Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act

Mr. President, sometimes on the floor of the Senate, good friends disagree--perhaps not as often as some would think, but on occasion that is the case, and it is the case today, when I observed and listened to a presentation by my colleague from New Jersey on the subject of Cuba. I am sure we do not disagree about some parts of this subject; that is, I do not like the Cuban Government. I want freedom for the Cuban people. We, I assume, both believe that and believe the imprisonment of political prisoners in Cuba--who languish in Cuban jails for exercising their right of free speech and who are doing that in dark cells--is wholly unfair and we should as a country do everything we can to try to bring the vestige of freedom to the Cuban people. I understand all that. I support that strongly.

I have been to Cuba. I have spoken to Cuban Government leaders. I have spoken to dissidents. I have spoken to people on the streets of Cuba. And I want Cuba, an island 90 miles off the shore of our country, to be a free country.

Let me describe how long Cuba has had Communist rule and, by the way, how many Presidents we have had during that Communist rule and, therefore, the embargo that has been leveled against Cuba all these years. Let me describe how many Presidencies that embargo has existed through. The Presidencies begin with John F. Kennedy and go through this administration. That is 10 Presidencies.

We slapped an embargo on the country of Cuba and punished the American people in the process by saying: We are going to limit your right to travel to Cuba. And we were going to shut off all commerce to Cuba, including, by the way, most of these years, a restriction on sending food and medicine to Cuba.

The embargo has not seemed to work very well. It is now 50 years old, and it still exists. Well, what has happened as a result of the embargo? We have now a debate about what should happen with respect to our relationship with Cuba at this point. My colleagues say: Well, don't do anything that would reward the Cuban Government. Far from it. I have no interest in rewarding a government that I substantially disagree with, a government that I believe throws innocent people in jail. I have no interest, nor do the people who support the bill Senator Enzi and I have now offered in the Senate, with 40 Senators cosponsoring it--we have no interest in rewarding the Cuban Government. That is not the issue. But we do believe the restriction on the American people's rights--the decision by a government that says: We are going to tell the American people where they can and cannot travel--we believe that is inappropriate. We do believe that ought to change.

So what I would like to do is talk about a couple things, including, No. 1, lifting the travel ban to Cuba and making it easier to sell food to Cuba.

I was the person who changed the law 10 years ago that allowed for the first time just a crack in this embargo that allows us to sell food into Cuba if it is paid for with cash. I think it is immoral for a countty to use food as a foreign policy weapon. I do not think food ought to be part of any embargo. I think that is immoral.

By the way, using food as a part of an embargo just hurts poor, sick, and hungry people. Do you think the Castro brothers have missed breakfast or lunch or dinner because we had an embargo on food shipments to Cuba? Hardly. So 10 years ago, I got the law changed. In fact, it was the Dorgan-Ashcroft amendment. I got the law changed. That allowed us to begin selling food into the country of Cuba. That was the first opportunity to make any changes at all in this embargo.

Now the question is travel to Cuba by the American people. Should we continue to say to the American people: You have no right to travel to Cuba. We do not like the Cuban Government, so what we are going to do is restrict the rights of the American people? We have been doing that for 50 years, and it is time--long past the time--for it to change.

Let me describe a letter that came recently to the House of Representatives.

By the way, the reason this issue has now come to the forefront is the Agriculture Committee of the House of Representatives just passed a bill that lifts the travel restrictions on the American people to travel to Cuba. It also makes some changes in the conditions under which agricultural goods can be sold to Cuba, which is very important to do as well because even though 10 years ago I got the provision enacted into law that allows the sale of farm products for cash into Cuba, in 2003, as a runup to the 2004 election, President Bush tightened all of those provisions and actually changed a rule so that in order for Cuba to purchase goods from our country; that is, agricultural commodities, they had to pay in cash before the commodities were even shipped. Well, that never happens in a transaction. You pay cash when you get the goods. But President Bush was attempting to restrict the sale of agricultural products to Cuba. So we need to fix that as well.

But the House of Representatives Agriculture Committee has now passed a bill lifting the travel ban. That means this issue is going to be front and center here in the Senate. Senator Enzi and I have the bill-- it is bipartisan--that would lift the travel ban to Cuba, and we have 40 Senators who are cosponsors.

