[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 65 (Monday, April 23, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2338-S2339]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                  CUBA

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, today I wish to address Cuba's 
undemocratic leadership transition and its implications for the Cuban 
people and U.S. foreign policy.
  Today, in a highly scripted process, Cuba's National Assembly 
replaced Raul Castro, the country's gerontocratic dictator, with heir 
apparent Miguel Diaz Canel. While this marks the first time in nearly 
60 years that a Castro does not occupy the Cuban Presidency, this 
transition by no means portends the desperately needed political and 
economic change that Cubans desire, nor does it mean that the Castro 
regime is no longer in charge.
  This week's transition, characterized as a coronation and an attempt 
to institutionalize the Castro regime, is a ruse. This spectacle does 
not remotely come close to meeting internationally recognized standards 
for a democratic election. Cuba remains a single party, authoritarian 
state that denies its citizens their most fundamental freedoms.
  Some contend that Mr. Diaz Canel could be a ``Cuban Mikhail 
Gorbachev,'' and in seeking to reform the Castros' broken model, he 
will stumble into the collapse of Cuba's communist system. Such 
thinking fails to account for the fact that Mr. Diaz Canel's political 
ascent was forged under the same Communist Party that has perpetuated 
the Castros' decades-long stranglehold on Cuba.
  More importantly, Raul Castro will maintain his position as the First 
Secretary of the Cuban Communist Party. As article 5 of Cuba's 
authoritarian constitution states, ``The Communist Party of Cuba [. . 
.] is the superior ruling force of society and the State . . .'' Under 
such a structure, does anyone honestly think that Raul Castro won't 
continue calling the shots while his handpicked dauphin occupies the 
role of President?
  As this political farce unfolds, I want to make brief observations 
about three aspects of Raul Castro's legacy, the state of human rights 
in the country, the state of the Cuban economy, and the crisis in 
Venezuela, which Miguel Diaz Canel now owns.
  Raul Castro will certainly leave an enduring human rights legacy. In 
the last 3 years, the Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National 
Reconciliation, Cuba's leading independent human rights organization, 
documented more than 20,000 arbitrary detentions of activists. 
Moreover, the State Department's 2016 Human Rights Report on Cuba 
stated that the Cuban Government routinely denies its citizens fair 
trials, monitors and censors private communications, suppresses 
freedoms of speech, assembly and press, and employs threats, physical 
assault and intimidation tactics against its own people.
  Raul Castro's economic legacy will be the maintenance of the dual 
currency system that distorts the national economy and subjugates Cuban 
citizens to second-class status in their own country. Foreign companies 
seeking opportunities in Cuba are still forced to conduct business with 
the military and its vast network of shell companies. ``Independent 
entrepreneurs'' are a complete misnomer, as individuals continue to 
operate in a byzantine system that prevents them from owning their own 
companies and subjects them to licensing and tax requirements designed 
to stifle entrepreneurial activity.
  Additionally, as well-connected members of the Cuban Communist

[[Page S2339]]

Party and the military use their positions for self-enrichment, average 
Cubans face a status quo of limited economic opportunities. As the gap 
between the ``haves'' and the ``have nots'' grows in Cuba, it appears 
that the Castros' Orwellian dystopia is a system in which all Cubans 
are equal, but some Cubans are more equal than others.
  Finally, looking outward, at the Summit of the Americas last week, 
where leaders of the Western Hemisphere grappled with an unprecedented 
migration and humanitarian crisis, Raul Castro may have been absent, 
but the legacy of ruin in Venezuela was front and center. In a July 
2017 Senate hearing, Organization of American States Secretary General 
Luis Almagro described Cuba's presence in Venezuela as an ``occupation 
army.'' While Nicolas Maduro clings to his failed ideological, 
military, and economic alliance with the Castro regime, Venezuelans are 
suffering from food shortages, a collapsed healthcare system, and 
rampant crime.
  This brutal reality is the Castros' legacy for the Cuban people and 
the hemisphere. In his role as First Vice President since 2013, Mr. 
Diaz Canel has been Raul Castro's first accomplice. So while Cubans 
will never stop dreaming for a future in which they are guaranteed 
human rights and are truly free to pursue economic prosperity, they 
know that Mr. Diaz Canel represents little more than a continuation of 
the Castro regime.
  Turning to U.S. foreign policy, to those who would argue Cuba is 
ready to be a member of the community of nations, let me point to the 
attacks against American diplomats in Havana. U.S. personnel have faced 
an unprecedented ordeal. More than 50 unexplained attacks have affected 
more than two dozen American citizens, with some cases involving 
lasting, physical brain damage. Let anyone who harbors doubts about 
these incidents refer to the Trudeau government's announcement this 
week regarding incidents affecting Canadian officials and changes to 
Canada's diplomatic presence in Cuba. These attacks are real. People 
are suffering.
  Cuban officials attempting to dismiss these egregious attacks is yet 
another sign of the disingenuous nature of the dictatorship. Whether 
the attacks were perpetrated by Cuban intelligence services or involve 
the participation of another country's intelligence services, it is 
unfathomable that a government that prides itself on running a police 
state would even try to feign ignorance about these incidents. I refuse 
to accept the premise that members of the Castro regime are not in some 
way complicit or have no information about who is responsible. The 
State Department must continue its investigation of these attacks.
  The Trump administration must also move beyond Presidential promises 
towards a substantive strategy that pressures the regime to undertake 
serious reforms to advance democratic values and human rights and end 
its support of failed leadership in Venezuela.
  First, the United States must remain steadfast in supporting 
democratic activists in Cuba. While President Trump claims to support 
those fearlessly advocating for their rights, his budget proposals tell 
a different story. Alarmingly, his fiscal year 2018 request to Congress 
proposed zero dollars for democracy programs in Cuba, while his fiscal 
year 2019 budget only requested $10 million. In contrast to his 
statements, this amounts to rejecting support for the Cuban people and 
our interests.
  Additionally, as the U.S. Government hones new tools to advance 
accountability for human rights violations, we should utilize targeted 
global Magnitsky sanctions to put a spotlight on the Cuban officials 
responsible for these abuses.
  Second, although senior administration officials have been critical 
of business deals with the Cuban military that enrich the Castro regime 
in the process, the regulations the administration introduced in 
November 2017 fail to address key elements of commerce that benefit 
Cuba's dictatorship. In the coming weeks, I will launch a congressional 
review of Treasury and Commerce regulations in order to end unnecessary 
loopholes that benefit the regime.
  Finally, as leaders from the Americas and Europe come together to 
address the multifaceted crisis in Venezuela, they must seriously 
confront Cuba's role in Venezuela's collapse. To date, efforts to 
coordinate increased international pressure on the Venezuelan 
Government have given the Castro regime a free pass. There was 
widespread support in the hemisphere for Peru's decision to not invite 
Nicolas Maduro to the Summit of the Americas due to the authoritarian 
nature of his government; yet no one, including the Trump 
administration, held Cuba's dictatorship to the same standard. It is 
time for the administration to reverse this trend and call for a 
coordinated diplomatic response to Cuba's longstanding role in 
Venezuela's emergence as a failed state.
  In closing, I urge my colleagues join me in speaking out against the 
undemocratic political spectacle in Cuba this week. We must join 
together to pursue a comprehensive policy towards Cuba that pressures 
regime officials to loosen their stranglehold on Cuba's economy and 
political system and that advances the true democratic and justice 
reforms the Cuban people so desperately desire.

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