By Charles Forelle, Eunice Ponce and Michael Barbaro.
cforelle@herald.com. Published Monday, June 25, 2001 in the
The Miami Herald
The last time an attorney general spoke in Miami, the nation's top law
enforcement officer was greeted with jeers and pickets. But this week it will be
a different story. A different political party. A different tone altogether.
Local Cuban Americans are lining up to meet and greet John Ashcroft as he
makes his first visit to South Florida since his appointment.
On the table will be policies resisted by Janet Reno, his predecessor, but
cherished by Cuban Americans, a lynchpin Republican constituency in Florida: the
indictment of Fidel Castro for murder and tough enforcement of the Helms-Burton
Act, said U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
Ashcroft's first stop was in Fort Lauderdale, where he spoke Sunday to
members of the National Sheriffs' Association.
He urged 1,200 association members to combat gun violence, drugs and
domestic violence by stressing a grass-roots approach to fighting crime.
In his first trip to Florida since his confirmation five months ago,
America's top law enforcement official also said that justice is best
administered when "America imposes its values on Washington rather than
when Washington imposes its bureaucratic values on America.''
Ashcroft, a former senator from Missouri, is a popular figure within the
20,000-member sheriffs' association, the first law enforcement group to support
his nomination for attorney general. Its support for Ashcroft's effort to defeat
Missouri Supreme Court Justice Ronnie White's nomination to the federal bench in
1999 turned the organization into a bit player in the former senator's
contentious confirmation hearings.
Ashcroft underscored his commitment to state law enforcement Sunday by
announcing the one-year extension of a partnership with the National Training
Center on Domestic Violance to train rural police in investigating and
prosecuting domestic violence.
In Miami today and Tuesday, Ashcroft will meet with federal law enforcement
and immigration officials as well as leaders of the Cuban-American community.
At an informal luncheon Tuesday at the Calle Ocho landmark Versailles
restaurant, he will likely be received with cautious optimism and strong
entreaties from leaders of the Cuban-American community who are happy he is not
Reno but wary of his past support for relaxing the embargo on food to Cuba.
Enrique Ros will represent his daughter Ileana at the meeting. State Rep.
Mario Díaz-Balart, the younger brother of Ros-Lehtinen's House colleague
Lincoln Díaz-Balart, will also be there.
It was not clear yet which other Cuban leaders will attend.
Ashcroft received flak from Cuban exiles last summer when he sponsored a
Senate bill to permit the Agriculture Department to allow the sale of food to
some nations, including Cuba, that are under trade sanctions.
"I think there were a lot of people who were very upset with the
Ashcroft naming because he had voted for lifting the embargo,'' said Joe Garcia,
executive director of the Cuban American National Foundation.
Garcia added that there were many more reasons to like Ashcroft than to
dislike him. "This guy is not mistaken on who Fidel Castro is. There are no
surprises here for us in terms of who this guy is.''
Garcia said he is looking for Ashcroft to relax the U.S. immigration policy
that intercepts Cuban refugees arriving by sea and to strongly enforce the
Helms-Burton Act, which, in part, prevents people who do business in Cuba with
property confiscated from American citizens from getting U.S. visas.
"In previous administrations, the Cuban-American community had very
close relations with immigration,'' Garcia said. "In the Clinton
administration, that nexus was broken.''
High on the list for both Garcia and Ros-Lehtinen is the Cuban cause of the
moment, the indictment of Castro for the murder of four Brothers to the Rescue
fliers shot down in 1996.
"We're very hopeful [Ashcroft] will have ears for our community's
needs,'' said José Basulto, the president of Brothers to the Rescue.
Basulto said this weekend that he had not received an invitation to the
lunch but that he would go anyway and present a letter to Ashcroft demanding
Castro's indictment.
"Reno couldn't perform,'' he said. "We're expecting an answer from
the attorney general.''
Copyright 2001 Miami Herald | 
