Rethinking the Cuban Adjustment Act’s goals

Rethinking the Cuban Adjustment Act's goals

Fifty years ago, in a speech delivered on the site in New York Harbor
that is home to the Statue of Liberty, President Lyndon Johnson made a
solemn vow: "I declare this afternoon to the people of Cuba that those
who seek refuge here in America will find it."

One year later, the pledge he made in October 1965 became law in the
form of the Cuban Adjustment Act, signed on Nov. 2, 1966.

It proved a godsend for the beleaguered people of Cuba, betrayed by a
gang of communist despots intent on establishing a totalitarian regime
that, incredibly, survives to this day.

The law offers Cubans who arrive in this country a unique and speedy
pathway to legal residency and citizenship available to no other
immigrants from anywhere else. Over the years, hundreds of thousands of
Cubans seeking a better life arrived in this country. In 2009, the
Congressional Research Service noted: "Cuba consistently ranks among the
top 10 source countries for legal permanent residents."

South Florida, home of the exile community, and America in general have
been enriched by their presence.

The gift of an open-door policy for Cubans has been repaid many times
over by their economic and cultural contributions to the country that
became their new home, and to which they pledged fealty.

The world has changed in significant ways since 1965, but the despotic
nature of the Cuban regime has not. Cuba remains frozen, in the grip of
the same barbudos who seized control in 1959. Their beards are gone, but
time has not diminished their lust for absolute power.

What has undeniably changed, however, is the nature of Cuban migrants
arriving in this country. The evidence that many are no longer political
refugees or individual victims of political persecution has been
apparent for years.

They see the 1966 law more as an inducement to migrate to this country
in search of a better life and rarely, if ever, consider the political
situation in Cuba. Nowadays some even bring their pets!

The latest exodus, using Guatemala and a route through Mexico as a
trampoline to bounce across the U.S. border, was amply documented in a
recent Miami Herald series.

As with most migrants from Cuba over the last decade or more, they are
young, motivated and desperate for a chance to obtain something better
than what they have in Cuba. But political persecution is rarely
mentioned as a factor.

And those Cubans who are, in fact, targets of persecution — prominent
dissidents like Berta Soler, Antonio Rodiles, and Jorge Luis García
Pérez ("Antúnez") — are free to come and go from Cuba, usually. In most
cases, they have made the courageous decision not to leave permanently,
regardless of the painful consequences.

These facts should compel a reconsideration of the Cuban Adjustment Act,
whether it still serves a useful purpose and whether the law conveys
benefits no longer justified by current circumstances.

Ironically, the case could be made that it is precisely the victims of
political repression that the Cuban Adjustment Act was designed to help
who are not using it.

And those who are not motivated by political considerations are the ones
most likely to take advantage of it.

And take advantage they do. Flagrant abuses of the most generous
provisions of laws designed to help Cuban migrants have prompted
Cuban-American members of Congress from Miami to consider changes. Now
is the time.

Tomorrow: Abuses and fixes.

Source: Rethinking the Cuban Adjustment Act's goals | Miami Herald -
http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/editorials/article43524117.html