For dozens of Florida-based travel agencies that book flights to Cuba, the future of their livelihood is, well, up in the air.

On Monday, a coalition of 16 Miami-based travel agencies specializing in trips to Cuba plan to file a lawsuit against the state, hoping that a judge will halt a recently approved law aimed at increasing state regulation of their trade.

They say the measure, which goes into effect Tuesday, will drive up operating costs and force many to shut down if they can’t muster the $250,000 bonds mandated by the bill.

The measure, sponsored by state Rep. David Rivera as a homeland-security issue, was drafted to apply to all Florida-based vendors selling trips to countries on the U.S. State Department’s list of nations that sponsor terrorism—which includes Cuba.

‘’It is unfortunate that certain state of Florida legislators have decided to waste taxpayer funds to further their own goal of preventing and hindering Cuban-Americans who desire to visit their families in Cuba,’’ said Steven Weinger, one of the lawyers involved in the lawsuit against the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

The travel agents have until Tuesday to register their companies with the state, pay $2,500 in fees and find bond companies willing to front the thousands of dollars required by the law, which the Legislature passed in May and Gov. Charlie Crist signed last week.

‘’There is just so much confusion and chaos going around right now,’’ said Armando García, president of Miami-based Marazul Charters Travel, one of the companies filing suit.

Travel to Cuba has long been a divisive issue among Cuban-Americans, some of whom rely on travel to Cuba to visit families while others criticize the trips for the money it provides the Cuban government.

‘’This family issue is going to be an albatross around their necks,’’ said Francisco Aruca, a Spanish-radio talk-show host and business associate at Marazul.

Many travel agency owners spent Friday rushing to ensure they could line up the bond money and filling out registration forms required by the state.

While the agencies are normally given two months to file paperwork, that time frame was whittled down to two business days. Department of Agriculture staffers were awaiting Crist’s signature on the bill before they could post the new requirements on the state’s website Thursday afternoon.

‘’We didn’t have any more time than this. The bill was just signed into law,’’ said Terence McElroy, spokesman for the department. ``We realize that there are people out there who may be sick, people may be on vacation or out of town, and we’ll work with these people. It’s not our intention to harm these companies, no one is going to be hammered.’’

The assurances were not enough for García and other travel agents, who say they are part of a state ``witch hunt.’’

‘’I held on to hope that the governor was going to veto this,’’ said Tessie Aral, president of Miami-based ABC Charters Travel. ‘I’m a Republican and I said to myself, `He’s got to veto this, he’s going to protect the interest of small businesses,’ but obviously somebody was putting the pressure on him.’’

Earlier in the month, Aral tried to exert her own pressure on Crist: She was one of about 120 travel agents and Cuban-American families who flew to Tallahassee to protest the measure.

Aral added it’s too soon to estimate how much consumers can expect to absorb from the increase in fees.

There are seven charter companies and 12 travel agencies that handle flights to Cuba from the United States. Prices for trips to the island average from $500 to $600 before taxes, and some agents estimate the new law may up the cost of the trips by as much as 15 percent.

Rivera remains steadfast that the measure will aid those looking to book trips to Cuba, adding that he’d like to see some of the money collected from the registration fees to launch an investigation into alleged ‘’price gouging’’ and ``excessive luggage fees.’’

‘’This is for the consumer protection of my constituents,’’ Rivera said. ``You are dealing with businesses dealing with terrorist countries that pose a risk to the United States, and they’re using our airports.’’

Rivera and the Cuba-travel agencies have long had a cantankerous relationship. In 2006, he successfully sponsored legislation banning state funding of educational trips to Cuba. The measure, aimed at the pocketbooks of travel agencies arranging such trips, remains tied up in the courts.

El Nuevo Herald staff writer Wilfredo Cancio Isla contributed to this report.

President Bush is bound for Florida today to do what he does best: Raise money.

For someone in need.

He will be raising it this afternoon for two of the three South Florida Cuban-American congressmen who face serious challenges from Democratic rivals this fall. At least one of them, the incumbent whose rival was never indicted, faces a serious contest. (Although, in Florida, the indicted should never be counted out of political contests.)

Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart is the junior member of a Cuban-American trio in Congress from Miami. The former chairman of the state Senate Appropriations Committee was first elected to Congress in 2002. His older brother, Lincoln Diaz-Balart, also a former state legislator, first went to Congress in 1992.

Bush will attend a fundraiser for the brothers Diaz-Balart today. Mario, the younger, faces a tough Democratic rival. Lincoln, the elder, faces a once-indicted mayor.

These have been exceptionally safe seats ever since Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, another Republican Cuban-American and the first Hispanic woman to win a seat in the state Legislature, claimed the vacated congressional seat of the late, legendary Rep. Claude Pepper of Miami in 1989.

But this year, Joe Garcia, a Democratic Cuban-American, former executive director of the Cuban American National Foundation in Miami—the organization of the late power-broker in the Miami Cuban exile community, Jorge Mas Canosa—and former member of the state commission that regulates utilities in Florida, is taking on Mario Diaz-Balart. (Garcia’s campaign video is featured in the Baltimore Sun link above.)

Garcia, who also has been involved in national politics with the New Democrat Network and Sen. John Kerry’s campaign, represents a younger generation of Democrats in a community that has long been known for its Republican solidarity.

The fundraiser will not be held in Miami, but rather in Naples.

The 25th Congressional District which Mario Diaz-Balart represents is a marvel of modern-day Gerrymandering, created by a GOP-run Legislature with map-drawing skills which ensured that Florida’s congressional delegation would become overwhelmingly Republican. The district covers much of the southern tip of the state - alligators mainly—and reaches from Miami on the Atlantic Coast to Naples on the Gulf Coast.

And Naples is where the money is.

Bush is greeting some ready friends today. The Diaz-Balarts have joined the president in supporting a lifting of the ban on off-shore oil-drilling in Florida. Ros-Lehtinen has not, remaining adamantly opposed to any drilling.

Ros-Lehtinen, extraordinarily popular, faces only nominal opposition.

Two of Florida’s 25 congressmen are unopposed this year—Democrats Kendrick Meek of Miami and Corrine Brown of Jacksonville, both African-Americans in solidly Democratic districts, another byproduct of the GOP’s Gerrymandering.

Lincoln Diaz-Balart faces a challenge from Democrat Raul Martinez, who served for 24 years as the mayor of Hialeah and has survived federal indictments and convictions.

Martinez, in fact, wanted to run against Ros-Lehtinen after the death of Pepper. But Lehtinen’s husband, then-acting U.S. attorney for South Florida, Dexter Lehtinen, launched an investigation against Martinez that resulted in a Grand Jury indicting Martinez on eight charges of extortion and racketeering.

Martinez was suspended from office and convicted, in July 1991, of six counts of conspiracy, extortion and racketeering and sentenced to 10 years in prison. He appealed and won a new trial. The second trial ended in a hung jury. A third trial, in 1996, won him an acquittal. He went on to serve as mayor until 2005.

If the voters of Hialeah were willng to reelect the indicted Martinez, there’s no telling what the voters of Lincoln Diaz-Balart’s congressional district might do.

(Rep. Alcee Hastings, a Democrat from Broward County, won election to Congress after impeachment and removal from the federal bench by Congress. He faces nominal opposition for reelection this fall.)

Yet, for whatever promise the indicted hold in Florida elections, bets are that most of Bush’s money will be going to Mario D-B, the one with an opponent without a rap sheet .

The older Diaz-Balart, defending his long-held seat against an indicted but exonerated Democrat, should not have to worry as much. It’s probably the younger Diaz-Balart, facing a Democrat with more potential in November, who is bringing in the president for a fundraiser. Or maybe it’s their flip on off-shore oil-drilling.

Bush, in the state where his younger brother, Jeb, reigned for two terms as governor, knows how to raise the funds..

Cuban Americans living in the United States could travel to Cuba more often and visit a broader list of family members under legislation approved by a congressional panel on Tuesday.

