WG: CISNEWS Battle over Cuban boy

> ----------
> Von:  center@cis.org[SMTP:center@cis.org]
> Gesendet:     Montag, 17. Januar 2000 19:53
> An:   CISNEWS@cis.org
> Betreff:      Battle over Cuban boy
> 
> 
> [For CISNEWS subscribers: Four items --
> 
> * GOP to introduce citizenship legislation for Elian;
> * Congress is urged to stay out of citizenship decision;
> * Cuba seeks foreign support for boy's return; and
> * Black activists protest double standard for Haitians.
> 
> -- Mark Krikorian]
> 
> 
> Rare Act of Congress Is Planned for Elian 
> GOP Leaders Back Citizenship Bills
> By Karen DeYoung 
> The Washington Post, January 16, 2000
> 
> The number of people who have become U.S. citizens through an act of
> Congress is small. Some, including Sir Winston Churchill, Mother Teresa
> and
> 17th-century English Quaker William Penn, were made honorary citizens for
> their valor and good deeds. Citizenship was posthumously bestowed on
> Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg for his efforts to save European Jews
> during World War II.
> 
> Now, if some lawmakers have their way, another person will be added to
> these rarefied ranks. Elian Gonzalez, age 6.
> 
> Florida Sen. Connie Mack (R) and four House Republicans--three of them
> from
> Florida--have said they will introduce bills to make Elian a citizen when
> Congress reconvenes on Jan. 24.
> 
> Swift movement on the measures seems likely, since Senate Majority Leader
> Trent Lott (R-Miss.) has signed on to Mack's proposal and House Majority
> Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) is the fourth sponsor of the proposed House bill.
> House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) "is supportive," a spokesman
> said.
> 
> Asked if President Clinton would sign such a bill into law, White House
> spokesman Joe Lockhart said: "We'll deal with that when we get there.
> We'll
> take great pains to stay out of the politics of this."
> 
> As a citizen, Elian would no longer be a foreigner without legal status in
> this country, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which has
> ordered him home to Cuba, would have no more say over his fate.
> 
> Backers of the measures hope his case would then head to Florida family
> court, where a Miami judge already has given temporary custody of the boy
> to his Cuban American great-uncle and has scheduled a March 6 hearing,
> despite INS insistence that the court has no jurisdiction. There, the
> boy's
> future could be argued by his Cuban father, who wants him back, and his
> Miami relatives, who maintain that life in communist Cuba automatically
> constitutes child abuse.
> 
> "Right now, you have attorneys arguing archaic, confusing and
> hard-to-understand immigration law," said Mack. "If it's shifted to an
> issue of custody, the decisions will be made in court. . . . All
> interested
> parties will have an opportunity to voice their opinions. The fundamental
> difference is you go away from being focused on the law to being focused
> on
> what's best for the boy."
> 
> For his part, Mack said, "I don't understand how the land of freedom can
> say it's in his best interest to be sent to a place where the government
> can tell him what he thinks and what he'll become." Mack said he thinks it
> is appropriate for Elian Gonzalez to take his place alongside Winston
> Churchill in the hearts and history of Americans. "It's fundamental about
> who we are as a nation."
> 
> Elian's plight would likely have elicited strong emotions from parents,
> and
> even members of Congress, no matter where he came from. Cute and
> photogenic, he is a motherless child with enough pint-sized stamina to
> have
> endured two days alone and adrift in the Atlantic Ocean. But because he is
> Cuban, because his divorced mother drowned while fleeing the island with
> him, and because he has been claimed by South Florida's politically
> powerful and highly vocal Cuban community, his case has been propelled
> into
> the realms of high politics and foreign policy.
> 
> Congress has been in recess since Elian was rescued at sea on Thanksgiving
> Day, so political debate over his fate has been relegated to home-state
> news releases, presidential photo-op commentary and candidate statements.
> But with the all-but-certain failure of INS efforts to get the boy back to
> Cuba before Congress reconvenes, that is about to change.
> 
> "Hopefully, we can address it in the first week we're back," Mack said.
> 
> Where it will end is anybody's guess. Although Cuba remains subject to the
> harshest economic sanctions under U.S. law, congressional sentiment has
> slowly been shifting toward more normal relations, particularly in the
> Senate. Clinton has long been considered a closet advocate of
> normalization
> and has publicly supported the INS ruling.
> 
> But election-year politics--and the tangled family emotions that overlay
> the international policy aspects of the case--tend toward the
> unpredictable.
