House Foreign Affairs Ranking Member Meeks, Kaine Lead Democrats in Letter Warning Against Trump Admin’s Failed Cuba Policy

Washington, D.C. - Representative Gregory W. Meeks, Ranking Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Senator Tim Kaine, Ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, today led 50 Representatives and Senators in sending a letter to President Trump that condemns the administration's ongoing blockade of Cuba. In their letter, the lawmakers outlined how these policies are exacerbating a humanitarian crisis and called for a new approach that reverses six decades of failed U.S. policy toward Cuba.

A PDF copy of the full letter can be found here.

"We write with great urgency to express our alarm at the dire humanitarian crisis in Cuba, a crisis your administration is actively worsening through its expansion of a policy that has failed for more than six decades. For 64 years, the United States has relied on the flawed premise that maximum pressure would yield political change on the island. It has not.

"Doubling down on failed strategies by restricting access to energy and health care is contrary to American values and is needlessly exacerbating a humanitarian crisis. By engineering an accelerated energy collapse, your administration has shifted responsibility for Cuba's suffering away from the Cuban government and squarely onto the United States.

"Conditions in Cuba are deteriorating rapidly. As widespread blackouts, shortages of basic goods, and the collapse of critical infrastructure are placing extraordinary strain on ordinary Cubans. The most vulnerable-children, the elderly, and those with chronic illnesses-are bearing the heaviest burden. With hospitals unable to stay online due to fuel shortages, patients are being turned away for treatment, and people will die if you do not reverse course immediately..."

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