Biden’s legacy on Cuba | Nation

On November 15, just a week after Joe Biden’s White House term entered its final lame-duck phase, the president received a powerful congressional letter urging him to “act immediately” to provide critical humanitarian and humanitarian aid to Cuba. Energy infrastructure assistance. The letter, co-sponsored by Reps. Barbara Lee and James McGovern and eight other signatories, states that “the people of Cuba are currently facing massive power outages and an escalating energy crisis.” . “This situation not only causes immense suffering for the Cuban people, but also poses serious risks to U.S. national security interests,” they wrote. “If left unaddressed, this crisis will almost certainly exacerbate an increase in migration and impose serious consequences on the U.S. border management system. pressure and completely destabilize an already tense Caribbean region.”

So far, the Biden White House has not responded. But at a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing last week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken testified, “I do not foresee any changes in our policy toward Cuba during the course of this administration.” Despite the president’s 2020 campaign While promising that he would restore the historic normalization of U.S. relations announced by Barack Obama 10 years ago today, Biden’s legacy on Cuba appears destined to be one of frustrating and infuriating inaction , while the policies of the former Trump administration remain in place. .

Obama-Biden breakthrough

Four years ago, few members of the political establishment and the Cuban policy advocacy community could have foreseen this ominous outcome. Expectations are high that the incoming Biden administration will revive the successful process of positive engagement engineered by the Obama-Biden administration but destroyed by Trump. After all, Biden was involved in the creation of Obama’s history-changing détente with Cuba; the vice president at the time was one of the few senior White House officials aware of Obama’s authorization of secret negotiations with Raúl Castro’s administration. lifestyle with Cuba.

The secret talks were conducted by two National Security Council officials. Benjamin Rhodes and Ricardo Zuniga, along with Raul Castro’s son Major Alejandro Castro and another Cuban military officer, over 18 months in 2014 A historic breakthrough was achieved on December 17. Both announced a deal to end past disputes and normalize diplomatic relations. Just two weeks later, Biden attended the inauguration of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff in Brasilia, where, a White House aide recalled, he was credited with finally normalizing bilateral ties between the United States and Cuba. and received praise from one Latin American leader after another.

Biden knows that the détente between the United States and Cuba is a substantial success for the interests of both countries. The Obama administration moved quickly to remove Cuba from the State Department’s list of countries that sponsor international terrorism, officially reopen its embassies in Washington and Havana, lift restrictions on remittances, resume commercial flights to the island, and ease travel restrictions. , so that U.S. citizens can enter Cuba. The influx of tourists and businesses such as Airbnb has provided substantial input into the Cuban economy, particularly the expansion of Cuba’s private business sector. The two countries have also established bilateral committees to oversee cooperation on key issues such as anti-drug operations, counter-terrorism cooperation, disaster management and regularization of migration to promote common security interests. In less than two years, Washington and Havana have signed 23 bilateral agreements to advance these issues through mutual cooperation.

Trump’s return

Obama’s engagement posture proved so successful that an interagency national security review conducted in the first months of the Trump administration concluded that the policy should continue. “[T]The comments were sent to Trump advising him to maintain Obama’s efforts to normalize relations with Cuba,” foreign policy 2017 report. “After promising on the campaign trail to introduce new policies to Cuban-American hardliners, he vetoed the idea.” During his first administration, Trump systematically dismantled the Obama-Biden relationship with Cuba. The policy of detente was replaced by dozens of brutal and punitive sanctions — including cutting off wire transfers during the pandemic — that have taken a costly toll on the Cuban economy and its people. Trump has violated the rights of U.S. citizens to freely visit Cuba, reducing flights, banning cruise ships and creating a list of “restricted entities” — hotels, restaurants, bars and businesses that U.S. tourists can no longer legally visit. Just seven days before leaving office, Trump falsely called Cuba a state sponsor of international terrorism and imposed more economic penalties on the island.