[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 5594]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      CUBAN PEOPLE DESERVE FREEDOM

  (Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN. Madam Speaker, there has been a lot of 
misinformation today about the Cuban Twitter program. This is not a 
secret program. Cuba democracy programs are public.
  Both USAID and State publicly put out requests for proposals from 
different NGOs or private businesses to administer and implement our 
Cuba democracy programs.
  The objective of these programs is to provide greater access to 
information to those suffering under the repressive regime. The Cuban 
dictatorship controls, censors, and blocks information going into the 
island to deny Cubans the ability to hear about world events or about 
the human rights violations occurring throughout the island in their 
very own country.
  The funds help provide technology-based training to get through--to 
cut through the censorship of the Castro brothers. Our goal is to 
stimulate new ideas to help the Cuban people tackle pressing issues 
such as human rights abuses.
  These new technology programs are also aimed at reaching out to the 
Cuban youth to share experiences and provide them with the tools to 
build their capacity for grassroots organizing to promote democracy, 
liberty, and freedom. The Cuban people deserve freedom.

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