A House of Representatives appropriations panel embraced the liberalized travel initiative, which faces several more legislative steps over the next few months and likely would be opposed by the Bush administration.

Under a proposal that funds several federal agencies next year including the Treasury Department, which oversees Cuba travel and trade restrictions, travelers would be able to visit close relatives in Cuba once a year, instead of the current once-every-three-years restriction.

The list of eligible family members US residents could visit in Cuba would grow from immediate relatives to include first-cousins, uncles and aunts.

“This is not a concession to the Cuban government. This is a concession to Cuban Americans who keep asking for it,” said Rep. Jose Serrano, the chairman of the appropriations panel that is advancing the legislation.

“There is no reason to place harsh restrictions on those who simply wish to visit close family members,” he added, detailing existing impediments for visiting sick relatives in Cuba.

The legislation, which could clear the House next month, also would further normalize U.S. agriculture trade with Cuba by removing an obstacle that forces Cuban importers to prepay all shipments, instead of when the commodities are delivered.

Similar travel and trade measures have been offered in Congress in the past, only to fail in the face of White House opposition.

The United States has imposed strict trade and travel restrictions on Cuba since the 1960s to punish the Communist-run island.

Estela Roberts and her family have always hoped they would be compensated one day for their property in Cuba seized after that country’s 1959 revolution.

Roberts, 62, whose family eventually relocated to Miami and then to Tampa, still remembers her family’s beautiful home in Havana, down to the “marble staircase with some ironwork.”

Along with a summer home in Tarara, a small sugar plantation, a bank and a tobacco store, the total value of the family’s confiscated property has been estimated to exceed $3 million.

Decades later, Roberts and her siblings have yet to receive a dime; frozen relations between the United States and Cuba have prevented their claim from being resolved.

Now, suddenly, they could become prime targets for speculators.

An orchestrated effort may be afoot to persuade people such as Roberts and companies in Florida and across the country to sell their decades-old claims, warns the U.S. Foreign Claims Settlement Commission.

Mauricio Tamargo, head of the commission, said his agency had begun to receive inquiries last summer from some claimants—many with sizeable claims—saying they had been offered payments for those holdings.

It is not illegal to sell or purchase these claims, Tamargo said, but the purpose of this sudden activity remains unclear to the government. As a result, the commission has put out an alert for potential sellers and buyers to beware.

The warning comes as claimants and their descendants are losing faith that after nearly a half-century they will ever see their accounts settled between Washington and Havana.

There had been a glimmer of hope with Cuban President Fidel Castro’s departure from power.

But the commission, which oversees their claims, has said more recently that it “is not aware of any plans for, or any indication of, a settlement between the United States and Cuba, nor is the commission aware of any bilateral negotiations between the United States and Cuban governments regarding these claims.”

“I was always hoping. I always had faith. But now, I don’t know,” said Estela Roberts. Her father, Alexander, an American citizen, had taken over the tobacco company as an importer in Cuba for American cigarette companies from his own father, who had arrived on the island after World War I.

The Cuban government has paid lump sum amounts to settle outstanding property claims by other countries, including Canada, France, Spain and Sweden.

Tensions Stall Settlement Talks

But the diplomatic tensions with Cuba have prevented such talks about settling American claims.

In all, there are nearly 6,000 American claims registered and certified by the commission for confiscated personal and business property in Cuba, with an estimated total value of $6 billion.

To register, all claimants must have been U.S. citizens or businesses owned by U.S. citizens at the time of the confiscations.

Included in those are at least 1,700 Floridians, including dozens in the Tampa area, and 82 Florida-based corporations.

Tampa-based Lykes Bros. Inc., for example, has a claim for more than $3 million for the company’s large ranch in eastern Cuba, also appropriated by the Castro-led government.

Under U.S. law, settling the long-standing claims is one of the preconditions for eventually lifting the U.S.-Cuba embargo. But there remains no official step toward that.

So who is offering to buy some of these claims, and why?

Tamargo refused to discuss whether the commission has identified specific people or companies that may be seeking to buy Cuban claims.

