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Obama Ends “Wet Foot/Dry Foot” Policy for Cuban Refugees
America will, per a new last-minute decree from Obama, no longer automatically grant asylum to Cubans who make it to US shores. Instead, Cuban refugees (and they really are refugees from that island hellhole) will automatically be sent back to Cuba, overturning a policy that has been in effect since Castro seized control of the island nation. The current policy (known as Wet Foot / Dry Foot) was a product of the Clinton administration, and stipulated that Cubans had to actually touch US soil, where before they were given asylum merely for being picked up at sea.
I cannot help but think that this is part of Obama’s attempts to poke as many people as he can on his way out the door, for Obama must know that such people, when returned to Cuba, are likely to be imprisoned.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is ending a longstanding immigration policy that allows any Cuban who makes it to U.S. soil to stay and become a legal resident, a senior administration official said Thursday.
The repeal of the “wet foot, dry foot” policy is effective immediately, according the official. The decision follows months of negotiations focused in part on getting Cuba to agree to take back people who had arrived in the U.S.
The U.S. and Cuba planned to issue a joint statement late Thursday. The official insisted on anonymity in order to detail the change ahead of the announcement.
The official said the Cubans gave no assurances about treatment of those sent back to the country, but said political asylum remains an option for those concerned about persecution if they return.
…
The “wet foot, dry foot” policy was put in place in 1995 by President Bill Clinton as a revision of a more liberal immigration policy. Until then, Cubans caught at sea trying to make their way to the United States were allowed into the country and were able to become legal residents after a year. The U.S. was reluctant to send people back to the communist island then run by Fidel Castro, and the Cuban government also generally refused to accept repatriated citizens.
The Cuban government has in the past complained bitterly about the special immigration privileges, saying they encourage Cubans to risk dangerous escape trips and drain the country of professionals. But it has also served as a release valve for the single-party state, allowing the most dissatisfied Cubans to seek better lives outside and become sources of financial support for relatives on the island.
For a look at the cultural impact of our Cuba policy, I recommend everyone to pick up a copy of Back to Blood, by Thomas Wolfe. I also suggest viewing Peter Robinson’s interview with Wolfe, given shortly after the book came out.
Published in General
Um, yeah. Mexico may be dang corrupt, but I wasn’t aware it had a human rights record as bad as Cuba’s. I thought that most of those who were staying up here illegally were doing so more for economic reasons than due to political oppression or fear of being jailed for saying the wrong thing back home (feel free to educate me if I’m wrong).
The definition for refugee is “a person who has been forced to leave their country in order to escape war, persecution, or natural disaster.” Does that really apply to most of the Mexicans that are living here illegally? I think the “persecution” part does cover Cubans, however.
I’m also unaware that Cuban refugees demonstrate a pattern of anti-western terrorism or hostility to western values anywhere close to comparable with those hailing from the Middle East. Again, feel free to educate me if I’m wrong. But culture does matter and should be a factor in deciding how much scrutiny to apply to different groups wishing to enter the country.
Assimilate to what? Conservatism? I don’t know if you noticed, but there are a lot more Democrats than Republicans in America. If immigrants become Democrats, it would seem they have assimilated. If they don’t assimilate enough to vote, then it would seem the damage they could do would be limited.
And also recall this. Obama used Cuba’s tyranny as an example of why we should be afraid of Ted Cruz. “I hope we don’t elect this guy, because he might be like these terrible guys I’m helping and enjoying a ballgame with!”
Reprehensible!
You see, this is what I don’t understand. Republicans have an opinion on which types of immigrants are ok. Democrats have an opinion on which they like. It doesn’t seem to me why one party’s assessment of which immigrants are cool are being terrible, but the other is doing God’s work. You’re all just picking the people who are closer to your tribe. A pox on both your houses.
Mexicans are not refugees. I don’t think Mexicans get put in jail by Mexico for leaving the country, Syrians are much farther away. I think the Monroe Doctrine still matters, so refugees from the Americas would get priority over refugees from across the globe. And then of course we wouldn’t expect Cuban refugees to become terrorists, or even just anti-American, as Knotwise mentions.
What about Haiti? That place is a raging hellhole. We could easily absorb the whole country.
I think that yes, both parties are more sympathetic to groups that are “closer to their tribe,” as you put it. But while that political self-interest is a factor in this, that doesn’t mean there aren’t legitimate, non-politically-partisan reasons for favoring certain groups of would-be-U.S.-residents over others.
The point I was making with regards to Mexicans, for example, was they do not count as political refugees like Cubans, so apples and oranges.
