{"id":2541,"date":"2020-08-05T22:45:12","date_gmt":"2020-08-05T22:45:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cubasupport.ie\/latest\/?p=2541"},"modified":"2020-08-06T23:31:57","modified_gmt":"2020-08-06T23:31:57","slug":"congress-put-the-brakes-on-cuba-relief-to-protect-front-line-democrat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cubasupport.ie\/latest\/congress-put-the-brakes-on-cuba-relief-to-protect-front-line-democrat\/","title":{"rendered":"CONGRESS PUT THE BRAKES ON CUBA RELIEF TO PROTECT FRONT-LINE DEMOCRAT"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Two amendments aimed at alleviating the stranglehold on Cuba\u2019s economy were withdrawn because of pressure to protect a vulnerable Florida rep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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LAST WEEK, several House Democrats quietly killed an attempt to roll back aspects of the Trump administration\u2019s sanctions on Cuba, which have exacerbated the economic fallout of the pandemic and hit the country with severe food and medicine shortages \u2014 to protect a front-line Democrat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rep. Bobby Rush, D-Ill., had proposed two Cuba-related amendments to the appropriations bill, aimed at alleviating the Trump administration\u2019s efforts to strangle the country\u2019s economy and returning to Obama-era policy. One of the measures would have prohibited officials from blocking food and medicine exports to Cuba, while the other amendment would have rolled back the Trump administration\u2019s cap on the amount of money people in the U.S. can send their families in Cuba, called remittances.Join Our NewsletterOriginal reporting. Fearless journalism. Delivered to you.I\u2019m in<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A coalition of over 100 groups, including progressive organizations like Just Foreign Policy, Demand Progress, and CODEPINK, supported the amendments and called on Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern, chair of the House Rules Committee, to allow the measures to come to the floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McGovern has been a vocal opponent of America\u2019s policy on Cuba since he was in college. Just last year, McGovern railed against the economic blockade, calling it a failure. \u201cNot only does it hurt the Cuban people, it hurts America too,\u201d McGovern said<\/a>. \u201cThere are lifesaving medicines that have been developed and produced in Cuba that are not available here because of our embargo.\u201d McGovern also highlighted the amendments in a speech on the House floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to McGovern spokesperson Matt Bonaccorsi, though the congressman would have approved the remittances measure, the parliamentarian had some issues with the amendment to stop enforcing restrictions on food and medicine exports. And just a few days later, Rush withdrew the amendments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But advocates in a coalition of groups supporting the amendments say that some House Democrats in the Florida and New Jersey delegations, including Rep. Donna Shalala, along with aligned nonprofit groups, pressured lawmakers to withdraw the amendments out of concerns that they would affect Florida Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell \u2014 one of 42 members<\/a> the party considers in need of electoral protection. Mucarsel-Powell, who represents a large Cuban-American population, anticipates<\/a> her race will be \u201cone of the toughest\u201d in the country. One House Democrat confirmed that there was pressure from others in the caucus to avoid a vote on these amendments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a statement about the decision, the Illinois Democrat cited pressure from his colleagues, albeit in a roundabout way. \u201cNormalizing U.S. relations with Cuba has, and will continue to be, a top priority so long as I am a Member of Congress,\u201d Rush said. \u201cHowever, upon further consideration and conversations with my Congressional colleagues, I have determined that these amendments are unlikely to be adopted by the Senate or signed into law by the President.\u201d Rush\u2019s office declined to expand on this statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For years, Democratic leadership has insisted that legislation be restrained to consider the reelection of Democrats from swing districts, dubbed the \u201cmajority makers.\u201d In Florida, a swing state, the Cuban-American electorate skews conservative, and the party goes out of its way to appeal to this influential voting bloc. \u201cEvery candidate has a right and obligation to run a campaign tailored to their district,\u201d Erik Sperling, Just Foreign Policy executive director, said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut it\u2019s a problem that U.S.-Cuba policy for the entire Democratic Caucus is determined by the campaign strategy for races representing less than 0.005% of the U.S. population. With the economic downturn from the pandemic causing food shortages, this systemic flaw could be lethal for Cubans.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s true the amendments were unlikely to be signed into law, but House Democrats pass plenty of legislation to send a strong message. And multiple sources involved in the discussions say that Mucarsel-Powell\u2019s race was top of mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2018, she defeated incumbent Republican Rep. Carlos Curbelo by 2 points. A recent poll<\/a> commissioned by a Republican Super PAC found that Mucarsel-Powell\u2019s Republican opponent, Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gim\u00e9nez, is leading by 5 percentage points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the Trump administration announced its cap on remittances, Mucarsel-Powell also gave a definitive statement opposing the policy. \u201cThere are hundreds of thousands of Cuban Americans who live in South Florida and in my district, who would like to continue supporting their families back in Cuba,\u201d she said<\/a> at the time. \u201cI strongly believe we should not do so by punishing the Cuban people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, a February 2019<\/a> study found that 56 percent of Cuban families rely on remittances from family abroad. Shalala slammed the administration\u2019s Cuba policy as recently as June 4, saying<\/a> that cutting off remittances during a pandemic would \u201cnot only be cruel to the Cubans on the island but their families \u2014 many of my constituents \u2014 in the U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though Cuba has one of the lowest rates of coronavirus cases (as a result of its universal health care system and rigorous response to the disease), restrictions on banks and shipping companies prevent Cuba from receiving desperately needed goods. In the earlier stages of the shutdown, officials cited a cap<\/a> on the sale of medical equipment that restricted the \u201cpercentage of U.S. content allowed in foreign sales to Cuba to less than 10 percent.\u201d The pandemic\u2019s economic consequences, which also shuttered Cuba\u2019s tourism industry, have worsened the cruelty of the 60-year U.S. blockade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natasha Lycia Ora Bannan, a human rights attorney and former president of the National Lawyers Guild, helped organize support for the amendments with a coalition of progressive foreign policy groups, including the push to get McGovern to allow the amendments on the floor. She said that advocates figured the amendments \u201cwould be a sure thing\u201d \u2014 considering the congressman\u2019s \u201clongstanding support\u201d for the normalization of relations between Cuba and the U.S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe presume that he\u2019s going to support this to find out that what is actually weighing in the background of this is concerns by Democratic leadership about how this will play out in some of their members\u2019 races \u2014 or really one member\u2019s district in South Florida where she\u2019s in a vulnerable race,\u201d she said. \u201cSo it isn\u2019t that there are ideological or philosophical differences with the amendments.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bannan said that Democrats have promised that stronger amendments and bills will come after the elections in November. \u201cWe\u2019re in the middle of a pandemic, and a country that is under an illegal blockade that is only getting further squeezed is the most cruel and inhumane part of it,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd that they\u2019re going to have to be that way for months and months more because of concern with one person\u2019s race is more than unfortunate \u2014 it\u2019s cruel.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Source: The Intercept<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two amendments aimed at alleviating the stranglehold on Cuba\u2019s economy were withdrawn because of pressure to protect a vulnerable Florida rep. LAST WEEK, several House Democrats […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":101011,"featured_media":2542,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","category-us-aggression"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8652,"url":"https:\/\/www.cubasupport.ie\/latest\/why-defunding-of-usaid-is-no-help-to-cuba\/","url_meta":{"origin":2541,"position":0},"title":"Why Defunding of USAID is No Help to Cuba","author":"Editorial Team","date":"July 28, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Interviewed on March 2, Cuban Vice-Foreign Minister Carlos Fern\u00e1ndez de Coss\u00edo reacted to the Trump administration\u2019s move to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). 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