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| Council On Hemispheric Affairs |
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| Monitoring
Political, Economic and Diplomatic Issues Affecting the Western Hemisphere |
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| Memorandum to the Press 04.78 |
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Word Count: 2200
Wednesday,
27 October 2004
• A new poll published by the National Democrat Network (NDN) suggests that President George W. Bush’s support among Florida's right-wing Cuban-Americans is significantly eroding.
• Senator John Kerry has sought to attract more Cuban-American voters by toughening his language against Castro and attacking Bush on the highly unpopular travel ban and cap on remittances that his administration implemented in July.
• Kerry is hoping to capitalize on recent trends suggesting that the Cuban-American base in Florida is gradually experiencing an ideological realignment towards the Democratic Party.
• The Democratic candidate’s “Statement of Principles on Cuba” illustrates a telling divide between him and his opponent on issues important to Little Havana, and suggests that Kerry would lift the family travel ban and remittances cap upon taking office.
A poll
published in September by the National Democrat Network (NDN), a Washington-Based
527 political organization, suggests that the Cuban-American vote in Florida
will not be as slanted towards George W. Bush as it was four years ago. As
a result, both President Bush and Senator John Kerry are scrambling to energize
support among Cuban-American voters in the crucial swing state. Bush, who
received 82 percent of the Cuban-American vote in Florida in 2000 (a state
which he won by a paltry 537 votes), is losing his stranglehold on the state’s
Cuban-American base. The NDN poll shows that, overall, 72 percent of Cuban-American
voters favor Bush, 19 percent back Kerry and 9 percent are still undecided
in the run up to election. Underscoring this fact, The Guardian of
London reported on October 5 that Kerry is attracting majorities of key Cuban-American
groups. For example, 58 percent of U.S. born Cuban-Americans favor Kerry over
Bush, and immigrants who arrived in Miami after the Mariel boat lift of 1980
favor Kerry by 11 percentage points. The data from the NDN poll suggests the
Senator could succeed in attracting a significant number of Florida’s Cuban-Americans
to the Democratic column on November 2. This has accelerated efforts by both
campaigns to court Cuban voters, and has even led John Kerry to reach out
to hard-line anti-Castro voters who are discouraged by the misguided pandering
of the current president.
Kerry toughens his language on Castro
With new data indicating that the Democratic candidate might be able to make
significant gains amongst Cuban-Americans in the election, some of Kerry’s
advisors have recently encouraged the Senator to toughen his language on Cuba.
In a reaction to Secretary of State Colin Powell’s slip that Castro poses
a “diminished threat” to the United States since the end of the Cold War,
Kerry offered a rebuttal that could have been taken out of the Clinton playbook,
attempting to move to Bush’s right in bashing Havana. Regarding Powell’s statement,
Kerry charged back, “[it is] shocking that the Bush administration is telling
the world that Fidel Castro no longer poses a problem for this hemisphere.
Fidel Castro is a tyrant who brutally oppresses the Cuban people […] Castro's
Cuba is the last bastion of communism in our region and a major obstacle to
the triumph of democracy in this hemisphere.” This statement, to date Kerry’s
most extreme remark about Castro, was aimed at attracting disgruntled hard-line
Miamians disillusioned by Bush’s policy on Cuba. In response to Kerry’s rejoinder,
Powell claimed that his words were taken out of context, and told the Knight
Ridder news organization on October 8, that Castro has “never stopped
being a problem” for the hemisphere. When asked about the incident, a State
Department official refused to speak about Powell’s comments, telling COHA
that the “Secretary’s comments stand for themselves.”
