By Lizette Alvarez, The New York Times. January 9, 2000
MIAMI, Jan. 8 _ The heated political battle over the custody of the 6-year-old boy Elián González showed no signs of subsiding today after a House Republican leader subpoenaed the boy to testify before Congress in an effort to keep him in the United States.
The subpoena was announced late Friday night by Representative Dan Burton of Indiana, the chairman of the House Government Reform Committee, hours after one of Elián's relatives in Miami took the first step toward becoming the boy's legal guardian. Mr. Burton's announcement said that Elián
would testify before his committee on Feb. 10 so he could remain in the country while the courts considered his case.
With his Miami family crying tears of joy behind him on Friday night, Elián waved the subpoena, a wrinkled piece of paper, back and forth in his front yard.
At least in his family's view, the subpoena was a temporary reprieve. Appeased for now, Cuban exile leaders called for a lull in the demonstrations.
"We hope this will protect him temporarily, at least until the judge issues an order" in state court, said the boy's lawyer, José García-Pedrosa.
But some Democrats called the subpoena a political ploy, saying it does not bar people from leaving the country, and they questioned whether it was even enforceable.
One Republican committee aide said it was unlikely at this point that a hearing would take place on Feb. 10.
In Cuba, Elián's father was outraged by Mr. Burton's effort to keep his son from his homeland.
"What right does that man have?" Juan Miguel González said in his hometown, Cárdenas, where many wept during a rally for Elián, according to The Associated Press. "I am the father of Elián, and immigration has said that I am the only one who can speak
for him.
"Why should it be delayed? Who is he? He is no one. I am the father."
The tug of war over the subpoena was the latest development in what has become an almost daily battle of words across the Florida Straits.
Over the last six weeks, both the Cuban exile community in this city and its nemesis 90 miles away, Fidel Castro, have followed a common path, turning Elián into a political bumper sticker.
Here, in the streets of Little Havana and beyond, where demonstrators this week have been hauled away in handcuffs trying to keep United States immigration officials from sending the boy back to his father in Cuba, Elián is a martyr in the making, a child who lost his mother at sea as
they fled Cuba.
The political firestorm here over Elián was set off on Wednesday by the Immigration and Naturalization Service when its commissioner, citing federal and international law, decided to honor the request of Elián's father that the boy be returned to his custody in Cuba. The decision
set a deadline of Jan. 14 for the boy's return. Elián's father has said he did not know his former wife had planned to take the boy from Cuba in late November. The boy's mother drowned in the crossing and the boy was found by a fisherman on Thanksgiving Day clinging to an inner tube in the
ocean.
He has been living with his paternal great-aunt and great-uncle in Little Havana.
The immigration decision sparked street protests in Miami, a visit by several mayors to Attorney General Janet Reno in Washington, a legal motion to grant the boy's great-uncle temporary custody, and, on Friday night, the subpoena.
Elián's relatives here and his lawyers have made sure the limelight stays trained on the boy. There are Elián Web sites and posters, free trips to Disney World, courtesy of the publicity-savvy Disney organization, and free school tuition. Photographers camp out at the boy's house.
In Cuba, the battle for Elián is no less fierce and political.
In the crumbling city of Cárdenas, on the northwest coast of Cuba, the boy is just as much a martyr, and Mr. Castro delights in the picture he paints of exiles brainwashing Elián with Pokémon cards and Mickey Mouse hugs.
Mr. Castro has dined with the boy's father, a doorman in the beach resort of Varadero, and his grandparents. Along a main street in the father's hometown, a banner flutters, reading, "Elián's lawyer is the Cuban people." Children sing odes to Elián in school for the
cameras. There are regular demonstrations; one on Friday, during which students told stories about Elián, brought relatives and children to tears.
For some watching the case, even those sympathetic with the exile plight, it transcends a run-of-the-mill custody case. "There is no question he has been turned into a political pawn," said Grover Joseph Rees, a former general counsel for the I.N.S. and now chief counsel on the House
Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights. "Fidel had dinner with the father and the two sets of grandparents. How often does that happen? On the other hand, yeah, our side inevitably sees it as a political struggle too."
Republicans have seized on the case as well. They have knocked on Elián's door. One of them, a Miami city commissioner, arrived dressed like Santa Claus. This week, Representative Lincoln Diaz-Balart of Florida delivered a black Labrador puppy called Dolphin.
Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi, the majority leader, said he and other Republicans wanted to make Elián a citizen so he can stay in the country. And today Senator Robert Smith of New Hampshire, who was in town for an Everglades hearing, paid his respects to the family.
From the other side of the ideological divide, Charles B.
Rangel, a New York Democrat who has for years advocated lifting the Cuban embargo, has volunteered to fly to Cuba to deliver the boy to his father.
And Vice President Al Gore, who is running for president and is facing a serious backlash among Dade County's Cuban American Democratic voters, has distanced himself from the Clinton administration's decision. On Friday, he helped pave the way for a meeting with Miami leaders and Ms. Reno.
Mr. Castro accuses Miami exiles of causing undue trauma to the boy's psyche. But in Miami, many exiles suspect the father has acquiesced to Mr. Castro's wishes under duress.
Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company |