> 
> Most members of Congress have said nothing at all about the boy. With few
> exceptions, the flood of news releases supporting the Americanization of
> Elian have come from a relatively small group of House and Senate members
> long-identified with efforts to isolate the regime of Cuban President
> Fidel
> Castro. They include Mack, the three Florida GOP House members who say
> they
> will sponsor a citizenship bill along with DeLay--Ileana Ros-Lehtinen,
> Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Bill McCollum--and Rep. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.),
> as well as the co-sponsors of an eponymous 1996 law tightening the U.S.
> economic embargo on Cuba, Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) and Rep. Dan Burton
> (R-Ind.).
> 
> Florida's other senator, Democrat Bob Graham, has asked Attorney General
> Janet Reno to defer the enforcement of the INS ruling pending
> "congressional review," which he said should include "possible changes in
> the law." Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), a
> candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, requested that Reno
> "stay" her decision to send the boy back to Cuba and asked to be
> personally
> briefed.
> 
> Among other Republican presidential hopefuls, Texas Gov. George W. Bush
> and
> Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) have both been critical of the INS and said the
> issue should be heard in court. So has Vice President Gore, although the
> other Democratic presidential contender, Bill Bradley, said he didn't want
> to "second guess" the INS.
> 
> But support for legislative intervention has not been unanimous among
> those
> who have expressed an opinion. Longtime advocates of normalizing relations
> with Havana, such as Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) and Rep. Charles
> B.
> Rangel (D-N.Y.), have publicly backed the INS ruling.
> 
> Rep. Lamar S. Smith (R-Tex.), a major conservative voice on immigration
> issues and chairman of the House immigration subcommittee through which
> the
> citizenship legislation would normally pass, has been noticeably silent.
> Asked on Friday to comment on the proposed bills, Smith issued a terse,
> four-sentence statement calling Elian's case "a sensitive issue that
> demands careful consideration."
> 
> "No one can justify the oppressive, communist government in Cuba," Smith
> said. "But we should not rush into separating a father and son. If any of
> us were a parent living in Cuba, as much as we might not like the
> authoritarian government, we would not want to give up our parental
> rights."
> 
> A Smith spokesman said it would be correct to interpret the statement as a
> non-endorsement of citizenship via legislation.
> 
> Smith's Senate counterpart, immigration subcommittee Chairman Spencer
> Abraham (R-Mich.), has said that it is "appropriate for courts to examine"
> Elian's case. But he has not commented on the citizenship issue.
> 
> "Private bills," those bestowing benefits on a single individual, have
> been
> around since the beginning of the Republic. Once common, their popularity
> "tailed off considerably after the Abscam affair in 1980," according to
> former INS general counsel David Martin.
> 
> During the Abscam federal bribery investigation, undercover agents posing
> as foreign businessmen offered members of Congress cash in exchange for
> "one particular favor," Martin said in a recent interview with National
> Public Radio. "And that was the passage of a private bill to change their
> immigration status."
> 
> Today, Congress generally frowns on private immigration bills as opening
> the door to suspicions of special favors and to unwanted hordes of "me,
> too" petitioners. "The overwhelming majority of members of Congress refuse
> to introduce a private bill under any circumstances," said Washington
> immigration lawyer Michael A. Maggio, who has tried to push his share of
> such bills.
> 
> The few that are introduced more often than not die a quiet death in the
> immigration subcommittees and never make it to the full judiciary
> committees, let alone to the House or Senate floor. In the last Congress,
> only one such bill became law--former New York Republican senator Alfonse
> M. D'Amato's petition to grant resident-alien status to Swiss banker
> Michel
> Meilei, who lost his job for saving Holocaust-era bank documents from a
> shredder.
> 
> But congressional sources said that with support from the Republican
> leadership, it is quite likely that legislation granting citizenship to
> Elian would bypass the committees altogether and go directly to the floors
> of the two chambers.
> 
> Although time has grown short, the Justice Department holds out hope that
> it can move the issue onto the federal docket this week--a venue where it
> believes the INS will prevail--and thus satisfy congressional demands for
> Elian's day in court.
> 
> Should that effort fail and legislation succeed, the INS and senior
> administration officials maintain that citizenship wouldn't affect the
> right of Elian's father to take him home. "There's no guarantee that a
> citizen remains in the United States," said Martin. "U.S. citizen children
> move with their parents to foreign countries all the time."
