[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 183 (Tuesday, December 8, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12701-S12703]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                  CUBA

  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I rise as a cosponsor for S. 428, the 
Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act.
  It is time we brought our strengths to bear--our people, our vision, 
our energy--to help the Cuban people shape the future direction of Cuba 
and to fix a policy that has manifestly failed. For America to act as 
the great power we are, with confidence in our values and vision, we 
need a Cuba policy that looks forward.
  The truth is, we have reached out to countries where our wounds were 
far deeper, and far more recent. When John McCain and I led the efforts 
to unfreeze our relationship with Vietnam, we said: ``let's be honest . 
. . the Cold War is over. All the American trade embargo is doing is 
keeping Vietnam poor and thus encouraging a flood of refugees.''
  For nearly 20 years after the fall of Saigon, the Vietnam war took a 
less bloody but equally hostile form. The U.S. and Vietnam had no 
diplomatic relations. Vietnamese assets were frozen. Trade was 
embargoed. But in 1995 the United States normalized relations with 
Vietnam. The Cold War had ended, and we even signed a trade deal with a 
country where 58,000 Americans had given their lives.
  The results? A Vietnam that is less isolated, more market-oriented, 
and, yes, freer--though it has miles to go.
  And yet, when it comes to Cuba, a small, impoverished island 90 miles 
off the shores of Florida, we maintain a policy of embargo--motivated 
by past grievance, not present realities and future dreams. Fidel 
Castro has stepped aside from day-to-day government, there is a new 
American President, and Cuban-Americans increasingly want broad, far-
reaching interaction across the Florida Straits. Times are changing, 
and we cannot live in the past.
  Forty-seven years ago, I was in my first semester of college when 
Soviet missiles, deployed in Cuba, threatened to set the world on fire. 
No one who lived through those thirteen harrowing days in October will 
ever forget them. Certainly, the threat from Cuba was real.
  It is true that we continue to disapprove of Cuba's dismal human 
rights record and palpable lack of freedom. And it is also true that, 
over 50 years, the embargo can claim some successes. For example, it 
can be reasonably argued that U.S. pressure contributed to Cuba's 
decision to cease its military adventurism in Africa and its support 
for the violent insurgencies that ripped apart Central America in the 
1980s.
  But on the two most important questions, the verdict is decisive:
  First, did this policy fulfill its often-stated purpose of 
overthrowing the Castro regime? Fidel Castro outlasted nine American 
Presidents, from Eisenhower to Clinton, and retired only for reasons of 
health during the tenth. When he passed on the reins to his brother, 
Fidel joined Omar Bongo of Gabon and Libya's Colonel Qaddafi as one of 
the world's longest-serving head of states.
  Second, have the benefits of our policy outweighed the costs? It is 
hard to argue they have. The embargo has cost Cubans access to our 
markets, and for many years to our food and medicine--with little 
progress to show. But it has cost us as well. It has limited the 
influence of our people and our democracy. What's more, this fall's 
U.N. vote condemning America's embargo showed yet again: Cuba is not 
the only country isolated by our policy. The vote against our policy 
was 187 to 3. All of our major allies voted against us, and one of the 
two voting with us itself routinely trades with Cuba.
  Is it morally satisfying to sanction a government whose human rights 
practices we abhor and whose political system rejects many of our 
values? Sure. And helping Cubans to live in democracy and liberty 
absolutely remains a goal of American policy. But for 47 years now, we 
have endorsed an embargo in the name of democracy that produced no 
democracy!
  In fact, our rhetoric and policies have actually helped to 
consolidate the Cuban government. We have provided the Castro regime 
with an all-purpose--if exaggerated--excuse to draw attention away from 
its many shortcomings, including its shamelessly flawed economic model. 
For too many Cubans, our threats have legitimized Castro's outsized 
nationalism and repression of opponents. Our posture has played to his 
strengths.
  At the same time, we have not brought our strengths to bear--our 
people, our vision, our energy, our opportunities. It is time for 
America to act as the great power it is--with greatness built on 
confidence in our values and vision.
  Of course, the greatest cost of our policy has been borne by the 
Cuban people themselves. Jose Marti, Cuba's great ``Apostle'' and man 
of letters, once said: ``Everything that divides men, everything that 
classifies, separates or shuts off men, is a sin against humanity.'' 
More than 70 percent of Cuba's 11\1/2\ million people have lived their 
entire lives in this stalemate. A Cuban boy or girl of 10 when Fidel 
Castro drove victorious into Havana is 60 years old today. His whole 
life has been spent deprived of basic freedoms but