But he emphasized that federal law prohibits anyone purchasing a Cuban claim from receiving more in settlement money than they paid the original owner. It is what federal officials call an “anti-speculation” measure.

The commission warns anyone considering a possible sale or purchase of their Cuban claim to seek legal counsel.

Although Tamargo won’t discuss who may be involved, Timothy Ashby, a Miami-based attorney, acknowledged that he’s now serving as a legal adviser for parties that are interested in acquiring or selling some of the claims.

He would not identify his clients, or even identify them as individuals or companies.

“I can only tell you that I’m serving as a legal adviser,” said Ashby, a former Commerce Department official.

Part of his work, said Ashby, is reviewing and reassessing the value of the American claims. He said that the total value placed on the seized property by the United States is much less than the totals according to Cuban tax records dating from 1962.

‘Pennies On The Dollar’

The upshot, he said, is that the best that most American claimants probably can get for their claims from Cuba is “almost certainly pennies on the dollar.” He also said Cubans are likely to seek to pay that compensation with bonds.

But Ashby explained there are investors or funds that trade in such sovereign government debt and might be willing to buy and combine a number of these claims as a way to gain some leverage of their own in future negotiations with Cuba.

Some of this could be in anticipation of doing business with Cuba once trade restrictions end and development on the island is expected to boom.

Whether this might defy the anti-speculation law is uncertain.

Neither Estela Roberts nor Lykes Bros. Chairman Howell Ferguson say they have been approached by would-be purchasers about their claims.

“I’ve heard no such rumblings,” Ferguson said.

Roberts said she doesn’t know what she would do if she were approached about a sale.

“But I’d sure like to know who’d be interested,” she said.

Reporter Billy House can be reached at (202) 662-7673 or bhouse@tampatrib.com

Greater optimism at home has not stopped the exodus to the United States

WITH Fidel Castro formally out of office and some signs of greater optimism among Cuba’s citizens about the possibility of social and economic change, you might expect fewer people to risk their lives by seeking to escape the island by sea.

Not so, apparently. The number of Cubans trying to smuggle their way into America is the highest it has been for more than a decade. The United States Coast Guard says that over the past eight months 3,846 Cubans have made the trip—a 7.5% increase on last year’s already high figure for the same period. Of these, around 40% (1,577) were intercepted at sea, an increase of more than a quarter. In the whole of the last (American) financial year, ending in September, 7,693 sought to flee to the United States, more than half of whom managed to avoid detection. But 3,197 were intercepted at sea, the highest number since the “rafter crisis” of 1994, when 37,000 were caught.

“There is sort of a silent exodus taking place from Cuba,” says Ramón Saul Sánchez, leader of Democracy Movement, a Miami-based Cuban advocacy group. Despite the transition of power from Fidel Castro to his brother, Raúl, many Cubans have little expectation of big changes on the island. American restrictions on travel and remittances to Cuba have added to their sense of desperation.

Yet the spike in the number of Cubans seeking to leave may have as much to do with an increase in organized smuggling as with economic despair. In the past, Cubans made the crossing—just over 100 miles (160km) between Havana and Key West—in home-made rafts. These days, they travel in speed boats hired in Miami by relatives paying up to $10,000 a head for the trip.

Cubans have also discovered a new route to freedom, crossing the sea to Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, then making their way overland to the border with the United States. Under American law, these so-called “wet-foot, dry-foot” Cubans are allowed to stay if they make it to their objective. Those picked up at sea are nearly always repatriated.

Until recently, the trafficking of people was virtually ignored by American officials. But prosecutors in Miami have now begun to get tough. Over the past two months, 41 Cuban-Americans have been charged with attempting to smuggle hundreds of Cubans into Florida by boat. Investigators started to pay greater attention after several drownings cast an ugly spotlight on the trade. The Coast Guard says that 36 Cubans died at sea in April alone. In one incident last November, as many as 40 people from a single village in Cuba, including a dozen children, are believed to have died. Rear-Admiral David Kunkel, the Coast Guard’s district commander, recently appealed to Cuban exiles to “put the criminals who engage in human smuggling out of business by not using them”.

