The timing of the exchange is peculiar because Cuba remains on the U.S. government’s state sponsor of terrorism list.
The Biden administration has invited a Cuban delegation to visit the U.S. for meetings with the Coast Guard this week — an exchange that, while part of an existing program, is the first time that Cuban officials in that program have been invited back to the U.S. since a democratic uprising in 2021 and Washington’s designation of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism.
“During the week of February 27, a Cuban delegation consisting of officials from Cuba’s Border Guard and Ministry of Foreign Affairs is expected to visit the United States to meet with the U.S. Coast Guard and tour U.S. port facilities,” the lawmakers revealed. Representatives Mark Green, Mike McCaul, Carlos Giménez, and Maria Salazar were the signatories to the letter. Green chairs the Homeland Security Committee, and McCaul is chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
According to their letter, the State Department had notified them of the Cuban delegation’s itinerary, which includes stops at the Coast Guard’s headquarters in Washington and the Port of Wilmington in North Carolina.
The visit is taking place under the auspices of the Coast Guard’s International Port Security Program — an exchange program between the Coast Guard and foreign countries’ equivalent agencies to share best practices about port security and “to encourage bilateral or multilateral discussions between nations.” Neither the Coast Guard nor the Department of Homeland Security has responded to National Review’s questions about the program.
The timing of the exchange is peculiar because Cuba remains on the U.S. government’s state sponsor of terrorism list, and on Monday, the State Department reiterated the rationale for that designation in its annual country reports on terrorism, which covered the year 2021. Specifically, the Cuban government has harbored members of Colombia’s National Liberation Army, a terrorist group, and several U.S. fugitives.
But in a statement, a State Department spokesperson, while confirming the Cuban delegation’s visit, defended it as “not new” nor a change of policy and consistent with a long-running series of exchanges.
“The U.S. Coast Guard and Cuban Border Guard have had a collaborative relationship for decades that focuses first and foremost on maritime safety. The most recent visit of a Cuban delegation as part of the International Port Security Program took place in 2019,” the spokesperson said.
However, that visit was before the state sponsor designation and the anti-regime protests. The State Department’s 2021 human rights report details the Cuban government’s brutal squelching of demonstrations that year and abuses inflicted on political prisoners. That report describes Cuba’s interior ministry’s role in the crackdown.
“On numerous occasions the government, using undercover police and Ministry of Interior agents, organized ‘acts of repudiation’ by crowds of civilians organized to assault and disperse persons who assembled peacefully,” the State Department said in the report.
The lawmakers alluded to the human rights concerns in their letter, particularly regarding the participation of Cuba’s ministry of the interior in this week’s visit. “The Cuban Ministry of Interior is responsible for Cuba’s internal security and frequent oppressive and deadly crackdowns against Cuban citizens. The Ministry of Interior also oversees Cuba’s Directorate of Border Guard Troops,” they wrote.
The GOP lawmakers also expressed concern about the counterintelligence ramifications of the visit, describing Cuba as “a chief counterintelligence threat.”