> 
> The path to such an outcome is littered with obstacles, however. Taking
> Elian to Cuba before the Florida custody hearing would require wresting
> the
> boy from the possession of his Miami relatives.
> 
> If the custody case does go to Florida court, Miami-Dade Circuit Judge
> Rosa
> Rodriguez has said Elian's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, must appear. But
> Gonzalez has said he will never give in to "that mafia" in Miami by
> showing
> up on its turf.
> 
> 
> ********
> ********
> 
> 2 Officials Urge Congress to Stay Out of Elian Case
> By Irvin Molotsky
> The New York Times, January 17, 2000
> 
> WASHINGTON, Jan. 16 -- The president of the Cuban National Assembly and
> the
> White House chief of staff both urged Congress today not to interfere in
> the question of returning a little boy to Cuba.
> 
> The Cuban official, Ricardo Alarcón, said he thought that Congress had
> "other more serious business to deal with, that you should -- that the
> American people should -- ask them to concentrate on those issues and not
> to be used as a tool for those kidnappers in Miami."
> 
> The White House official, John D. Podesta, urged Congress to leave the
> resolution of the case up to the federal courts.
> 
> Both of them spoke against a proposal that Congress grant the boy, Elián
> González, American citizenship, which would effectively block the
> Immigration and Naturalization Service from acting to send him home.
> 
> The 6-year-old boy has been staying with relatives in Florida since Nov.
> 25, when the boat that was carrying him, his mother and other Cuban
> refugees sank. His mother, Elisabet Brotons, died, and his father, Juan
> Miguel González, has asked that he be returned to Cuba.
> 
> Mr. Alarcón, who appeared on the NBC News program "Meet the Press," said
> from Cuba: "I think that citizenship is something that should not be used
> for that kind of maneuvering. You cannot impose citizenship upon anybody.
> And this individual, this 6-year-old boy, has not requested anything, and
> he cannot, legally speaking.
> 
> "And the father clearly doesn't want him to be deprived, not only for his
> son, but to deprive his son, after having deprived him of his father and
> his four grandparents, also of his nationality. This is going too far,
> really."
> 
> The idea of granting American citizenship to Elián was proposed late last
> week by Senator Connie Mack, Republican of Florida, and four members of
> the
> House of Representatives. The Republican majority leader of the Senate,
> Trent Lott of Mississippi, has endorsed it.
> 
> Mr. Podesta said: "The best place for this to be decided is in a court of
> law, rather than in the halls of Congress. But, you know, we'll have to
> wait and see what they propose and take that on when they get back to
> town.
> 
> "Certain members, obviously of the leadership, have suggested that they
> want to pass legislation when they first return to town, and we'll have to
> see what they come up with when they propose it."
> 
> Mr. Podesta, who appeared on the ABC News program "This Week," also took
> note of an effort by another Republican, Representative Dan Burton of
> Indiana, to keep Elián in the United States by issuing a subpoena for his
> testimony before Congress and said, "Our position has been: let's try to
> keep this, as best we can, out of politics."
> 
> Mr. Alarcón said in a second television appearance, on "Fox News Sunday,"
> that the citizenship proposal was "absolutely nonsense," and he added,
> "Congress is supposed to be a serious institution and not an instrument to
> permit what amounts to a kidnapping of a small boy."
> 
> One of the candidates for the Republican nomination for president, Senator
> John McCain of Arizona, said he supported granting citizenship to the
> child.
> 
> "Sure," Mr. McCain answered when the question was put to him on "Meet the
> Press." "We've done that to so many others who have been able to escape."
> In answer to another question, he said that as president he would not
> return Elián to Cuba.
> 
> Mr. McCain, who was a prisoner of war in Vietnam, said: "I have had some
> experience with Communist governments, and there are millions of Americans
> that have, too. Ask any of them who lived under it what it was like and
> whether we should condemn that young boy to it, and especially since his
> mother made the ultimate sacrifice in order that he might breathe free."
> Meanwhile, Cuba's foreign minister left for Europe today to seek support
> for the boy's return.
> 
> "It is inconceivable and unacceptable that this small child remains
> kidnapped," Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque told Cuba's Prensa Latina
> news service, according to The Associated Press. He was to visit Italy,
> San
> Marino, France, Denmark and Russia and also meet with Vatican and Spanish
> officials before returning to Cuba on Jan. 28.