In an attempt to stem the flow, America’s State Department has accelerated its visa procedures for Cubans seeking to be reunited legally with their families in the United States. But the escalation in smuggling has had one positive outcome: American and Cuban coast-guard officials are now co-operating to try to stop the trade—one of the very few areas where the two countries do work together. “It really is in no one’s interest to let this continue,” said one American official.

Jared Carter stepped to the lectern and made his courtroom debut Wednesday in federal court in Burlington. The second-year law school student has taken on a case that’s personal: Should he and his wife be able to travel to Cuba to see her family and celebrate their marriage?

The Constitution provides a fundamental right to associate with family, Carter told U.S. District Judge William Sessions III. Federal rules that restrict travel to Cuba undermine that right, Carter argued.

John O’Quinn, deputy assistant U.S. attorney general, defended the restrictions. He argued that government has the constitutional right to restrict travel to other countries and the Cuban policy is designed to prevent money from flowing to the Communist Castro regime, which the United States does not support.

After a more-than-two-hour hearing, Sessions neither dismissed the case nor granted the preliminary injunction that Carter and the other plaintiffs were seeking. Instead, the judge asked both sides for more information about why the government offers certain emergency travel exemptions but not others.

Armando Vilaseca, another plaintiff in the case, said afterward he was encouraged by the hearing. “I’m very happy it wasn’t dismissed,” he said. “I can understand why Judge Sessions clearly needs more time and information.”

Carter and his wife, Yurisleidis Levya Mora, joined Vilaseca and Maricel Keniston in challenging federal restrictions on travel to Cuba. Because of its potential impact on decades-long strained relations with Cuba, the case is attracting national attention, including input from the American Civil Liberties Union chapters in Vermont, Florida and Massachusetts.

James Messinger, a lawyer for the ACLU, questioned the 2004 policy that set the Cuban travel restrictions. A government report found no evidence that the travel restrictions had any impact on the flow of money to the Cuban government, he said.

Carter met his wife while he was visiting Cuba. They settled in Vermont where he attends Vermont Law School and married in December. They want to travel to Cuba to celebrate their marriage with her relatives, including grandparents who are in their 70s, he said. Federal rules permit travel to visit immediate family in Cuba only once every three years.

Vilaseca sought the right to visit his aunt, who was terminally ill when the lawsuit was filed in March. She died in April.

“I still hoped to see her one more time,” said Vilaseca, of Westford, superintendent of schools at Franklin West Supervisory Union in Fairfax who moved from Cuba to the United States as a child.

Vilaseca said he thinks the travel restrictions should be changed for other Americans with family members in Cuba. “My story is one of thousands of stories. Something as simple as going to a wedding should not be so difficult,” he said after the court hearing.

Mark Schneider, a Plattsburgh, N.Y., attorney who joined Carter in arguing the case, told Sessions that time is of the essence in seeking a preliminary injunction that would allow the plaintiffs to travel pending a broader decision on the restrictions.

Sessions bluntly told him a speedy resolution was unlikely, particularly given that a decision would likely be appealed. “This is not something that’s going to be expediently resolved,” he said.

There is an exemption that allows U.S. citizens to travel to Cuba in case of an emergency to visit an immediate family member who is also a U.S. citizen and is traveling there, but there are no similar exemptions for U.S. citizens to respond to travel for emergencies facing Cuban relatives. Sessions focused on that discrepancy.

“Is that rational?” he asked O’Quinn.

Sessions gave the lawyers 30 days to provide more information on that question.