Let me read to you a letter that was sent to the U.S. House of Representatives by 74 Cuban human rights leaders, dated May 30, 2010, just a month and a half ago. They said:

The supportive presence of American citizens, their direct

help, and the many opportunities for exchange, used

effectively and in the desired direction, would not be an

abandonment of Cuban civil society but rather a force to

strengthen it. Similarly, to further facilitate the sale of

agricultural products would help alleviate the food shortages

we now suffer.

The current Cuban government has always violated this right

[to travel] and in recent years has justified its actions

with the fact that the government of the United States

also restricts its citizens' freedom to travel. The passage

of this bill would remove this spurious justification.

This is not from me or the cosponsors of my bill; this is from 74 Cuban human rights leaders.

As to the issue of lifting the travel ban--the one we have slapped on the American people in order to punish somebody else; we have punished the American citizens because we are upset with somebody else--here are people who support lifting the travel ban: a political prisoner, Marcelo Rodriquez from Cuba; Guillermo Farinas, a hunger striker in Cuba; Yoani Sanchez, one of the leading political bloggers in Cuba; Oscar Chepe, a former political prisoner; and Miriam Leiva, founder of the Ladies in White.

One of my colleagues recently had a poster I saw about the Ladies in White. The founder of the Ladies in White supports lifting this travel ban. They are not soft on Castro or soft on a Communist government. They just believe this travel ban should be lifted because it will be beneficial to their interests as leaders in human rights in the country of Cuba.

The sacrifices of those whom I have shown here in photographs, the sacrifices they have made in Cuba--sitting in dark prison cells, hunger strikes, and more--I think give them great credibility when they speak out on what is the best way to promote democracy in Cuba.

I indicated that I got a law passed that allowed us to sell some food into Cuba for cash. Since that time, U.S. farmers have sold $3.2 billion worth of food to Cuba. I mentioned that in 2003 the Bush administration decided to dramatically change that to try to restrict the sale of agricultural products to Cuba, and they succeeded in some respects. We need to change that as well. It makes no sense to do what they did in 2003.

But let me try to describe what was done in 2003 so that everybody understands what happened. The President, trying to get tough in 2003, eliminated the people-to-people visits program with Cuba; eliminated secondary school education travel with Cuba; restricted family travel to Cuba by Cuban Americans; restricted amateur athletic travel; prohibited gift parcels with clothing, personal hygiene items, soap- making equipment, and so on; restricted religious travel; and then also imposed the cash-before-shipment rule in order to restrict the sale of agricultural commodities to Cuba. So that is where we have been with respect to what happened in the previous administration.

President Obama has taken some unilateral actions since taking office. He has removed the restrictions on Cuban Americans who want to visit Cuba for family visits, and he has authorized U.S. telecommunications companies to sell their services in Cuba. I think he should go further immediately, and I think he has the capability to do that by restoring people-to-people visits to Cuba, permanently restoring the original definition of the term ``payment of cash in advance'' so that farmers can continue to sell agricultural products to Cuba. And especially, we need here in the Congress to pass S. 428, which is the Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act.

The American people have the right to travel almost anywhere they wish. They could travel to Russia in the middle of the Cold War. In fact, we sent our philharmonic orchestra, in 1959, right at the height of the Cold War, to play music in Communist Russia. They were not restricted. There is no travel restriction with respect to Russia.

The New York Philharmonic, in 2008, went to North Korea. And if you want to get a lump in your throat and feel really proud, go get the recording, the DVD, watching the New York Philharmonic play a concert in North Korea. It is extraordinary. But they were not prohibited from traveling to North Korea because you can travel to North Korea.

You can travel to the country of Iran. This picture is from the Office of Foreign Assets Control, which is the office down in the bowels of the Treasury Department that determines how they are going to enforce the travel ban to Cuba. They say:

All transactions ordinarily incident to travel to or from

Iran . . . are permitted.

So let's review. You could travel to Russia in the middle of the Cold War. You can travel to Iran right now. You can travel to North Korea right now. North Korea is a Communist country. You can travel to China right now. China is a Communist country. You can travel to Vietnam right now. Vietnam is a Communist country. By the way, with respect to China, I am cochair of the Congressional Executive Commission on China. We have the world's most complete database of political prisoners held in China. There are very serious problems in China with respect to imprisonment of innocent people who are now sitting in the dark corners of cells in the farthest reaches of China, political prisoners, and we don't decide because of that we are not going to allow travel or trade with China or Vietnam. We have decided that engagement through travel and trade is the most productive way to move those countries toward greater human rights. It is only with Cuba that our country has decided it is not a strategy that works at all. What works is punishing the American people.

