. However, if the bill does come to the House floor, we have to be ready to defend the Cuba provisions. Losing this vote would send the wrong message to a new administration about the level of support in Congress for changing this failed policy.

The Senate has also taken significant steps toward abandoning the inhumane restrictions on trade and travel to Cuba. On July 9, the Senate Financial Services and General Government Appropriations subcommittee unanimously approved a spending bill that included Cuba related provisions similar to those introduced by Mr. Serrano in the House. The provisions included in the Senate bill would restore the rights of Cuban Americans to the level they were at before 2004, when President Bush’s “Commission for Assistance for a Free Cuba” tightened restrictions. This means that Cuban Americans could now be able travel to the island once a year rather than once every three years and that the 14-day travel limit would be lifted. The bill also includes a provision to increase the spending limit for Americans traveling to Cuba from $50 to $170.

In both the House and the Senate, opponents of Cuban-American family travel have said they are going to challenge the Cuba provisions. Congresswoman Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) and Congressman Boyd (D-FL) both expressed their opposition to the Cuba language in the bill during the full House Appropriations committee meeting. Senator Brownback (R-KS) also expressed opposition to the Cuba provisions in a recent Congressional Quarterly article, announcing that he “may provide a different option” at the full Senate committee markup.

Ultimately, if this bill moves to the floor in either chamber, the hard-liners in Congress will continue to mischaracterize any provisions that support family travel as condoning the Castro regime. It will be essential for activists to remain vigilant in order to ensure that this legislation is seen for what it can truly be, a first step toward the full restoration of rights for all Americans and their families to travel to Cuba.

Since August 2006, when Fidel Castro transferred power to his younger brother Raul, talk of “transition” has once again been at the forefront of discussions on U.S.-Cuba policy. For some, “transition” signifies a constitutional succession in Cuba; but for others, including the Bush Administration, true “transition” could only come with a regime change.

Despite these differences, one thing is certain: the power transfer in Cuba is official. With Raul Castro as the head of state in Cuba, the United States has an unprecedented opportunity to reconsider its policy toward the island. A new diplomatic strategy should take into account not only the shortcomings of current policy, but also the historical experiences of other “transitional” countries around the world.
The republics of the former Soviet Union provide us with some information about one model of transition. Today, we must urge our policy-makers to examine these lessons learned—both successes and failures—and apply them to a new model for U.S. policy toward Cuba, in order to ensure policy goals include engagement and respect for sovereignty.

Policy toward Cuba throughout the Cold War was geared toward isolation. The rationale for implementing a comprehensive economic embargo was dictated by the fear that the Cuban socioeconomic model would appeal to other Latin American countries. In light of the geopolitical environment of the Cold War, the fear of Cuba’s influence in the region, at least in part, explained a policy aimed at isolating the island from the United States, Latin America, and eventually the rest of the world.

At the end of the Cold War, geopolitics changed. The 1960 U.S.-Cuba policy is now even more outdated and irrelevant. The fear of Cuba’s model spilling over into other countries can hardly be termed a threat—though its example of standing up to the United States still appeals to developing nations. The rhetoric used to justify Cuba policy changed from fear of communism to support for democracy and human rights and thus the conditions demanded by Washington in order to normalize relations with Cuba also changed. From the 1960s and into the late 1980s, the key security issues outlined by the United States were Cuban troops in Africa, exporting revolution to Latin America, and Cuban military security ties with the Soviet Union. The resolution of these issues was considered a precondition for any alteration in existing policy. Today, these security concerns are irrelevant. Cuban troops are no longer active in Africa, Cuba is no longer engaged militarily in Latin America, and the Soviet Union no longer exists. Still the embargo stands.

In an October 2007 speech at the U.S. State Department, President Bush discussed his conditions for engagement with Cuba: “As long as the regime maintains its monopoly over the political and economic life of the Cuban people, the United States will keep the embargo in place.” He also stated: “To further that effort [to] break the hold of the regime, the United States is prepared to take new measures right now to help the Cuban people directly -- but only if the Cuban regime, the ruling class, gets out of the way.” The word “freedom” has become the central concept in the latest policy justification. President Bush further articulated his understanding of freedom as freedom of speech, freedom of association, freedom of the press, freedom to form political parties, freedom to change the government through periodic multiparty elections, and the release of all political prisoners.