Contact Terri Hallenbeck at 229-1297 or thallenb@bfp.burlingtonfreepress.com

Obama Will Give Reform in Cuba a Nudge if Not a Shove

Barack Obama’s gutsy appearance Friday in Miami before the Cuban-American National Foundation was of course a refreshing change of pace from the lame and stale “stay-the-course” boilerplate that’s been passing for a John McCain foreign policy vision. Unlike McCain, who despite the baby-step reforms in Cuba is stubbornly holding out for the status quo unless the Castro brothers’ regime basically rolls over and dismantles itself—sure, like that’s going to happen—Obama enunciated more clearly than ever that “after eight years of the disastrous policies of George Bush, it is time to pursue direct diplomacy, with friend and foe alike, without preconditions.” He continued, “every four years [pols] come down to Miami, they talk tough, they go back to Washington and nothing changes in Cuba,” pointing out, “that’s what John McCain did the other day. He joined the parade of politicians who make the same empty promises year after year, decade after decade.”

In declaring his administration would meet with the Raúl Castro régime without preconditions, Obama was not being naïve but impeccably realistic—and in fact following in the footsteps of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, who, after all, never insisted that Communist China, Vietnam, and the Soviet Union hold free elections and essentially give up their dictatorships before negotiating with them. At the same time, he hasn’t pronounced himself ready just yet to let go of the entire embargo, except for immediately lifting the limits on Cuban-Americans traveling to see their families. Can’t frighten the horses by deep-sixing the whole shebang too suddenly, you understand, but a campaign insider told me earlier this year that this is more a question of timing and tactics than intention.

The very fact that he was giving this spiel in front of an outfit whose late leader… READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

Mr Obama said he would lift restrictions on family travel and remittances. The Ladies in White have come out publicly to support the call by the US presidential hopeful, Barack Obama, for direct talks with the new Cuban President, Raul Castro.

In an open letter to Mr Obama they wrote of their hope that his policies may help free their husbands and sons.

Mr Obama told Cuban exiles in Miami on Friday that America needed to talk to its enemies as well as its friends.

Mr Obama also said that - if elected in November - he would lift President George Bush’s restrictions on family travel and remittances to Cuba but maintain the US trade embargo.

Applauded

The position of both Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican hopeful John McCain is that any change in policy would only benefit Cuba’s communist leaders.

The founder of Ladies in White, Miriam Leiva, and her recently freed dissident husband, Oscar Chepe, also wrote an open letter to Barak Obama.

They applauded his offer to allow Cuban Americans to freely visit relatives here.

They also wrote that a more creative policy could help the transition towards democracy and that the current confrontation is used by the authorities in Havana to justify their repression.

The Cuban government denies that there are any political prisoners on the island, calling them all mercenaries in the pay of the United States.

John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, no doubt believes he scored a 10 with his hard-line Cuba policy speech in Miami earlier this week. But presidential candidates, like figure skaters, are often judged on the originality of their moves —and in that regard McCain may be staring at lower marks in the crucial swing state of Florida than his campaign appreciates.

McCain got the jump on Barack Obama, who is slated to speak to the Cuban-American National Foundation in Miami on Friday. But while Obama is expected to outline a more nuanced approach to Cuba, McCain’s visit to Little Havana and his speech to more conservative Cuban-Americans were rote repeats of the routine every White House hopeful performs in Miami: cafe cubano at the Versailles restaurant followed by equally caffeinated bellowing about his anti-Castro bona fides and the Cuba-policy cowardice of his opponent, in this case Obama. President Franklin Roosevelt “didn’t talk with Hitler,” McCain argued, attacking Obama’s recent suggestion that if elected President he would open a dialogue with communist Cuba’s leader, Raul Castro, as well as leaders of other hostile nations such as Iran.

The McCain mambo, not surprisingly, got robust applause at the town hall meeting he addressed. But outside those walls the response was more subdued. If McCain is vulnerable to the charge that his presidency would effectively be a Bush third term, he might want to explore Florida beyond the echo chamber of the older Cuban exile community. He’s likely to find a growing number of younger, more moderate Cuban-Americans who no longer believe the 46-year-old U.S. trade embargo against Cuba will topple the Castro regime and who yearn to hear candidates discuss matters besides Cuba, like the alarming lack of accessible health care among Latinos. “Waving the bloody shirt of anti-Castro politics is going to be less effective” in this election, says political analyst Dario Moreno of Florida International University in Miami. “The Cuba issue is losing its saliency.”