An anonymous Kerry campaign official also told COHA that the Senator’s statements
about Cuba did signal a “slight shift” in his language. However, the official
downplayed the significance of Kerry’s statement, saying that he is focusing
“primarily on mainstream issues because that is what he is defending himself
on right now. He is trying not to take too much of a stance on issues like
Cuba right now.” Despite those comments, it appears that Kerry believes many
Cuban-Americans, including some hard-liners, have not yet decided who they
are going to vote for, and the Senator is making a play to attract any undecided
voters in the crucial swing state. This presumably includes those who believe
that President Bush over-stepped his bounds when he turned to his discretionary
powers and in July implemented a stringent travel ban and put a cap on remittances
that can be sent to Cuba. Recent explosive developments in Little Havana have
also suggested that an ideological realignment may be brewing inside the Cuban-American
community. This includes the surprising move by Joe Garcia, who left his post
as executive director at the notoriously conservative Cuban American National
Foundation (CANF) to help lead the liberal “Hispanic Project” at the NDN this
fall.
The “Hispanic Project” is a voter drive designed to help swing Florida and
its 27 electoral votes, as well as other states with large numbers of Hispanic
voters, like New Mexico and Nevada, to the Kerry column. When Garcia was with
the unabashedly right-wing CANF, he was a key player in Cuban-American politics,
and garnered a great deal of support for many anti-Castro programs. His move
to the NDN reflects the shift that is taking place in Florida’s Cuban-American
community, including changes in political allegiance by hard-liners who were
previously among the most fervent backers of the GOP. Garcia’s move to the
NDN also illustrates just how disillusioned some Cuban-Americans have become
with President Bush. Garcia is likely to play a critical role in the days
before the election, helping to attract a growing number of Cuban-Americans
to the Kerry camp.
Kerry’s comes out against Bush’s unpopular measures
Kerry’s recent attack on the Bush Administration and his tough language against
Castro is evidence of just how important the Cuban vote is for Kerry. It also
provides an example of how foreign policy positions are being manipulated
by both candidates to promote their own political ends. As recently as late
September, Kerry had voiced support for a measure passed in the House of Representatives
that called for ending the travel ban to Cuba. Kerry said of the measure,
“[T]he House voted…to undo George Bush’s anti-family policy of placing inhumane
restrictions on the ability of Cuban-Americans to visit their relatives in
Cuba.” In any event, that bill is expected to be defeated in the Senate, and
Bush has threatened a veto if it ever reaches his desk. Kerry has also voiced
support for abolishing the cap on remittances that are allowed to be sent
to relatives in Cuba. The travel ban and the remittances cap have proven to
be extraordinarily unpopular among a growing number of Cuban-Americans. Those
that dislike the Bush Administration’s new regulations are most likely to
vote for Kerry. These include migrants who arrived in the U.S. after the Mariel
boat-lift of 1980 and U.S.-born Cuban-Americans. The Bush administration has
even received criticism from hard-line anti-Castro groups like the CANF, which
may help explain Garcia’s departure from the organization and Kerry’s new
rhetoric. Even a slight shift of traditional voting behavior among Cuban-Americans
could win Kerry the state and ultimately the election.
Despite shifts in rhetoric, Kerry’s position on Cuba is
moderately liberal
Kerry’s official position on Cuba, entitled “Statement of Principles on U.S.
Cuban Policy,” has not changed since it was first published June 5, 2004 on
his campaign website, JohnKerry.com. The statement, though markedly different
from the current president’s position on Cuba, echoes some of Bush’s recent
assertions about increasing U.S. efforts to bring about regime change on the
island. Kerry plans to “support effective and peaceful strategies that will
hasten the end of the regime as soon as possible, and enable the Cuban people
to take their rightful place in the democratic community of the Americas…[he]
want[s] to work with all Americans…to bring about a peaceful transition to
democracy in Cuba, putting the focus on Castro’s failures instead of [U.S.]
policy.” Kerry criticizes both the Bush travel ban and the restrictions on
cash remittances to the island, noting that “President Bush’s recent election
year move to significantly restrict cash remittances to Cuban families and
virtually eliminate family travel must be seen for what it is—a cynical and
misguided ploy for a few Florida votes.” Kerry also stops short of calling
for overt American military action to remove the Castro regime, saying, “I
am not going to pander and promise something that no president in the last
45 years has been able to deliver. I want to take steps to…work toward a democratic
solution and the ultimate end to the Castro regime in a peaceful and democratic
way.” He also “promotes the interchanges of ideas that will begin…to lay the
foundations for economic prosperity and an independent civil society,” increasing
humanitarian trade such as food and medicine to the island and the “free flow
of information to Cuba.”