Yet, these firm words from the president are only the latest in a series of demands for Cuba. The United States has demonstrated an uncanny ability to alter the conditions to which Cuba must adhere in order to gain favor and normalize relations. All the while, the United States has pressed forward with a policy of isolation. The future of relations seems likely to follow this same trend, even now that Fidel has resigned. Raul Castro is perceived by the administration as the same as his brother and statements by embargo supporters indicate that economic reforms Raul might institute would not alter their stance. In a panel discussion at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research on January 15th, 2008, Nilda Pedrosa from the office of Senator Mel Martinez (R-FL) expressed her absolute disapproval of even considering economic engagement with Cuba without first seeing total political reform. Kristen Madison, of the U.S. Department of State, echoed Ms. Pedrosa’s sentiments by stating that the United States should only consider economic engagement with Cuba when it is possible to influence the island politically. President Bush’s October 2007 speech on Cuba policy flatly stated that no change will occur in Cuba policy, regardless of a change in power on the island or any economic reforms.

If the United States were truly interested in promoting democracy, freedom, and economic prosperity in Cuba--and not converting into policy a vendetta held by the hard-line faction of the Cuban-American community in south Florida as a pay-back for election favors—it would ease or lift the embargo and remove travel restrictions and allow the free exchange of ideas and people to occur.

The apparently seamless transfer of power from Fidel to Raul demonstrates the resilience of the Cuban system. This resilience flies in the face of U.S. policy, again proving the ineffectiveness of the half-century strategy for dealing with the island. Continued non-engagement is as detrimental to U.S. interests in Cuba today as it is detrimental to Cuban civil society—in whatever future Cuba chooses for itself.

For the first time in a presidential election, U.S. policy toward Cuba has held national prominence. Two presidential candidates, Senators Barrack Obama (D-IL) and Chris Dodd (D-CT) have challenged the Bush Administration's stance on Cuba.

In an August 21st op-ed published in the Miami Herald, Senator Obama called for an end to restrictions on family travel and remittances to the island stating, "the (Bush) administration's decision to restrict the ability of Cuban Americans to visit and send money to their relatives in Cuba... is both a humanitarian and a strategic issue... It has also made them [Cubans] more dependent on the Castro regime and isolated them from the transformative message carried there by Cuban Americans."

Senator Dodd went even further, stating in a September 9th Univision debate, "I would begin to unravel that embargo. I would lift travel restrictions, so Cuban Americans can go visit their families. I would be lifting the restrictions on remissions." Fellow candidate, former Senator John Edwards (D-NC), called for an end to travel restrictions but stopped short of calling for a change in remittance caps. Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) echoed Senator Dodd's call for a complete normalization of relations between the two countries and Governor Bill Richardson (D-NM) has also vowed to repeal Bush's restrictions on Cuban-American family travel and remittances.

Not all candidates support change in U.S.-Cuba policy, however. Frontrunner, Senator Hillary Clinton, favors maintaining the status quo toward Cuba and keeping the embargo and other restrictions in place. The Republican frontrunners, former Governor Mitt Romney (R-MA), Senator John McCain (R-AZ), former Senator Fred Thompson (R-TN) and former Mayor of New York City Rudolph Giuliani (R-NY), have all voiced similar views to those of Senator Clinton and the Bush Administration.

Presidential candidates have always looked at the Cuban-American community as a monolithic entity, whose hard-line conservative base needed to be appealed to take Florida during the election. A recent poll that measures Cuban-American sentiment in Miami-Dade County in Florida, however, shows a growing rift on Cuba policy within the Cuban-American community. The Florida International University Cuba Poll is carried out every couple years by the Institute for Public Opinion Research and the Cuban Research Institute of Florida International University to assess Cuban-American opinion on U.S.-Cuba policy and their views of the island. In the 2007 poll, researchers found that 65 percent of Cuban Americans in Miami-Dade County support starting a dialogue with Cuba. This is up from 55.6 percent in the 2004 Cuba Poll. Support for the U.S. embargo has also declined, from 66 percent in 2004 to 57.5 percent in 2007. Furthermore, 64 percent of the respondents would like to return to the 2003 policies governing travel and remittances.