Even moderate Cuban-Americans want to see the Castros gone and democracy returned to their ancestral island. But most resent President Bush’s policy of letting them visit their relatives in Cuba only once every three years (although Bush announced on Wednesday that he’ll allow Americans to send cell phones to Cubans now that Raul Castro has permitted his citizens to own them). And when recent surveys show that even a majority of Miami Cubans, of all people, favor relaxing the restrictions — in an FIU poll 55% backed unlimited travel to Cuba — it’s probably time for U.S. politicians to drop the one-string embargo banjo and pick up a new instrument for effecting change across the Florida Straits.

That’s especially true when you look at what’s happening in the three major Miami… READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE

Here is the speech Sen. John McCain delivered Tuesday at the Sheraton Miami Mart. A copy was provided to the media by his campaign.

Today, on Cuba’s Independence Day, we have occasion to celebrate the rich cultural heritage and deep-rooted traditions of the Cuban people. Cuban Americans, many of whom have ascended to the heights of business, government, and the arts, have enriched and enlivened our country. In every field, and in states across America, they bring to our communities their custom of hard work and personal initiative. And for many of these patriotic individuals, while their lives and work are here in the United States, a bit of Cuba will always endure in their hearts.

So must it be for all Americans who cherish those freedoms we so often take for granted at home. For today is not a cause for celebration alone. Those inspired freedom fighters who secured Cuba’s independence over 100 years ago could hardly know that their descendants would be engaged in a struggle for freedom and democracy a century later. And yet today, the Cuban people continue to live under tyranny, and their struggle goes on.

It is not a fruitless struggle, not by any means. One day, America will again have warm relations with a Cuban government that represents the sovereign will of its people, one that respects their fundamental human and political rights. One day, Cuba will be an important ally in advancing democracy throughout our hemisphere. Make no mistake: Cuba is destined to be free.

Today, as so many of you know too well, the situation is very different. Fidel Castro has passed the titles of power to his brother in a fashion suited more for a personal fiefdom than to a government purporting to represent that proud and dynamic people. A few recent news articles have labeled as ‘’reforms’’ the smattering of small changes that have taken place since Raul Castro has formally taken charge. Such characterizations must sound quite cynical to the political prisoners that fill Cuban jails, to the millions who suffer under poverty and repression, and to all those who wish to choose their leaders, not suffer under them. The Castro regime enforces strict limits against freedom of expression, of association, of assembly, of movement, of speech. Last year, as many as 5,000 citizens served sentences for the vague crime of ``dangerousness.’’

Yet tyranny will not forever endure, and as President, I will not passively await the day when the Cuban people enjoy the blessings of freedom and democracy. It is in our national interest to support their aspirations and oppose those of the Castro regime, one that harbors fugitives from U.S. justice, expresses unrelenting hostility to America, and shoots down unarmed civilian aircraft. I wish the other presidential candidates felt similarly. Just a few years ago, Senator Obama had a very clear view on Cuba. When asked in a questionnaire about his policy toward Cuba, he answered: ‘’I believe that normalization of relations with Cuba would help the oppressed and poverty-stricken Cuban people while setting the stage for a more democratic government once Castro inevitably leaves the scene.’’ Now Senator Obama has shifted positions and says he only favors easing the embargo, not lifting it. He also wants to sit down unconditionally for a presidential meeting with Raul Castro. These steps would send the worst possible signal to Cuba’s dictators—there is no need to undertake fundamental reforms, they can simply wait for a unilateral change in US policy. I believe we should give hope to the Cuban people, not to the Castro regime. My administration will press the Cuban regime to release all political prisoners unconditionally, to legalize all political parties, labor unions, and free media, and to schedule internationally monitored elections. The embargo must stay in place until these basic elements of democratic society are met.

