even the Dems dis Debbie
Debbie Mucarsel-Powell is not having a great day after her attempts to play politics with the Cuban community went south.
The Miami-Dade commission, where Democrats hold a majority, outright rejected her bill saying it “smacks of D.C. politics,” with one Democrat even calling it “offensive to a community.”
In case you missed it…
Miami-Dade commission rejects Democratic bill to help reunite Cuban families
Miami Herald
Douglas Hanks
November 20, 2019
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article237555054.html
Miami-Dade commissioners gave a collective thumbs down Tuesday to a Democratic congresswoman’s bill to expedite travel applications from Cuban relatives of U.S. citizens.
Cuban-American Republicans on the 13-seat Miami-Dade County Commission criticized the proposal by Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, a first-term Democrat from Pinecrest who may face a challenge in 2020 from the county’s Republican mayor, Carlos Gimenez.
“This smacks of D.C. politics,” Commissioner Esteban “Steve” Bovo Jr., a Republican son of a Bay of Pigs veteran, said during the debate over a symbolic resolution endorsing Mucarsel-Powell’s “Cuban Family Reunification Act.”
Democrats hold a slim majority on the officially nonpartisan commission, but the party’s edge didn’t help Mucarsel-Powell. A staffer from her office spoke in favor of the legislation during public comments at the start of the meeting, but only one commissioner endorsed the bill during the debate on the dais. That was the sponsor of the resolution, Commissioner Daniella Levine Cava, a Democrat running against Bovo in the 2020 mayoral race.
“This is an item that has to do with the importance of family,” said Levine Cava. “It’s about reunifying families who have sought refuge from the communist Cuban regime.”
Cuban Americans no longer hold a majority on the commission, and Levine Cava is one of seven commissioners whose roots don’t trace back to the island nation that remains a driving force in Miami politics. Home to the country’s largest Cuban-American population, the Miami-Dade commission regularly delves into foreign policy related to the island regime and urges Congressional action tied to the communist nation.
In July, the commission unanimously endorsed Washington imposing sanctions on a Cuban company for importing Venezuelan oil. In May, the board endorsed President Donald Trump’s new sanctions on the “tyrannical” Cuban regime, and in early 2018 a commission resolution urged the United Nations not to recognize any Cuban elections that aren’t “free” and open to multiple parties.On Tuesday, Cuban-American Republicans said they didn’t appreciate being asked to endorse Mucarsel-Powell’s legislation related to U.S. immigration policy for Cubans. “The pain of the Cuban people, I have never used for politics,” said Commissioner Rebeca Sosa, a Republican whose family fled Cuba in the 1960s when she was 9.
Mucarsel-Powell’s bill seeks to revive a program launched under President George W. Bush that lets Cuban-American families apply for “parole” for relatives living in Cuba. The status allowed family members to bypass some U.S. immigration delays and come to the United States while waiting for visas to be approved.
The program froze in 2017 after Washington pulled staff from the U.S. embassy in Havana on the heels of employees becoming ill from what was feared to be a mysterious sonic attack. With a skeleton crew there, immigration authorities are no longer processing the paperwork needed for Cuban citizens to participate in the parole program that a U.S. family member would initiate.
The Mucarsel-Powell legislation would require the Trump administration to resume processing parole paperwork in Havana, and assign temporary staff there to tackle the backlog while taking steps “to ensure the safety of such personnel.” The bill attracted only Democratic backing in the House, with Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, a Republican from the Miami area, saying safety concerns at the embassy prevent him from supporting the legislation.
Sosa also cited safety as one reason for not supporting the Mucarsel-Powell legislation. “At the end of the day, we are asking the U.S. government to assign personnel back to the Cuba U.S. embassy,” Sosa said.
Mucarsel-Powell, who immigrated to the United States from Ecuador as a child, endorsed Levine Cava’s mayoral run in August. Gimenez, who was born in Cuba, said he is considering a run in the Republican primary to challenge Mucarsel-Powell for her District 26 seat. In a statement, the congresswoman’s office said the reunification issue “is not political” for her and she has “heard from families across the district about the hardship that the suspension of the Cuban Family Reunification Parole program has caused.”
Levine Cava’s resolution urging Congress to pass Mucarsel-Powell’s bill received such a chilly reception on the board that Levine Cava initially moved to defer the vote to another meeting. Then Audrey Edmonson, a Democrat and chairwoman of the commission, said she thought it would be better for the resolution to go away all together.
“When you don’t know something, and you see you are doing something that is somewhat offensive to a community, I would suggest you just withdraw it,” Edmonson said. Levine Cava called Edmonson “a wise wisdom” and agreed to pull back the resolution. Her fellow commissioners unanimously agreed, and the issue died.
“I acknowledge and respect, of course, the experience of my colleagues who have personally experienced the oppression of this regime,” Levine Cava said. “I stand with you in solidarity.”
In a Twitter post later that evening, Levine Cava wrote she saw no reason to continue pressing for the bill’s support.
“It was clear that it would fail as nobody spoke in support,” she said. “It is a shame that we cannot stay focused on the needs of families, distracted by the divisive politics of the day.”