Photo by Michele Eve Sandberg
Audio By Carbonatix
Even though she isn’t Cuban, Maribel Gonzalez sympathizes with Miami’s exile community. So on Wednesday afternoon, decked out in a red Make America Great Again hat and a Cuban flag scarf, Gonzalez joined a throng of Cubans on the sidewalk in front of downtown Miami’s Freedom Tower.
Ten years after the death of Cuban strongman Fidel Castro, Miami’s Cuban exile community is celebrating what could be the downfall of his brother, Raúl Castro.
For Gonzalez, a Dominican woman who’s lived in Miami for 35 years, the latest development is part of a divine predestination being carried out by the Trump administration. “Donald Trump and [Secretary of State] Marco Rubio are being guided by God to liberate Cuba the same way they did with Venezuela,” Gonzalez said. “We know Trump is going to free Cuba. The hour has come.”
Meanwhile, Miami-Dade County’s political creme de la creme trickled into the Freedom Tower to soak in the vibes of the U.S. Justice Department’s indictment of Raúl Castro for his alleged role in the deaths of four people aboard two Brothers to the Rescue aircraft in 1996. Castro, who was the minister of defense at the time of the incident, faces charges of murder and conspiracy to kill U.S. citizens.
Near the front steps of the historic building, which was a hub for processing Cuban migrants in the 1960s, the crowd cheered the indictment, which is part of the Trump administration’s squeezing of the faltering Cuban communist regime.
Billed as a press conference by the South Florida U.S. Attorney’s Office, access to the event was restricted to media and VIPs who got the invite. Party affiliation didn’t matter as the county’s top Republicans and Democrats showed up to mark the momentous occasion. Attendees arriving early included Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, Miami Mayor Eileen Higgins, county commissioner Danielle Cohen Higgins, Miami City Commissioner Miguel Gabela, Miami-Dade Elections Supervisor Alina Garcia, and former Miami Commissioner Joe Sanchez. Business luminaries in attendance included billionaire Inter Miami owner Jorge Mas and Maximo Alvarez, owner of Doral-based Sunshine Gasoline Distributors.
“It’s history in the making,” Sanchez, dressed in a light gray suit, told Miami New Times. “No matter how late it is, justice is always good. It’s a great day for America and a great day for the exile community.”
As Sanchez walked through the Freedom Tower’s large wood doors, 58-year-old Francisco Perez observed the scene with another Cuban compatriot wearing a red hat emblazoned with the name of Charlie Kirk, the right-wing provocateur who was assassinated last year in Utah. Like Sanchez, Perez believes the 94-year-old Castro should have been indicted in 1996 when a Cuban fighter jet shot down the unarmed Brothers to the Rescue planes for violating Cuban airspace. Armando Alejandre, Mario de la Peña, Carlos Costa, and Pablo Morales, who were searching for Cubans attempting to flee the island, were killed.
“It’s a little late,” Perez said. “But it is justice for the families of the pilots.”
After the press conference began inside, the swarm of anti-Castro protesters outside swelled from a handful of people to more than three dozen spectators. Brian Rodriguez and Carlos Villareal, two men in their twenties wearing red “Make Cuba Great” hats, started a chant: “¡Viva Cuba libre! ¡Abajo la dictadura Castrista! ¡Abajo la dictadura! ¡Libertad para los presos políticos! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!”
Rodriguez, who came to Miami from Cuba in 2002 at age 1, said he came out to show solidarity with his people. When asked if the U.S. government should go snatch Castro like it did Venezuelan dictator Nicholas Maduro, Rodriguez hedged. “I’m not too sure,” he said. “That would be up to Donald Trump.”
“I think if you ask that question to all Cubans, they would all say yes,” Villareal interjected. “At least 90 percent of them.”
Villareal, who emigrated to the U.S. three years ago under the Cuban Family Reunification Parole program instituted by Democratic President Joe Biden, which Trump terminated, said once he becomes a U.S. citizen, he will vote Republican. He then urged the crowd to shout out “Rubio,” and they all started chanting the Cuban-American cabinet member’s name.
Growing up in Cuba, he was taught to believe the Brothers to the Rescue pilots were “terrorists and bad guys,” Villareal said. “You don’t get to hear the truth,” he added. “It’s hidden, and when you get outside of that bubble in Cuba, you see that the stories you were told are not true.”
After the press conference concluded, some Miami-Dade politicos were more blunt about whether the U.S. government should extricate Castro from Cuba.
“The message [the indictment] is sending is that now we might go and get you to bring you here,” Miami-Dade property appraiser Tomas Regalado told Miami New Times. “Cuba will not be free and prosperous unless we get Castro and all his people out.”
Miami-Dade County Commissioner Juan Carlos Bermudez echoed Regalado: “From my perspective, justice would be served with him spending his final days in a jail in the U.S. That would be the proper response.”
Photo by Michele Eve Sandberg
