U.S. gift to Cuban exiles abused

U.S. gift to Cuban exiles abused
BY DANIEL SHOER ROTH
DSHOER@MIAMIHERALD.COM

A walk on the beach to count my blessings led me to understand with
greater clarity the polarized debate on the Cuban Adjustment Act.

In this city of Botox, implants, and steroids, where people seem to
avoid eye contact with a stranger, the walk got me into an authentic,
profound dialogue with a newly arrived Cuban who needed barely an hour
to share plenty of anecdotes that illustrate a new chapter in the Cuban
exile community.

The hardships on the island had led him to spend $12,000 to escape
clandestinely through Mexico, cross the U.S. border guided by "coyotes,"
and stay here by invoking the "wet foot, dry foot" policy.

He then took shelter under the federal law that allows him to adjust his
migration status to permanent resident after one year and one day. The
government provides him with food stamps and other federal benefits. He
is looking for work to begin to save money to travel to Cuba once he
obtains his residency. He longs for his beloved wife and baby. He feels
he cannot live without them.

His testimony caused me pain. I tried to offer words of encouragement.
When we parted I found one more reason to thank my own blessings.

Stories like his surface everywhere in South Florida. There are Cubans
who go back on vacation. Others take advantage of the trips to travel as
"mules," carrying an inventory of electronic gadgets and other gifts
that in Cuba are basic necessities.

Any solidarity gesture is laudable. It is a noble thing that immigrants
living in prosperous countries help the loved ones they left behind.
Poverty pushes them to seek a full life — and share it.

Yet it is also undeniable that there are people abusing the U.S.
government's generosity. The Medicare scammers return to Cuba with
impunity. And now, Havana's new immigration policy that eases travel
restrictions (though a visa is still required to enter the United
States) and extends up to two years the time Cuban citizens can live
abroad without losing their residence, makes it easier for Cubans to
obtain permanent residency in the United States and then return to Cuba
quickly enough to retain their Cuban residence.

This way they can travel from one country to the other of their own
will, injecting funds to the impoverished Cuban economy.

Last week, at a question-and-answer session with the American Society of
News Editors, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Miami, reemphasized the need to
examine and amend the Cuban Adjustment Act to stop those abuses and
irregularities, a position supported by a segment of exiles in Miami
with conservative values.

"I don't criticize anyone who wants to go visit their mom or dad or
their dying brother or sister in Cuba," he said. "But I am telling you
it gets very difficult to justify someone's status as an exile and
refugee when a year and a half after they get here they are flying back
to that country over and over again."

His speech, in tune with the ideology of Cuban-American U.S. Reps.
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Mario Diaz-Balart, has prompted explosive
criticism among some Cuban exiles who denounce the proposal as
insensitive and lacking empathy with those who have family or friends in
Cuba.

"We would be stabbing ourselves," said Héctor Caraballo, president of
the Cuban American Committee of the Democratic Party in Miami-Dade
County. "It would be a serious mistake to try to change or adjust the
Cuban Adjustment Act because, in the long term, it would lead to its
elimination."

Caraballo says that the Cuban residents in the United States who return
to Cuba to visit family or friends help bring about an internal
transformation, strengthening Cuba's civil society and leading to a
greater opening. Community leaders who share his liberal ideology defend
Cubans who travel to the island arguing that they entered the United
States through a family-reunification visa — not as political refugees.

The root of the problem is that the Cuban Adjustment Act was written in
1966 to address the political conditions in Cuba at that moment. Yet the
majority of Cubans who seek shelter under the act today emigrated for
economic reasons, as do non-Cuban immigrants who do not receive any of
those benefits. All of that fosters inequality and criticism from U.S.
immigration-rights advocates.

There is no doubt that Cubans continue being victims of the most corrupt
and ruthless dictatorship in the hemisphere. But such human tragedy does
not justify abusing the magnanimous immigration system of this country,
a beacon of light that brightens a tempestuous sea, allowing us
immigrants to anchor in the open arms of its piers.

Source: "Daniel Shoer Roth: U.S. gift to Cuban exiles abused - Daniel
Shoer Roth - MiamiHerald.com" -
http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/07/03/3484200/daniel-shoer-roth-us-gift-to-cuban.html