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By Tyler Bridges. Tbridges@herald.com. Posted on Sat, Feb.
22, 2003 in The Miami
Herald
U.S. Rep. Jim Davis, D-Tampa, is scheduled to break new ground next week
when he becomes the first member of Florida's congressional delegation to openly
travel to Fidel Castro's Cuba.
On the five-day trip that begins Friday, Davis hopes to meet with a broad
spectrum of people, including government officials and human rights activists.
He said he does not expect to meet Castro but did not rule out the possibility.
''People feel very, very passionate'' about Cuba, Davis said Friday. "I
need to go down myself and see it firsthand.''
Davis has planned his trip with the assistance of the Cuban American
National Foundation, and he is expected to meet with one-time political
prisoners Thursday night in Miami before he leaves for Cuba the next day on a
charter company's aircraft.
''We look forward to him being responsive to the needs of the Cuban people
on the island and to considering the emotions of the Cuban-American constituency
in South Florida,'' CANF executive director Joe Garcia said.
ITINERARY UNCLEAR
Neither Davis nor the group arranging the trip, the Washington, D.C.-based
Inter-American Dialogue, wanted to specify the itinerary.
Davis has been a moderate on Cuba, disappointing liberals by voting against
lifting the trade embargo, but also angering hard-line exiles by voting to allow
the Cuban government to buy American food and medicine without public or private
financing and for supporting the Varela Project, which seeks a national
referendum on open elections, civil liberties and freedom for political
prisoners in Cuba.
Davis said he plans to see Oswaldo Payá, the prime force behind the
Varela Project, who visited Miami in January.
Since Castro took power in 1959, Florida members of Congress have viewed a
potential trip to Cuba as a political death sentence. Only one other has
visited. Rep. Peter Deutsch, D-Pembroke Pines, went three years ago, but he
posed as a tourist.
DRAWS OPPOSITION
Deutsch on Friday applauded Davis' plan, but U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart,
R-Miami, expressed opposition.
''I don't like travel to Castro's Cuba,'' Diaz-Balart said, then quoted José
Martí: "He who travels to the House of the Oppressor acquiesces in
the oppression.''
Dan Erikson, director of the nonprofit Inter-American Dialogue, said the
group does not take stands on issues but does favor "trying to get a handle
on what Cuba will look like in the future, and that means without Castro.''
Davis and Erikson noted that they have yet received visas from the Cuban
Interests Section in Washington but expect to get them.
Davis, 45, is a fourth-term Democrat with a low-key, plain-speaking style.
He has begun to lay the groundwork for a 2006 race for governor, political
insiders say.
Among those steps: hiring Karl Koch, one of the Florida Democratic Party's
top political strategists, as his chief of staff.
Davis did not want to discuss the potential political implications, saying, "Some
people wouldn't want me to go, and others want me to go in a different way. But
I'm going to do it my way.'' | 