Although Kerry’s stance on the Cuban government and Castro has at times been
difficult to pin down, he has been more or less consistent in his support
for the Cuban people. In June, New York Times’ columnist David Brooks
criticized the candidate for his remarks about Cuban dissident Oswaldo Payá’s
Varela Project. Brooks’ denigration of Kerry came after the arrest of 75 anti-Castro
human rights activists for compiling signatures calling for new civil rights
legislation. Kerry was actually taking a moderately liberal position because
many claim that the events that brought about the detentions were different
from what was commonly reported in the U.S. Brooks reported that Kerry told
Andres Oppenheimer of the Miami Herald on June 6 that the Varela
Project “has gotten a lot of people in trouble . . . and it brought down the
hammer in a way that I think wound up being counterproductive." Although
those remarks seemingly contradict an official statement on the candidate’s
website in which he endorses the work of the Varela Project, Kerry is consistent
in his opposition to the administration’s inappropriate and counterproductive
meddling in Cuban affairs. Kerry’s statement, titled “Strengthening U.S. Relations
with Latin America and Creating a New Community of the Americas,” reads, “[I]n
Cuba Kerry supports Oswaldo Payá and his brave colleagues on the Varela
Project. At the same time, it is important not to undermine dissident movements
from the outside—particularly by the actions of this Administration.”
The Kerry campaign official’s remarks to COHA and the Senator’s rebuttal of
Secretary Powell indicate that Kerry will support influencing regime change
in Cuba and other window-dressing moves if it increases the number of Floridians
prepared to vote for him. This does not necessarily indicate a departure from
his previous stance on Cuba. While firmly opposed to Castro’s government,
Kerry has not sought to punish the Cuban people, and has not supported measures
that tighten the embargo against Cuba, including the Helms-Burton legislation
of 1996. Although Kerry originally supported the legislation, which reinforced
the sweeping embargo implemented by President Kennedy in 1962, he eventually
voted against the final version of the bill when it reached the Senate floor.
The Kerry campaign recognizes that every vote in Florida is essential to winning
the highly sought-after battleground state, and it is willing to do everything
it can to attract votes in order to ensure victory, even if it means appeasing
Little Havana’s right-wing anti-Castro groups.
Government funds to anti-Castro groups is not likely to change under
Kerry
Both Kerry and Bush’s remarks about influencing “peaceful democratic regime
change” appear to favor a general trend of increasing U.S. funding of anti-Castro
activities in Cuba and the United States. U.S. Foreign Aid (USAID), which
has spent approximately $7 million on its “Cuba Program” during the 2004 fiscal
year, has, with Bush’s backing, asked for that amount to be increased to $9
million for the next fiscal year—a more than 20 percent increase from 2004,
and a rise of more than 33 percent from the roughly $6 million USAID spent
on Cuba in 2003.
Financial support for dissident Cuban groups through quasi-governmental agencies
like the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), which receives funds from
the U.S. government and funnels money into other Cuban-dissident organizations,
has also increased. Though statistics for the NED’s 2004 budget allocations
have not yet been published, the organization, which dates back to the Reagan-era,
and which many believe was founded in part to carry out covert operations
on behalf of agencies like the CIA, spent $1,143,372 on Cuba in 2003. This
was an increase of more than 20 percent from the $769,000 it allocated toward
Cuban projects in 2002.
That regime change in Cuba has become a greater priority, and even official
U.S. policy, may not be
indicative of what Kerry’s Cuba policy will look like
if he is elected. Kerry’s voting history on the issue is more progressive
than his recent rhetoric implies. Although little suggests that Kerry would
lift all sanctions against Cuba, or radically decrease funding anti-Castro
dissident groups if he wins in November, his actual Cuba policy is likely
to markedly contrast with the present Bush doctrine.
This
analysis was prepared by David Oppenheim, COHA Research Associate.
October
27, 2004
COHA
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