Maintaining the embargo is, however, just one element of a broader approach my administration would make to the people of Cuba. I would provide more material assistance and moral support to the courageous human rights activists who bravely defy the regime every day, and increase Radio and TV Marti and other means to communicate directly with the Cuban people. My Justice Department would vigorously prosecute Cuban officials implicated in the murder of Americans, drug trafficking, and other crimes. While our Cuba policy will not always be in accord with that of our hemispheric and European partners, my administration will begin an active dialogue with them to develop a plan for post-Castro Cuba, a plan that will spark rapid change and a new awakening in that country. The Cuban people have waited long enough.

As we work with our hemispheric partners, we must be clear about the kind of leadership America seeks to provide. For decades, in Republican and Democratic administrations alike, the United States has treated Latin America as a junior partner rather than as a neighbor, like a little brother rather than as an equal. As a resident of a state that borders Mexico, I am acutely aware of the extraordinary contributions that our neighbors make to the United States—from trade to culture to a commitment to democracy and human rights. Latin America today is increasingly vital to the fortunes of the United States, and Americans north and south share a common geography and a common destiny. It is time to embrace this destiny for the benefit of all our peoples.

We have made progress toward this vision by expanding the benefits of free commerce, through NAFTA, the Central American Free Trade Agreement, and our free trade agreements with Peru and Chile. But the progress has stalled; our long-standing bipartisan commitment to hemispheric prosperity is crumbling. We see this most vividly in Barack Obama’s and Hillary Clinton’s opposition to the free trade agreement with Colombia. The failure of the Congress to take up and approve this agreement is a reminder why 80 percent of Americans think we are on the wrong track. Congress can find time to pass a pork-filled farm bill, but it cannot stir itself to support a key ally and further American prosperity.

The Colombia FTA would benefit American workers and consumers—the U.S. International Trade Administration estimates that over $1 billion in tariffs have been imposed on U.S. exports to Colombia since the FTA was signed, tariffs that would be eliminated once the agreement takes effect. Here in Florida, trade has created new markets for the Sunshine State’s world-class produce, manufactured goods, and professional services. Florida’s exports to Canada and Mexico rose by some 208 percent since NAFTA was enacted, and its exports to Chile grew 99 percent in the first four years of its free trade agreement. Colombia today stands as Florida’s fifth largest export market—Florida exported $2.1 billion worth of goods there last year—and now the Colombians are offering to drop their barriers to American goods. Yet Senators Obama and Clinton oppose the agreement, wishing to retreat behind protectionist walls an d undermine a key hemispheric ally.

The strategic implications of rejecting this agreement are profound. Colombia is a beacon of hope in a region where the Castro brothers, Hugo Chavez, and others are actively seeking to thwart economic progress and democracy. Delaying approval of the Colombian Free Trade Agreement will not create one American job or start one American business, but it will divide us from our Colombian partners at a time when they are battling the FARC terrorists and their allied drug cartels. It will undercut America’s standing with our allies in a critical region and across the world, at a moment when rebuilding these relationships has never been more important. It will set back the goal of deepening relations with our neighbors to the south and enhancing the stability, peace, and prosperity of our hemisphere.

If I am elected president, the United States will not bow to the special interests seeking to block progress. Instead, we will forge a new policy toward Latin America and the Caribbean Basin, one founded on peace and security, shared prosperity, democracy and freedom, and mutual respect. We will work to prevent Venezuela and Bolivia from taking the same road to failure Castro has paved for Cuba, and we will broaden and strengthen ties with key states like Brazil, Peru, and Chile. We will make clear to all countries in the region that if they share our values of freedom and openness, they can count on us as a friend. We will not abandon our partners to demagogues, drug lords, and despair, but expand the benefits of security, trade and prosperity to all.

My vision embodies the interests and the values of America and seeks the betterment of all people, everywhere in our hemisphere. And it is a vision that includes the people of Cuba.

Courageous men found their calling at the beginning of the last century in winning for Cuba its independence. And those brave men and women who stand up for their rights today will, one day soon, win for Cuba its freedom. When they do, they will enjoy not only the fruits of their own liberation, but also the firm and fast friendship of all Americans who have stood with them throughout the years of struggle. On this Cuban Independence Day, let us take a moment to pray that Cubans everywhere can one day soon enjoy the liberty for which their forefathers fought.