[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 76 (Tuesday, May 9, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H4600-H4601]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                     A DARK DAY IN AMERICAN HISTORY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr. Deutsch] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, at about 12 o'clock this afternoon, a 
United States Coast Guard vessel brought 13 Cubans who had left Cuba in 
a raft back to a military base inside of Cuba. That Coast Guard vessel 
was escorted by two Cuban naval warships in this act.
  It is a first time. Today is truly, unfortunately, a dark day in 
American history, a dark day for the Coast Guard, a day which hopefully 
will be a very short day and short time period in American history.
  But if we do not act, it will be a day that in years to come people 
will look back, I am sure, with remorse and regret, the first time in 
American history that the U.S Government has repatriated people to a 
Communist dictatorship.
  It is a symtomatic problem of a Cuban policy by this administration 
that has been schizophrenic, at best. We were told during the 
Guantanamo exodus that it was impossible to blockade the island. Yet 
the administration, in fact, has blockaded the island with the help of 
the Cuban Government and Cuban Navy in a one-way blockade, preventing 
people from leaving.
  The island could have been blockaded several months ago, in fact, 
even up to a year ago, to prevent a migration which did occur of tens 
of thousands of people.
  Our country has become a partner with Castro in repression of his 
people at this point in time. The 13 people that have been returned to 
Cuba were not sent back to Canada, were not sent back to Mexico, were 
sent back to a country which this Government has continuously called, 
and by accurate, independent accounts from Amnesty International, press 
accounts, the most repressive government in this hemisphere, a 
terrorist government, a government in terms of world history that 
stands out as one of the worst abusers of human rights in the history 
of this planet.
  The Attorney General, in announcing this change in policy, said that 
those who returned to Cuba were to be guaranteed no reprisals. I asked 
the Attorney General this evening why then the secrecy in the return, 
why then the delay in the actions? These people were picked up in a 
boat on Friday. Today is Tuesday.
  It defies logic, based on the history of the country of terrorist 
incidents that occur in Cuba almost on a daily basis that we know 
about, obviously scores that we do not know about, that there will not 
be reprisals. It defies logic.
  You do not have to be the Secretary of State of the United States, 
you do not have to have gotten a Ph.D. in international relations to 
understand the nature of the Cuban Government.
  And again, I asked the Attorney General why into a military base, why 
not into Havana Harbor where there would have been at least some 
foreign press to record the incident, some stringers 
[[Page H4601]] from local papers in south Florida to record the 
incident?
  There is a real question as well in terms of the process of 
determining political asylum of those 123 people while they were on the 
vessel. The administration has given myself as well as other Members of 
Congress who have inquired totally conflicting reports in terms of the 
status hearings of those people.
  This administration and, in fact, this Congress is faced with a 
choice. We cannot have it both ways. We all profess that our desire is 
to bring down the Castro dictatorship, which we must bring down, a 
relic of decades past, an evil empire 90 miles from our shore. And yet 
in order to do that, we have the resources at our disposal to do it. 
Yet we have chosen not to.


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