Now, in the case of the Syrians we are talking about folks who certainly fit the definition of refugee. However, the objection to them being welcomed with open arms as opposed to Cubans goes beyond just the question of what their political-party-affiliation will be once here, but rather the question of what the probability is that several of them or their offspring will decide to commit mass murder in Allah’s name. That doesn’t seem an unreasonable concern to me to have about Syrians as opposed to Cubans.
The reason I am so angry at the Democrats is that they have been preaching about how awful Trump and his followers are, because they are “intolerant and xenophobic,” while this action shows their immigration policy is completely about serving the Democratic Party, and not about accepting the unwashed masses. The Republican immigration policy is about serving US national interests. Accepting Cuban refugees helps the US in a number of ways (e.g. it weakens and discredits the Castro regime). Accepting poor Mexican immigrants is effectively the US paying for Mexico’s poor economic policies, so that is not in US interests.
In the case of Syria, there’s probably a better way to help the refugees than shipping them here, like setting up safe zones over there, as Trump has suggested. I’m not a Trump fan, but on this issue I think he’s pretty good.
I’m not aware that Haiti jails and tortures dissidents in the way that the Castros do. I think Haiti is just really badly governed, but I may be mistaken. I think Haiti is basically like a smaller, but worse version of Mexico in that regard.
Talk about inhuman. Then again he protected hospitals in Illinois that were starving infants to death after unsuccessful late term abortions. So the man has a long history of being a scumbag and hating the poor, hungry, innocent, and weak.I can’t think of anything more cruel and less compassionate when it comes to his disastrous foreign policy.
Can you imagine what his last minute pardons are going to be like? Just brace yourself next week for that nightmare.
‘Chelsea’ Manning is rumored to be on the short list.
There is method to this. Who in the Republican tent would not be best pleased with making Cubans automatic refugees and residents when they get to the US? What about fence sitters who aren’t sure they want more Cubans in Miami, or aren’t that comfortable with a functionally bilingual city? Forcing the conversation by changing things – gotta talk to change them back – will bring these voices to the fore.
I would like to point out a crucial difference between the situation of the refugees of (all perhaps?) other countries versus the refugees of North Korea and Cuba: why do the Cuban and North Korean governments want those emigrants back? Why aren’t those people free to leave? When we are evaluating the refugees’ circumstances in the countries from which they are fleeing, their being considered “defectors” should be sufficient for us to make it possible for them to stay here.
That is the difference between the refugees coming from Cuba and those coming from the rest of Central and South America.
Great story, by the way. There are a lot of us out there who have learned to restrain ourselves, and it’s a pity there aren’t more
Hey! We agree on something! You’re confused. ;-)
You have missed something key here though:
A joint statement? With Cuba?
Since when do we set our immigration policy in cooperation with a police state?
Reminds me a lot of Jimmy Carter, another nasty piece of work.
The ones who believe in their own moral superiority above everyone else’s always are.
To think we barely tolerated this man when he scolded us for not accepting Syrian refugees with a rhetorical wag of the finger. I will brook no more lectures from this man. He is petty and small.
And getting smaller by the day. With only six days and change left, he may just manage microscopic.
Need a federal court order here, right away. This is unconscionable.
You have to explain this to me. Sorry.
Have you heard of “Rosemary’s Baby”. Maybe before your time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosemary's_Baby_(film)
Most of the Trump supporters I know want more than the status quo ante – they want the “status quo ante” of 1789 or thereabouts.
It’s a Hail Mary pass, with the idea that maybe this guy who doesn’t need the job to be rich and famous, loves America, and understands how businesses work, can actually start to cut down the size and scope of federal government.
Trump isn’t a principled conservative, but I think he understands the practical harms caused by excessive regulation. Also, someone who has had to meet payroll isn’t going to think that a hiring spree in DC is the way to balance the budget.
I wasn’t sure but I thought about that. Rosemary Kennedy came to mind. Then I thought I’m just an uncultured male … you know, a Republican.
This makes no sense – didn’t Obama lift sanctions and make it easier to go between the two countries for the first time in 50 years?
Apparently he only intended it one way. For the little people. Typically liberal, “We got one set of rules for us, and one for the rest of you lowly plebs.”
And it kills me the way he tried to defend letting in hordes of illegals from Mexico and Central America, spreading measles and scabies, by saying we can’t turn them away because “That’s not who we are.” So then suddenly finding the impulse to curb immigration by sending Cubans back to certain doom IS “who we are”?
At least you weren’t thinking Rosemary Clooney