Cuban-Americans are not the only ones with changing views toward U.S.-Cuba policy. In a 2007 Associated Press (AP) poll, 62 percent of Americans polled favored establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba. Based on these numbers, it would seem that the Republican presidential candidates might not want to rely on archaic Cuba policies as a means of winning votes – even in the key primary state of Florida.

What are the real family values when we keep families away from each other,? Mari, Washington, DC

In 2004, the Bush Administration issued a new set of harsh regulations on travel to Cuba, upping the ante significantly. While many Americans were impacted by this, the Cuban-American community has been affected most cruelly. Cuban Americans are restricted from traveling to the island more than once every three years to see their families, and family has been redefined in a very limiting way to include only: parents, siblings, children and grandparents. Aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews, and god-parents are totally off limits. There are no exceptions to these restrictions, not even for family emergencies or deaths. For the last three years, the Latin America Working Group Education Fund (LAWGEF) has worked closely with the Cuban-American community, the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), and other allies here in Washington, DC, to decry this violation of the basic right to visit one’s family.

One of our most ambitious projects to fight these restrictions was a photo exhibit, Love, Loss and Longing: the Impact of U.S.-Travel Policy on Cuban-American Families, which has been on national tour throughout 2006 and 2007. LAWGEF and WOLA have shown the exhibit in over 20 venues across the United States and have brought the message of needed change to thousands of Americans. Seeing how the exhibit’s photographs and accompanying testimonials touched viewers and opened their eyes to this cruel U.S.-policy’s impact, we have expanded the exhibit’s reach by publishing the exhibit in book form. You may view the book here

Why a photo exhibit?

Marisela’s father relied on her frequent visits and care packages to help fight his steadily-progressing Alzheimer’s. In 2004 the changed restrictions on travel to the island prohibited her from traveling to the island and reduced the amount and types of items she could send to support him. Shortly thereafter, Marisela’s father passed away; because she had been to see him during the previous three years, she was unable to attend his funeral. Now she asks: “I came to this country in pursuit of freedom! How is that…I can’t [visit] my father’s grave?” Mario, Sr., moved to the United States in 1992 and left behind his visually-impaired son, Mario, Jr. In the following years Mario, Sr., visited his son multiple times a year to help with maintenance around the house and to provide emotional support. Mario, Jr., recently had a son; and Mario, Sr., is now a grandfather. In 2004 when the restrictions on family travel changed, Mario, Sr., was prohibited from traveling to the island more than once every three years - no exceptions allowed. Now Mario, Sr., cannot help his son or be a part of his grandson’s childhood. He asks: “What does it mean to be a good father?” These are two of countless heartbreaking stories of family separation the LAWGEF has heard over the past three years.

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Nestor Sr., 74
Upholsterer
Hyattsville, MD/Havana

"Who will take my ashes to Cuba?"

Nestor Sr. left Cuba more than 50 years ago hoping for a better life in the United States. He was 20. He settled in Washington, married and raised six children. Nestor Jr., photographer for this exhibit, is his oldest son. Vicente, who is pictured here, is his youngest.

Nestor Jr, was 18 when he traveled to Cuba and arrived unannounced on his grandmother’s doorstep in Los Pinos. With the embrace of his father’s relatives, he felt he had “come home.” Between 1978 and 2003 he made over 20 trips to Cuba, visiting family, exploring far corners of the island with his camera and organizing workshops and exhibitions with North American and Cuban photographers.

Vicente traveled to Los Pinos with his father and discovered that his Cuban family was larger than his family at home. Playing with cousins on the streets of Havana he felt safer than on the streets of Washington. After his trip he started asking more about his father’s homeland and began referring to himself as Cuban.

Under the restrictions neither Nestor Jr. nor Vicente can return to Cuba – ever. Their grandmother is deceased and their cousins aren’t eligible for visits as “family.”