[[Page S12702]]

also deprived--in accordance with U.S. policies except during brief 
periods--of interaction with America's people.
  We must have the courage to admit the need for a new approach. 
President Kennedy, who instituted sanctions against Cuba, had by mid-
1963 set in motion secret contacts aimed at normalizing relations. Ford 
and Carter, too, looked for ways out of the box. George H.W. Bush 
cooperated with Cuba on the Angola peace accord, and his administration 
even dangled a promise of improved ties with America. Each initiative 
failed for a different reason, but all were grounded in the same 
recognition: there must be a better way forward.
  Fortunately, we know there is a different strategy that can succeed. 
The Clinton administration worked to refocus our policy around what 
matters: on the Cuban people, not the Castro brothers; on the future, 
not the past; and on America's long-term national interests, not the 
political expediencies of a given moment.
  The Clinton administration promoted people-to-people relations 
``unilaterally''--without conditions on Havana. We worked to improve 
bilateral cooperation on issues like migration and combating drug 
trafficking, which were clearly in our national interest. Family travel 
in both directions quickly skyrocketed. And tens of thousands of 
Americans from across society--church members, academics and students, 
medical professionals, athletes, journalists, and more--were permitted 
to interact with their Cuban counterparts.
  Those policies sent a clear and effective message to the Cuban 
people: the United States is not who your leaders say we are. Our 
problem is not now, nor has it ever been, with the Cuban people. We 
completely changed the dynamic: A synagogue with holes in its roof so 
big that birds flew around the sanctuary has been repaired with funds 
and materials from American supporters. Environmentalists worked 
together to save species and protect our shared environment. The 
children who received bats and balls--and moral support--from Baltimore 
Orioles players visiting Cuba for an exhibition game will never forget 
the gesture of American generosity.
  And guess what. Across the board, Cubans seeking a better future for 
their country have said that nothing energized civil society in Cuba 
more than contact with U.S. civil society. Even Cuba's human rights and 
democracy activists benefitted immeasurably from the contact.
  Unfortunately, the Bush administration shut down most forms of 
contact and dramatically reduced our interactions to a tightly 
regulated, government controlled trickle. They tightened licensing 
procedures, reduced transparency, and put government in the people's 
way in what amounted to a unilateral suspension of Americans' ability 
to help Cubans shape their future. People-to-people relations were made 
secretive, filtered, and for narrow objectives. That is the opposite of 
pro-democracy.
  Regrettably, that was the record of the Bush administration: an 
enormous step backwards. Now it's up to the Obama administration to 
craft a Cuba policy that moves us forward.
  In May 2008, Barack Obama said on the Presidential campaign trail 
that it was ``time for a new strategy.'' While he wasn't ready to give 
up the embargo as a source of leverage, he did declare at the Summit of 
the Americas: ``The United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba,'' 
and announced that he was ``prepared to have [the] Administration 
engage with the Cuban government on a wide range of issues.''
  As promised, the Obama administration has expanded licenses for 
Cuban-Americans--albeit only Cuban-Americans--to travel to Cuba. 
Controls on family remittances, gift parcels, and certain transactions 
with telecommunications companies were loosened as well. Mid-level 
talks about immigration matters and postal relations have resumed. And 
we've turned off an Orwellian electronic billboard flashing political 
messages from our Interests Section in Havana.
  These are positive steps, but they are only a start. So what comes 
next?
  At a minimum, the administration should use the authorities that it 
has to reinvigorate people-to-people relations--to unleash the energy 
of the American people who want to help Cubans build their future. The 
policy worked in the past and enjoyed wide support in both countries.
  When announcing expanded family travel, the President said, ``There 
are no better ambassadors for freedom than Cuban-Americans.'' But I 
think it's also fair to say that there are excellent ambassadors for 
freedom among the 299 million other Americans--religious faithful, 
teachers and students, environmentalists, scholars, doctors and nurses, 
political scientists, and artists--whose challenging minds, economic 
success, love for democracy, and advocacy of solid American values make 
them proud ambassadors as well.
  The New York Philharmonic and its board of directors have been 
brilliant representatives of America on trips to North Korea, Vietnam 
and around the world. I don't understand why the administration 
recently blocked their proposed trip to Cuba. What are we afraid of?
  Second, as we reinvigorate people-to-people diplomacy, the 
administration should review the programs that the Bush administration 
funded generously to substitute for it.
  The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is already undertaking an 
investigation into the need to reform Radio and TV Marti--programming 
beamed into Cuba at a cost of $35 million a year. Many Cubans call TV 
Marti ``La TV que no se ve'' because it has never, in 18 years of 
broadcast, had a significant audience in Cuba. Report after report has 
documented that the Marti services are hindered by bad management, weak 
professional tradecraft, and serious politicization. We are looking at 
whether its business model--as a ``surrogate service'' exempt from many 
Voice of America standards and regulations--has failed, and whether the 
TV service should be closed entirely and radio should be integrated 
into the high-quality VOA services. We ought to be especially concerned 
that human rights activists in Cuba a key bellwether audience are 
unanimous in their view that the Marti brand must be repaired.
  Meanwhile, USAID's civil-society programs, totaling $45 million in 
2008, have noble objectives, but we need to examine whether we're 
achieving any of them. The Bush administration changed the program's 
focus from supporting the Cuban people to accelerating regime change, 
and the fact that some of our grantees have extravagantly high 
overheads has raised concerns about where all the money is going. It is 
also fair to ask whether these programs even work.
  Bush's refocus on regime change made it difficult for Cubans outside 
declared antiregime groups to accept the informational materials or 
assistance offered--even if they had a burning desire for it. Our 
interests section used to distribute tens of thousands of books a year 
to Cubans across the political spectrum and the books could be seen, 
well-worn, in government and Communist party think tanks. Today, 
politicization has reduced the flow of information to many of the very 
same people eager to steer Cuba toward a better future.
  The Foreign Relations Committee has begun a review of these programs. 
It is in the administration's interest to take the lead in overhauling 
them.
  Finally, as I mentioned at the outset, I want to address legislation 
that will go even farther toward fixing our Cuba policy. S. 428, the 
Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act, does not lift the embargo or normalize 
relations. It merely stops our government from regulating or 
prohibiting travel to or from Cuba by U.S. citizens or legal residents, 
except in certain obviously inappropriate circumstances.
  The Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act has strong support in Congress--33 
sponsors in the Senate and 180 cosponsors for similar legislation in 
the House. I cosponsored similar legislation in the past, and I am 
proud to do so again. We are talking about restoring a fundamental 
American right--the right to travel--that is denied to Americans 
nowhere else in the world. Americans who can get a visa are free to 
travel to Iran, Iraq, Sudan, and even North Korea, and it makes no 
sense to deny them the right to travel to a poor island near Florida. 
There is a certain irony in the fact that Americans have to apply for 
licenses and wait, with little or no feedback, to travel to a country 
that we criticize for denying its

