Castro and Chávez: The Evil Twins for Florida's GOP

[Judi Lynn]

Castro and Chávez: The Evil Twins for Florida's GOP
By Carmen Gentile / Miami Thursday, Mar. 05, 2009

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Thousands of Venezuelans residing in Florida cast ballots at their Miami consulate last month in a referendum on whether to abolish presidential term limits back home. Most voted "no," because the last thing they want is to see left-wing President Hugo Chávez run again when his second term expires in 2012. But two of the most emphatically anti-Chávez figures at the consulate weren't voters. They weren't even Venezuelan. They were some of South Florida's most prominent and outspoken Cuban-American politicians: Republican Representatives Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. Chávez won his referendum handily, but the day was still a victory of sorts for Diaz-Balart and Ros-Lehtinen, who got to cultivate potential constituents with a common concern — namely, the tight alliance between Chávez and their own nemesis, the Castro regime in Cuba.

Florida's Republicans could use more constituents. Last November, Barack Obama, who won a surprising 57% of the state's Latino vote, became the first northern Democrat to win Florida in a presidential election in 64 years. Cuban-American leaders could use more help in their shrinking corner — especially after a new Florida International University (FIU) poll showed that, for the first time, a majority of Miami Cubans oppose continuing the 47-year-old U.S. trade embargo against Havana. And so the more than 150,000 Venezuelans now living in South Florida — a third of whom have arrived since Chávez took office in 1999 — have come at a good time for the state's GOP and the hard-line Cuban-American exile community.

"Venezuelans are under a lot of pressure from Chávez, who is acting more like a dictator every day," says Diaz-Balart, who accuses the Venezuelan President of human-rights abuses against opponents and of pressuring independent media that criticize his government. Ros-Lehtinen agrees, noting the similarities between the Cubans who fled the island in the wake of Fidel Castro's communist revolution 50 years ago and the Venezuelans now residing in her South Florida district. "We are very much aware of the key issues facing them," she says. Adds Ninoska Perez, director of the conservative Cuban Liberty Council in Miami, "In many ways, we Cubans see what is happening in Venezuela as the same that happened in Cuba." (See pictures of Cuba.)

The similarities may not be that strong — Chávez is still a democratically elected leader who allows, among other things, a noisy opposition press. Furthermore, most of Florida's Venezuelans aren't yet U.S. citizens, so they aren't likely to be a force at the polls. But last month's referendum result will probably push many more to try and stay in this country. More and more, says Ros-Lehtinen, her office is fielding requests from Venezuelans regarding a U.S. immigration policy known as Deferred Enforced Departure, which allows those with expiring visas to extend their stay for reasons of political asylum, claiming they face dangers at home for their opposition to the Chávez government.

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