So what we have done is decided we are going to punish the American people who wish to travel to Cuba by tracking them down--by diverting somewhere around 25 percent of the resources in the Office of Foreign Assets Control, which is a little office in the Treasury Department that is supposed to be working on tracking financing by terrorists. Instead, about a quarter of their time, I am told, is used to try to track American tourists who are being suspected of vacationing in Cuba. When they track them down, they get after them. They want to levy a big fine.

I have described previously, and I will again, because my colleague who presented used a lot of posters to show what the circumstances are, but here is what the Office of Foreign Assets Control says with respect to travel to Cuba by an American citizen:

Unless otherwise authorized, any person subject to U.S.

jurisdiction who engages in any travel-related transaction in

Cuba violates the regulations.

So what does that mean? What are the consequences? Well, it means we are punishing the American people saying: We restrict your right to travel. So Carlos Lazo, a man whom I have met and who went to Iraq to fight for his country and who won a Bronze Star because he was brave and was a great soldier, came back to this country after having served his country in uniform, was awarded with great fanfare a Bronze Medal for bravery, and then was told, when he was informed--he had two sons living in Cuba and his older son was sick--you have no right to travel to Cuba to see your sick child. Unbelievable. In fact, I even forced a vote in the Senate on this question.

Sergeant Lazo, back from Iraq, with a sick son in Cuba was told: You have no right to travel. Unbelievable. Yet that was the case.

I have shown this photograph many times, but it is useful to describe how unbelievably foolish these policies are. This is Joan Scott. The Presiding Officer knows Joan Scott as well. She went to Havana to distribute free Bibles on the streets of Havana. For that, her government tracked her down and tried to fine her $10,000. For going to Cuba to distribute free Bibles, this government is going to track its citizens down to try to fine them $10,000.

I have met Joan Slote as well. She was riding bicycles in Cuba. She joined a Canadian bicycle tour and took a bicycle trip to Cuba. This government of ours tracked her down and tried to fine her $10,000. By the way, this woman, I think, made $1,100 a month in Social Security, and her government decided to try to attach her Social Security payments. What was her transgression? What was her crime? She took a bicycle trip to Cuba as an American citizen.

I don't think there needs to be said very much more about this. This is the most unbelievable policy with respect to Cuba. I have been to Vietnam, I have been to China--both Communist countries. We decided engagement through trade and travel is constructive. It works. It is why I assume the legislation Senator Enzi and I have offered is cosponsored by Senator Lugar, the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; Senator Dodd, the chairman of the Banking Committee and chairman of the Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere Affairs. They are part of the 40 Senators who have cosponsored legislation saying to our government: Would you stop

punishing the American people because you are upset with somebody else, and would you stop being so unbelievably inconsistent?

Don't tell us that trade and travel is a constructive way to deal with Communist countries and then tell us that dealing with Cuba 90 miles off our shore requires us to punish the American people by restricting their right to travel.

I say again: What right does this government have to tell an American citizen where they can travel? They can go to North Korea, Iran, China, Vietnam, but not travel to Cuba. That is obscene. It makes no sense to me. Aside from we ought to stop doing stupid things, aside from just that notion, we surely ought to decide that it is not in the interests of this country to have its government telling people how, when, and where they can travel.

I wish to finish by just saying this again. I don't deny there are substantial human rights abuses in Cuba. I have been there. I have talked to the dissidents. I have talked to the Cuban people who have come to this country who know of, who have seen, who have watched the unbelievable lack of human rights that exist in that country. So that is not the point. The point isn't to deny the charts that people show on the floor of the Senate showing abuse. I could bring to the floor of the Senate, as chairman of the commission that deals with China, dozens of photographs of Chinese prisoners held in the darkest cells in the farthest reaches of China who have done nothing but are suffering. But we have not decided as a country that we will restrict the American people's right to go to China because that exists in China. We have set quite the opposite policy. We believe the best way to promote a march toward greater human rights in China and Vietnam and elsewhere is through trade and travel. That is the construction that this country has taken for a long while, except with respect to Cuba. In that circumstance, we say, no, we must, we must, we must prevent Americans from traveling to Cuba.

