Top Cuban official says country open to more U.S. expulsions, blames embargo for migrant exodus

Washington — The Cuban government is prepared to accept more deportation flights from the United States of Cuban migrants, who have traveled to the southern border in record numbers over the past three years, a senior Cuban official told CBS News in an exclusive interview.

After a two-year hiatus, the United States resumed deportation flights to the island last year. Since then, the United States has sent a monthly flight carrying deported Cubans to Havana.

But in an interview with CBS News this week, Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío said Cuban officials were prepared to accommodate more than one flight per month.

“We are open to the idea of ​​having more” deportation flights, said Fernández de Cossío, who traveled to Washington this week to meet with Biden administration officials as part of the latest round of negotiations on migration between the two countries.

Since the Cuban Revolution of 1959, the United States and Cuba have had a deeply contentious relationship. The Cold War-era rivals still disagree deeply on many issues, from Cuba's human rights record and its ties to China and Russia to the U.S. embargo on Cuban imports and exports that has lasted for decades.

But Washington and Havana have worked together on immigration, including signing the 1994 U.S.-Cuba Migration Accords, which officials from both countries are discussing this week. The two countries' immigration work has intensified in recent years with the record arrival of hundreds of thousands of Cubans at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Since the start of fiscal 2021, the United States has received more than 450,000 Cuban migrants at the southern border, according to Customs and Border Protection data. The flow of Cuban migrants to the U.S. border has slowed since last year, when the Biden administration created programs that allowed some Cubans to legally enter the United States or present themselves at an official border crossing.

In this week's interview, Fernández de Cossío blamed the exodus from Cuba in recent years on the U.S. embargo and other U.S. policies, including the Cuban Adjustment Act of the 1960s, which created a path special route to permanent residence in the United States for certain Cuban migrants. Only Congress can change this law.

Fernández de Cossío said the United States “aims to destroy the Cuban economy” through its sanctions. He did not admit that Havana's economic mismanagement and repressive policies also caused Cubans to flee the island, as the U.S. government claims.

“We can talk about other factors, but if we have a coherent policy from the most powerful economy in the world that is trying to destroy the livelihoods of an entire population, 11 million Cubans, it is logical to expect people, a part of the population, to want to leave the country,” he declared.

In 2023, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security estimated that “deteriorating economic conditions and political repression in Cuba continue to increasingly drive Cubans from their country.”

Fernández de Cossio also spoke about the lack of legal avenues for Cuban citizens to come to the United States to cross the southern border illegally by Cubans.

He urged the State Department to resume processing tourist and short-term visas in Havana. The Biden administration has restarted immigrant visa processing in Cuba, but short-term visa applicants to Cuba must still travel to a third country to have their applications processed.

Fernández de Cossío said U.S. officials had informed him that they would resume full visa processing in Cuba in the future.

State Department officials did not respond to requests for comment on Fernández de Cossío's remarks.

Fernández de Cossío expressed some concerns about additional U.S. sanctions if former President Donald Trump is elected in November. During Trump's term, the United States took a more aggressive stance toward Cuba, reversing the Obama administration's attempt to normalize relations with Havana.

“Of course we are worried if there are additional economic measures [against] Cuba, whoever wins the elections. “The Biden administration has very faithfully carried out the policies put in place by the Trump administration and added some,” he said. [be] surprised they did. It would be unfair and we think it would be immoral, but we have to recognize that it would happen and [it] gives us cause for concern. »

More from Camilo Montoya-Galvez

Camilo Montoya-Galvez is the immigration reporter at CBS News. Based in Washington, he covers immigration policy and politics.

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