[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 14712]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      FIDEL CASTRO'S BRUTAL LEGACY

  (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. Mr. Speaker, the Cuban people can finally close one 
chapter in their 57-year nightmare of oppressive rule: Fidel Castro has 
died.
  When I was just 8 years old, I was forced to flee my native homeland 
of Cuba with my family. We were not the first, nor were we the last, to 
leave all that we had behind in search of freedom, democracy, 
opportunity, and safety.
  Many constituents I am so humbled to represent have had family 
members who did not survive their journey, yet they all risked their 
lives in fleeing Cuba because they felt the brutality of Fidel Castro. 
They witnessed firsthand the ruthlessness of the tyrant, and they felt 
that it was like having their human rights stripped from their very 
being.
  Their stories and their experiences--the firing squads, the gulags, 
and the torture--Mr. Speaker, will be Fidel Castro's legacy.

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