I say, again, 74 leading Cuban human rights leaders have signed a letter sent to us from Havana, Cuba--74 of them--and have said: Lift this travel ban. This travel ban makes no sense. You want to help Cuba? You want to help the people of Cuba? Lift this travel ban.

I also would say again, if I can find the chart that I had, the very brave citizens in Cuba who have spoken out and who are widely recognized, who have suffered: Marcelo Rodriquez, Yoani Sanchez, Guillermo Farinas, Oscar Chepe, and Miriam Leiva, all of them have suffered in Cuba. All of them believe this travel ban ought to be lifted.

I hope this Senate pays some attention to that and finally sees we can't do two things at the same time: No. 1, stop punishing the American people because we disagree with another country's government and, No. 2, do smart things that allow us to find ways to push and move that government toward greater human rights for its citizens.

Lifting the travel ban will accomplish both because there are 40 of us in the Senate who have sponsored and cosponsored legislation to lift that travel ban. When we have the opportunity for that vote in the Senate, I believe we will prevail at last--at long last--and we will prevail, and it will be constructive public policy for this country to have done so. Certainly, it will have lifted the yolk of oppression by a government that restricts the rights of its own citizens--I am talking about our government--that will lift the yolk of oppression that has existed for some 50 years by a government that tells its citizens where it can and cannot travel.

I don't want to hear any more about a government that tracks down a guy from the State of Washington whose father was a minister in a small church in Cuba, who immigrated to this country, and his father died and his father's last wish was that his ashes would be strewn on the church property in Cuba where he was a minister. So his son carried out his father's wish. He went to Cuba and took his father's ashes to the church where he once served and deposited them on the lawn by that church. For that his government tracked him down and attempted to levy a very substantial fine on that young man from the State of Washington.

I am tired of those stories. Those stories are an embarrassment about public policy gone wrong, and we need to fix it.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise as a cosponsor for S. 428, the Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act.

It is time we brought our strengths to bear--our people, our vision, our energy--to help the Cuban people shape the future direction of Cuba and to fix a policy that has manifestly failed. For America to act as the great power we are, with confidence in our values and vision, we need a Cuba policy that looks forward.

The truth is, we have reached out to countries where our wounds were far deeper, and far more recent. When John McCain and I led the efforts to unfreeze our relationship with Vietnam, we said: ``let's be honest . . . the Cold War is over. All the American trade embargo is doing is keeping Vietnam poor and thus encouraging a flood of refugees.''

For nearly 20 years after the fall of Saigon, the Vietnam war took a less bloody but equally hostile form. The U.S. and Vietnam had no diplomatic relations. Vietnamese assets were frozen. Trade was embargoed. But in 1995 the United States normalized relations with Vietnam. The Cold War had ended, and we even signed a trade deal with a country where 58,000 Americans had given their lives.

The results? A Vietnam that is less isolated, more market-oriented, and, yes, freer--though it has miles to go.

And yet, when it comes to Cuba, a small, impoverished island 90 miles off the shores of Florida, we maintain a policy of embargo--motivated by past grievance, not present realities and future dreams. Fidel Castro has stepped aside from day-to-day government, there is a new American President, and Cuban-Americans increasingly want broad, far- reaching interaction across the Florida Straits. Times are changing, and we cannot live in the past.

Forty-seven years ago, I was in my first semester of college when Soviet missiles, deployed in Cuba, threatened to set the world on fire. No one who lived through those thirteen harrowing days in October will ever forget them. Certainly, the threat from Cuba was real.

It is true that we continue to disapprove of Cuba's dismal human rights record and palpable lack of freedom. And it is also true that, over 50 years, the embargo can claim some successes. For example, it can be reasonably argued that U.S. pressure contributed to Cuba's decision to cease its military adventurism in Africa and its support for the violent insurgencies that ripped apart Central America in the 1980s.

But on the two most important questions, the verdict is decisive:

First, did this policy fulfill its often-stated purpose of overthrowing the Castro regime? Fidel Castro outlasted nine American Presidents, from Eisenhower to Clinton, and retired only for reasons of health during the tenth. When he passed on the reins to his brother, Fidel joined Omar Bongo of Gabon and Libya's Colonel Qaddafi as one of the world's longest-serving head of states.