> 
> 
> ********
> ********
> 
> Cuba seeks foreign support in Elian case
> Anita Snow
> January 16, 2000 
> 
> HAVANA (AP) -- Growing impatient with 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez's extended
> U.S. stay, Cuba's foreign minister left for Europe on Sunday to seek
> support for the boy's return.
> 
> ``It is inconceivable and unacceptable that this small child remains
> kidnapped,'' Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque told Cuba's Prensa Latina
> news service before leaving. He was to visit Italy, San Marino, France,
> Denmark and Russia and also meet with Vatican and Spanish officials before
> returning to Cuban on Jan. 28.
> 
> As for Cuba's strategy back home, ``Our mobilizations will continue,''
> Perez Roque said, according to the news agency. ``No one should make the
> mistake to think that we are going to get tired.''
> 
> There were no mass demonstrations scheduled for Sunday. But over the
> weekend, Fidel Castro's communist government appeared to be gearing up for
> more and larger protests in the days to come.
> 
> Several dozen workers wearing T-shirts emblazoned with Elian's portrait
> mixed and poured cement for a new concrete plaza outside the U.S.
> Interests
> Section, where many of the rallies to demand Elian's repatriation have
> been
> held.
> 
> Some of the largest protests in recent weeks were held Friday and
> Saturday.
> In the first demonstration, more than 100,000 Cuban mothers marched
> outside
> the American mission. On Saturday, more than 150,000 protesters held an
> angry political rally on the site where Castro defined the Cuban
> revolution
> as socialist almost four decades ago.
> 
> Elian was found clinging to inner tube off the coat of Florida on Nov. 25
> after his mother, stepfather and others died in a failed attempt to reach
> U.S. shores. Since then he has been the subject of a fierce international
> custody battle between his father, who is in Cuba, and his paternal
> great-uncle, who has temporary custody of the boy in Miami.
> 
> The U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service ruled that the child
> should
> be reunited with his father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez. But Elian's Miami
> relatives and others who oppose Elian's return to Cuba have launched a
> series of legal moves aimed at delaying or stopping his repatriation, and
> Cuba has become increasingly fed up with delays in the boy's return.
> 
> Both President Clinton and Attorney General Janet Reno supported the INS
> decision, but Cuban officials complain that American officials have done
> nothing to enforce the ruling.
> 
> The Miami relatives are expected to take their case to federal court in
> Miami this week.
> 
> 
> ********
> ********
> 
> Black Activists Protest Immigration
> By Mildrade Cherfils 
> January 15, 2000
> 
> MIAMI (AP) -- Black activists at a rally honoring Dr. Martin Luther King
> Jr. on Saturday called for an end to what they see as a double standard in
> U.S. immigration policy that favors Cubans over Haitians.
> 
> The group of about 150 people denounced Miami officials for going to
> Washington on behalf of 6-year-old Cuban Elian Gonzalez while "not saying
> a
> word" about more than 400 would-be immigrants shipped back to Haiti after
> their boat ran aground New Year's Day.
> 
> "It's a simple cry that we're calling: Be fair," said Rev. Willie Simms, a
> member of the Miami-Dade County Community Relations Board.
> 
> Under the 1966 Cuban Readjustment Act, Cubans who reach U.S. soil can
> stay.
> But there is no such law for Haitians and others who arrive here
> illegally.
> They are sent back unless they can prove a "credible fear" of persecution
> in their homeland.
> 
> While politicians were fighting to keep Elian in the country, Haitians
> Marc
> Dieubon, 9, and his sister Germanie, 8, among the 411 whose boat ran
> aground, were sent back to Haiti even though their pregnant mother had
> been
> taken ashore for medical treatment.
> 
> U.S. officials said they weren't told Yvena Rhinvil's children were with
> her, and the government last week said the children would be allowed to
> reunite with her in Florida while her political asylum claim is processed.
> 
> Ms. Rhinvil attended Saturday's rally and thanked the Haitian community.
> 
> "They're standing with me and fighting for me," she said. "I thank them
> very much."
> 
> Ramon Saul Sanchez, head of Democracy Movement, said the children probably
> wouldn't have the opportunity to be reunited with their mother in Florida
> had it not been for Elian.
> 
> The Cuban boy has been living with relatives in Miami since he was found
> Thanksgiving Day clinging to an inner tube after the boat he was on sank
> and his mother drowned. The Immigration and Naturalization Service
> determined the boy should be returned to his father in Cuba, but his Miami
> relatives are fighting for custody. The controversy has sparked weeks of
> protests in both countries.
> 
>