Nestor Sr. wonders, “When I die who will take my ashes to Cuba if my sons can’t go?”

“¿Quién llevará mis cenizas a Cuba?”

Nestor, 74 Tapicero
Hyattsville, MD/Habana

Nestor Senior dejó Cuba hace más de 50 años para una vida mejor en los Estados Unidos. Tenía 20 años. Radicó en Washington, se casó y crió a seis hijos. Nestor Junior, fotógrafo para esta exhibición, es su hijo mayor. Vicente quien aparece en esta fotografía es el más joven.

Nestor Junior tenía 18 años cuando viajó a Cuba y llegó sin anunciarse a la puerta de la casa de su abuela en Los Pinos. Con el abrazo de los parientes del lado paterno se sintió que había “llegado a casa.” Entre 1978 y 2003 el hizo más de 20 viajes a Cuba, visitando a su familia, explorando los rincones de la isla con su cámara y organizando talleres y exhibiciones con fotógrafos estadounidenses y cubanos.

Vicente viajo a Los Pinos con su padre y descubrió que su familia en Cuba era más grande que su familia en casa. Jugando con sus primos en la calles de la Habana se sintió más seguro que en las calles de Washington. Después de su viaje, empezó a preguntarse más acerca de la patria de su padre y empezó a identificarse como cubano.

Nestor Senior se pregunta, “Cuándo yo muera, ¿Quién va a llevar mis cenizas a Cuba si mis hijos no pueden ir?”

 

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Two years ago, Dr. Jeanne Lemkau, a clinical psychologist, professor emerita at Wright State University School of Medicine in Ohio, and admitted Cubaphile, walked into our office to discuss a new research project about the effect family travel restrictions have on Cuban families. The project would be a collaboration between Jeanne and Dr. David Strug from the Wurzweiler School of Social Work at Yeshiva University, NYC, and would take the two to Cuba and all over the United States to personally interview Cubans and their family members. They would use their background as a medical professionals to assess the restrictions’ impact on family health.

The LAWGEF’s Mavis Anderson realized the potential this study could have in the policy debate and suggested turning the research into a nationally-touring photo exhibit that would bring the Cuban-American stories of love and loss to Americans across the country.

Nestor, a Guiding Force

From that point forward, LAWGEF staffers Mavis Anderson and Claire Rodriguez, along with our partners, Elsa Falkenburger and Geoff Thale at WOLA, worked closely with Jeanne and David to shepherd the project through production and began the daunting task of coordinating a nationwide tour. We realized we were heading into uncharted territory when we sat down to brainstorm with the exhibit’s photographer, Nestor Hernández, Jr., on how to ship the exhibit from one venue to the next. Nestor, a Cuban-American photographer in Washington, DC, was a veteran of traveling photo tours and had exhibited his works all over the world. He became a guiding force in the photo exhibit, and his beautiful photography inspired us to forge ahead with the tour.

In February 2006, as Nestor was photographing the second half of the exhibit, he fell ill and was unable to continue the project. Our work came to a standstill as we absorbed what was happening – we were losing a colleague-turned-friend, and one of the driving motivations behind the exhibit. If we hadn’t been emotionally invested in the project before, we became so then.

It was too late to delay the scheduled May opening; we had congressional co-sponsorship and the invitations had already gone out. Jeanne quickly contacted another Cuban-American photographer in her hometown, Juan E. González López, who agreed to take over for Nestor. With Nestor’s encouragement, we pressed ahead. Juan studied Nestor’s photographs and started photographing the remaining participants, trying to preserve Nestor’s distinct style. Shortly before the exhibit’s opening, Nestor’s illness began to progress rapidly; and the week before the exhibit opened on Capitol Hill, Nestor was re-admitted to the hospital.

The day before the opening, Juan and Jeanne visited Nestor and showed him the completed exhibit. Nestor expressed deep appreciation to Juan for continuing the legacy of his style and seeing the project to completion. Tragically, Nestor passed away the day after the exhibit opened on Capitol Hill. The exhibit’s nationwide tour and the book are dedicated to his memory. Nestor’s father, Nestor Hernández, Sr., is featured in the exhibit; his support and Nestor’s spirit continue to guide our work.

