Cuba: Migration Crisis?

By Raúl Capote Fernández on April 16, 2022.

In recent weeks, the manipulation of the Cuban migratory issue has increased in social networks and counterrevolutionary digital sites, the media articulation that responds to Washington’s interests never tires of encouraging and calling for illegal departure to the United States.

Based on a real situation caused by the internal economic crisis in Cuba, after more than 2 years of pandemic and the increase of the coercive economic measures implemented by the U.S., a climate of constant tension has been created around the issue.

People’s emotions are being manipulated by means of a virtual avalanche of false information, calls to leave the country and false testimonies of people in Cuba anxious to emigrate, etc.

That in the media scenario, in the real scenario, the measures adopted by some Latin American embassies to hinder and even close almost completely the transit of Cubans through their territory, establishing very difficult conditions to comply with or outright denying visas and permits, are striking.

While illegal departures are encouraged, the US consulate in Havana is still almost closed. The migratory agreements between both nations are not being complied with and visas are practically not being granted in the consulates open in other countries; a situation that turns the normal visa process into an nightmarish odyssey.

Since the triumph of the Revolution, the US migratory policy towards Cuba has had an underlying component that stimulates illegal and irregular flows, as part of its destabilizing policy.

Migratory relations between Cuba and the United States have always had a distinctive seal; before 1959, the closeness and the links of dependence marked the development of this process.

Between 1950 and 1958, some 65,200 Cubans emigrated to the United States, which, counting residents and their descendants, amounted to 100,000 Cubans living in that country, to which were added in 1958, 72,000 who traveled with non-immigrant visas.[1]

As a result of the revolutionary process that triumphed on the Island in 1959, the relations of dependence with Washington ceased to exist and the migratory process began to be used as an instrument of destabilization that continues to this day.

The U.S. government organized special migratory programs only for Cubans, even granting the category of Political Refugee to anyone who left the Greater Antilles and arrived in that country.

To understand the aggressive nature of this policy, it is necessary to study the law approved on November 2, 1966 by the United States Congress, the “Act to Adjust the Status of Cuban Refugees to that of Lawful Permanent Residents of the United States, and for Other Purposes”, which was signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson.

The Cubans arriving in the US admitted or paroled into the U.S., who physically remains in the country for one year, may be “adjusted” by the Attorney General as an alien lawfully admitted to reside permanently, which is extensive and applicable to the spouse and child of this alien. This is an exemption not offered to immigrants coming to the US from any other country.

Imagine for a second that this law would apply to all citizens of Latin America who wish to emigrate beyond the Rio Grande.

Under this law, still in force, all those who arrive, even those who do so illegally, have the possibility of adjusting, and in a year and a day receive Permanent Residency, then in less than 3 years they can access U.S. citizenship.

Cubans are the only immigrants who can immediately and automatically, regardless of whether they have arrived illegally, receive a Work Permit, without the need to file an Affidavit of Support to receive their legal residency, obtain a social security number, public food and housing benefits, privileges that any other immigrant who applies to reside in the United States does not have.

To all of this, let’s add the constant violation of immigration agreements, the denial of family reunification visas, non-immigrant visas and others, and the constant incentive to immigrate illegally.

What is the purpose of this policy, what is the sense of it, why unleash a multifaceted campaign to encourage illegal departures at this time?

There is no doubt that the aim is to create a serious migratory crisis while casting a disparaging image of Cuba.

As the White House itself has warned, blaming Cuba of course, a massive departure could be considered harmful to the national security of that country and therefore the government would have to take measures.

A migratory crisis duly presented by the big hegemonic media at the service of Washington would create the image of chaos and ungovernability on the island and a simple call from one or a group of the so-called “oppositionists” would be enough to unleash pandemonium and the Yankee marines would rush in to provide “humanitarian aid” to the Cubans.

There is another important factor to  consider, the failure of the plans that led to the events of July 11, a plan meticulously prepared for years that ended, like so many others, in a resounding fiasco, when the “opponents”, who were anything but peaceful and even less spontaneous, were defeated by the people.

The immense machinery of symbolic warfare did not succeed in defeating the Revolution, no matter how much it managed to confuse some, there were demonstrators, yes, people who went out to the streets moved by the fear of COVID, by the hardship caused by the strengthened economic siege, but none of them was judged and none of them are in prison.

Those who acted that day under the guidance of a foreign government sought to create chaos, to generate the image of ungovernability and to pave the way for the intervention of the United States. Their calls that day says it all, there are thousands of videos uploaded to the networks calling to invade, to bomb, to destroy.

Now they are coming for more, they are relentless in their efforts and are seeking to create chaos, to create a situation that will allow them to justify the old dream of invading Cuba and overthrowing the Revolution. I do not believe that April is a favorable month for such plans, in truth, neither this month nor any other, but much less April as Cubans remember the embarrassing defeat of the US at Playa Giron.

Notes:

(1) Source MINREX, www.cubagob.cu/rel_est/acuerdos.htm.

(*) Cuban writer, professor, researcher and journalist. He is the author of “Juego de Iluminaciones”, “El caballero ilustrado”, “El adversario”, “Enemigo” and “La guerra que se nos hace”.

Source: Resumen Latinoamericano