The Republican Senator Who's Trying to Lift the Cuba Travel Ban

[Judi Lynn]

The Republican Senator Who's Trying to Lift the Cuba Travel Ban

Feb 2, 2015 3:22 PM CST

Arizona Senator Jeff Flake has been working on lifting the ban for the past 15 years.


Arizona Senator Jeff Flake has been on Capitol Hill long enough to know that the legislation he introduced last week lifting the Cuba travel ban probably will get little traction in the current legislative environment. Still, Flake is betting on winning in the court of public opinion.

"As more Americans now go down under the relaxed restrictions, they'll just want more freedom," said Flake, predicting that an expansion of regularly scheduled commercial air service would lead to broad calls for lifting the travel ban completely.

Flake, began championing the cause almost 15 years ago as a House member during the early days of the George W. Bush administration, said that at the time he ran into resistance from the White House, specifically top Bush political adviser Karl Rove, who cautioned that effort was broadly unpopular with Florida's large Cuban-American population.

"I started doing this in 2001 and 2002, it was Karl Rove telling me, you know, it's Florida politics," Flake said. "That no longer applies. The politics are different than they were then."

Recent polling shows a reversal in traditional support among Cuban-Americans for punitive policies towards Cuba, a potentially significant development for swing-state Florida politics. A 2014 Florida International University poll found that 69 percent of Cuban Americans support lifting the travel ban and a majority—52 percent—support doing away with the trade embargo of the island nation.

More:
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-02-02/the-republican-senator-who-s-trying-to-lift-the-cuba-travel-ban

[Daniel537]

1. Those opinion polls really need to start translating into votes for this to happen.

The average idiot congressman merely turns to Rubio, Ros-Lehtinen, Menendez and the rest of the cabal when this issue comes up. I saw Luis Gutierrez just the other day on Telemundo next to Ros-Lehtinen saying he was not supportive of easing any sanctions on Cuba, and afterwards he literally hugged Ros-Lehtinen, the reason being that she is one of the few Republicans who supports immigration reform. Its typical political horse-trading, and until we see progressive, anti-embargo Cuban-Americans in office, i don't see any congressional movement happening. Just look at how much "got done" on this issue when Dems controlled congress. Couldn't even get a bill to lift the travel ban from passing committee. We've got a very long way to go before we have true normalization.

[Marksman_91]

3. I think the Dems didn't do anything about it back in '08 because it might've affected their votes

Back when the Dems had the majority in Congress, I don't think most people supported ending the embargo, and would've been political suicide for the following election. Now that Obama has no more elections to worry about, he can put forward these ideas without worrying for political fallout.

[Daniel537]

6. Actually most did support lifting the embargo in 2009

Granted not by as wide a margin now, but still pretty solid. 57% opposed the embargo and 55% opposed the travel ban.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/12/23/poll-support-increases-for-lifting-cuba-embargo-travel-restrictions/

Of course another factor in that bill not gaining any traction is the fact that the head of the House Foreign Affairs Committee at the time, Howard Berman, received money from the biggest pro-embargo lobby, the US-Cuba Democracy PAC. Obama can only move ahead so much now, since Clinton's signing of the Helms-Burton Law in 1996 and the TSRA Law in 2000 codified the embargo and travel ban, respectively.

[Judi Lynn]

7. Howard Berman, what a colossal disappointment. "Democrat."

[center]

Having speaks with his friend, Cuban
"exile" winger, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.

[Still Sensible]

2. Might be one of a very few Flake positions I agree with. n/t

[Judi Lynn]

4. Odd, isn't it? Same here. Really unexpected. n/t

[Still Sensible]

5. I grew up in southern Arizona and even registered voters

for Mo Udall. The state was republican back then, but now they're batshit crazy.