Touring the Nation

The day the exhibit opened on Capitol Hill was a stressful day for our office. We wanted to make everything perfect, from assembling the easels to display the photographs at 6:00 in the morning and then rushing back to the office to put the whole exhibit online for press calls and immediate access for the public. In the late afternoon, the room started to fill, and over 150 people attended the opening reception. Congressman Bill Delahunt (D-MA) attended and spoke about the need to change policy. The next day the Miami Herald ran a story about the photo exhibit opening in the broader context of the changing Cuban-American community in Miami, FL.

Demand to show the exhibit in cities across the country was high. Love, Loss and Longing was exhibited in: Oakland and Sacramento, CA; Miami, FL; Chicago, IL; Bloomington, IN; Cambridge, MA; Baltimore, MD; Minneapolis, MN; Jackson Hole, WY; Newark, NJ; New York, NY; Yellow Springs and Dayton, OH; Devon, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh, PA; and Arlington and Crystal City, VA.

Showing the photo exhibit in so many venues in such a short time presented many challenges that we had not anticipated. Who knew it would be so challenging to find a crate to ship a 200-pound photo exhibit or that shipping companies would be so unreliable? However, the rewards of accompanying the exhibit on its nationwide tour more than made up for the challenges. Working with an art exhibit allowed us to partner with people across the country with whom we never would have had the opportunity to collaborate. We worked with art galleries, museums, local governments, political cartoonists, churches, social-justice groups, restaurants, and committed individuals. We loved bringing so many new faces to the Cuba-policy debate.

Empowering the exhibit participants to share their stories of separation was a moving experience. Many of the Cuban Americans, especially those living in Miami, have faced vocal criticism for their position on travel; and their bravery in coming forward with the pain this policy causes their family was inspiring. The strength of their stories made the exhibit more moving and motivated us more than we thought possible. In Jackson Hole, WY, the photo exhibit host’s son, a young high school student whose father is Cuban American, saw the exhibit and was moved to tears by the stories portrayed in the exhibit. He said, “These people are just like our family.” His words inspired his older brother to accompany their father to Washington, DC, for a Cuban-American lobby day to speak in favor of ending the restrictions on travel for all Americans.

The day after the photo exhibit showed in Miami, an article ran in the Miami Herald about the changing nature of the Cuba debate in Miami. Love, Loss and Longing was exhibited at Tinta y Café, a new café on Miami’s Calle Ocho, which the owner opened to “give a voice to the silent majority of people in Miami who are frustrated with the failures of U.S. Cuba policy.” (1) Five years ago the café wouldn’t have been permitted to open, much less display a photo exhibit calling for policy change.

Wrapping it Up

The LAWGEF has seen how effective an advocacy tool the photo exhibit has been for our work and is considering touring another exhibit. The LAWGEF’s Colombia program hopes to bring a photo exhibit about the impact of the war in Colombia to the United States next year. The exhibit will tour the country visiting churches, peace organizations, and art galleries.

Finally, after a great year and a half, the time has come to retire the Love, Loss and Longing photo exhibit. We are pleased to announce that one copy of the exhibit will be on permanent display at the Dayton International Peace Museum. The museum provides a space to promote peace and nonviolent solutions to conflict. You can learn more about the museum and their initiatives at: http://www.daytonpeacemuseum.org. The other copy of the exhibit will be divided and shared with the exhibit participants.

Arlene, a photo exhibit participant from Chantilly, VA, says, “Family is more powerful than any law.” We know she is right—working together over the past year-and-a-half, we became like a family. We visited the photo exhibit subjects in their homes, in the hospital, and in their places of work. We have seen what families can do together. And we have witnessed the pain that a misguided policy can cause.

To order your copy of the Love, Loss and Longing book today click here

In addition, we are grateful to our faithful supporters and the many individuals who personally and generously donated to this project. We would especially like to thank the Christopher Reynolds Foundation, the Arca Foundation, Oxfam America, and the Bruderhof Foundation for their support of this project.

1. Corral, Oscar. “A New Forum for Exile Discourse.” Miami Herald. 23 February 2007