[[Page S12703]]

citizens the right to travel. The current ban on travel contravenes the 
spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights' statement that 
``everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and 
to return to his country.''
  Free travel also makes for good policy inside Cuba. Visits from 
Americans would have the same positive effects as people-to-people 
exchanges, but on a larger scale. Visiting Europeans and Canadians have 
already increased the flow of information and hard currency to ordinary 
Cubans, with a significant impact on the country. Cuba's economic 
model, for sure, remains profoundly flawed, and human rights conditions 
remain dismal. But the hard-currency sectors of the Cuban economy have 
significantly altered workers' dependence on the regime, introduced 
material incentives that are changing economic culture, and raised 
expectations, if not demands, for greater improvements in the future. 
After years of Cuban government propaganda, Americans are even better 
positioned than Europeans and Canadians to be catalysts of change. We 
can do more if we let them.
  That is one reason why all of Cuba's major pro-democracy groups 
support free travel. Freedom House, Human Rights Watch, and other 
groups critical of Cuba's government agree. Studies of change in 
Eastern and Central Europe show a direct correlation between contact 
with the outside world and the peacefulness and durability of 
democratic transitions.
  This is a policy whose time has come. Numerous polls of Americans--of 
Cuban origin and otherwise--show strong support. Non-Cuban-Americans 
have long supported easing restrictions. But here is what is 
surprising: one recent poll found that 59 percent of Cuban-Americans--
the group most widely thought to oppose a change in policy--actually 
support allowing all American citizens to travel to Cuba. As the 
proportion of Cuban Americans who arrived after 1980 increases, support 
for free travel is only growing. In fact, even many Cuban emigres 65 
years and older, once passionately opposed to it, now favor free 
travel. This is a sea change in the attitudes of Cuban-Americans, and 
we should not ignore it.
  Change is in the air--in Havana, in Washington, and in major Cuban-
American communities. I don't personally hold high hopes that the 
transfer of power from Fidel to Raul Castro and to the next generation 
of hand-picked loyalists portends rapid change, but it is obvious that 
the Cuba of today is not the Cuba of the 60s or even the 90s, and that 
our policy should not be stuck in time either. Cubans are searching for 
models for the future, and our economic system and democratic ideals 
appeal to them.
  In September, when the Colombian rock star Juanes came to Havana, by 
some estimates as many as a million people came to hear the concert. 
From the stage, he looked out at the Cuban people and started a simple 
chant: Una Sola Familia Cubana. The crowd roared approval at the 
thought of ending the conflict between Cubans across the Florida 
Straits.
  There is a hunger out there among the Cuban people. America should 
capitalize on it. They want contact with their own families, and they 
want contact with American people and American ideas.
  There is no other country in the world to which we have closed our 
lives as long as we have to Cuba. The Berlin Wall fell 20 years ago, 
but the wall separating Americans and Cubans has yet to come down.
  We have a choice to ignore change and resist it or to mold it and 
channel it into a new set of policies. After 50 years of trying to 
isolate and destroy, it's time to try working with the Cuban people and 
making a new future together.

                          ____________________