Fifty Years of Revolution: Perspectives on Cuba, the United States, and the World

16. The New Cuban American Politics: Passion, Affection, Dollars, and the Emergence of MiHavana

16 The New Cuban American Politics Passion, Affection, Dollars, and the Emergence of MiHavana Damián Fernández Much has been written about the impact of Cuban Americans on U.S. policy toward Cuba. From scholarly and journalistic accounts a portrait emerges of a single-minded ethnic enclave whose power has commandeered (some would say hijacked) Washington’s decisions vis-à-vis the island . The geographic heart of the politics shaping U.S. relations with Cuba is the city whose name has become code for Cuban American control: Miami . To say Miami is to say Cuban Americans.1 Both terms are interchangeable in the public imaginary; both carry multiple, and at times paradoxical, connotations. Power and geography have thus converged in a manner that seems to doom U.S.-Cuban relations to physical and political immutability. Geography becomes political destiny. But is it? And if so, is it as fixed as landmasses? Does the political geography of South Florida condemn U.S.Cuban relations to continuity? While the policy circuit between Havana and Washington usually runs through Miami, it would be an error in judgment not to note the alternating currents flowing through it over time.2 Geographic dimensions, including demographic concentration of the ethnic group in South Florida, have been necessary conditions to explain the decisive role Cuban Americans have played in U.S. foreign policy, but they are far from sufficient to explain the group’s capacity for political influence or the variations thereof. Particularly in the past decade, significant shifts in social and political patterns have taken place in South Florida—some of which point to greater direct connections between the region and the island, an emerging network that excludes Washington.3 As Miami and its Cuban American population have changed, so has the outlook for relations with Cuba. The city is no longer the same place it was in the 1980s or 1990s. Although Cuban 334 · Damián Fernández Americans continue to hold significant power in political and economic sectors, Greater Miami is not exclusively a Cuban enclave. It is now a panLatin entrepôt, the gateway to the Americas, and with aspirations of becoming a global city.4 The Latinization of Miami and the city’s expanded financial role would argue for relations with Cuba sometime in the future. Moreover, the social and demographic profile of the Cuban American community has experienced significant shifts in the past decades, resulting in redefined political contours that point to a new outlook as well. In tandem with exogenous factors, both national and international in scale, endogenous changes within Cuban Miami are ushering in a new era in the history of Cuban-U.S. relations. A new regional political, cultural, and economic geography is in the making. Explaining Cuban American Influence on U.S. Foreign Policy Cuban American influence over U.S. policy came of age in 1980 with the establishment of the Cuban American National Foundation (CANF) under the leadership of Jorge Mas Canosa, a wealthy Miami businessman.5 The early 1980s were propitious for the Cuban American lobby. The advent of Ronald Reagan’s presidency at the beginning of the decade opened the ideological doors to Cuban Americans who supported the president and who were aligned firmly with his cold war redux. By that time Cubans in Miami had garnered the economic and local political clout that enabled them to follow the Jewish example and become a major ethnic lobby group, specifically in the foreign policy arena.6 The success of the Cuban American effort can be explained by four interrelated factors operating in tandem: • Convergence with the presidential worldview. Cuban Americans were staunch supporters of President Reagan’s international policies , especially his global anticommunist crusades. As a result, not only did they find a warm reception in the White House for their Cuban cause, but CANF lobbied in favor of a number of other foreign policy issues on the president’s agenda, including U.S. involvement in the Central American conflicts.7 • Geographic concentration, single-issue constituency, and a oneparty minority. The political “trifecta” of geographic concentration of a single-issue constituency with broad partisan uniformity has tended to exaggerate the perception of Cuban American power. The New Cuban American Politics · 335 Their demographic concentration in South Florida gave the group electoral influence that was perceived as critical to win office, even at the national level.8 Politicians of all stripes courted Cuban American...