Second, have the benefits of our policy outweighed the costs? It is hard to argue they have. The embargo has cost Cubans access to our markets, and for many years to our food and medicine--with little progress to show. But it has cost us as well. It has limited the influence of our people and our democracy. What's more, this fall's U.N. vote condemning America's embargo showed yet again: Cuba is not the only country isolated by our policy. The vote against our policy was 187 to 3. All of our major allies voted against us, and one of the two voting with us itself routinely trades with Cuba.

Is it morally satisfying to sanction a government whose human rights practices we abhor and whose political system rejects many of our values? Sure. And helping Cubans to live in democracy and liberty absolutely remains a goal of American policy. But for 47 years now, we have endorsed an embargo in the name of democracy that produced no democracy!

In fact, our rhetoric and policies have actually helped to consolidate the Cuban government. We have provided the Castro regime with an all-purpose--if exaggerated--excuse to draw attention away from its many shortcomings, including its shamelessly flawed economic model. For too many Cubans, our threats have legitimized Castro's outsized nationalism and repression of opponents. Our posture has played to his strengths.

At the same time, we have not brought our strengths to bear--our people, our vision, our energy, our opportunities. It is time for America to act as the great power it is--with greatness built on confidence in our values and vision.

Of course, the greatest cost of our policy has been borne by the Cuban people themselves. Jose Marti, Cuba's great ``Apostle'' and man of letters, once said: ``Everything that divides men, everything that classifies, separates or shuts off men, is a sin against humanity.'' More than 70 percent of Cuba's 11\1/2\ million people have lived their entire lives in this stalemate. A Cuban boy or girl of 10 when Fidel Castro drove victorious into Havana is 60 years old today. His whole life has been spent deprived of basic freedoms but

also deprived--in accordance with U.S. policies except during brief periods--of interaction with America's people.

We must have the courage to admit the need for a new approach. President Kennedy, who instituted sanctions against Cuba, had by mid- 1963 set in motion secret contacts aimed at normalizing relations. Ford and Carter, too, looked for ways out of the box. George H.W. Bush cooperated with Cuba on the Angola peace accord, and his administration even dangled a promise of improved ties with America. Each initiative failed for a different reason, but all were grounded in the same recognition: there must be a better way forward.

Fortunately, we know there is a different strategy that can succeed. The Clinton administration worked to refocus our policy around what matters: on the Cuban people, not the Castro brothers; on the future, not the past; and on America's long-term national interests, not the political expediencies of a given moment.

The Clinton administration promoted people-to-people relations ``unilaterally''--without conditions on Havana. We worked to improve bilateral cooperation on issues like migration and combating drug trafficking, which were clearly in our national interest. Family travel in both directions quickly skyrocketed. And tens of thousands of Americans from across society--church members, academics and students, medical professionals, athletes, journalists, and more--were permitted to interact with their Cuban counterparts.

Those policies sent a clear and effective message to the Cuban people: the United States is not who your leaders say we are. Our problem is not now, nor has it ever been, with the Cuban people. We completely changed the dynamic: A synagogue with holes in its roof so big that birds flew around the sanctuary has been repaired with funds and materials from American supporters. Environmentalists worked together to save species and protect our shared environment. The children who received bats and balls--and moral support--from Baltimore Orioles players visiting Cuba for an exhibition game will never forget the gesture of American generosity.

And guess what. Across the board, Cubans seeking a better future for their country have said that nothing energized civil society in Cuba more than contact with U.S. civil society. Even Cuba's human rights and democracy activists benefitted immeasurably from the contact.

Unfortunately, the Bush administration shut down most forms of contact and dramatically reduced our interactions to a tightly regulated, government controlled trickle. They tightened licensing procedures, reduced transparency, and put government in the people's way in what amounted to a unilateral suspension of Americans' ability to help Cubans shape their future. People-to-people relations were made secretive, filtered, and for narrow objectives. That is the opposite of pro-democracy.

Regrettably, that was the record of the Bush administration: an enormous step backwards. Now it's up to the Obama administration to craft a Cuba policy that moves us forward.

In May 2008, Barack Obama said on the Presidential campaign trail that it was ``time for a new strategy.'' While he wasn't ready to give up the embargo as a source of leverage, he did declare at the Summit of the Americas: ``The United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba,'' and announced that he was ``prepared to have [the] Administration engage with the Cuban government on a wide range of issues.''

As promised, the Obama administration has expanded licenses for Cuban-Americans--albeit only Cuban-Americans--to travel to Cuba. Controls on family remittances, gift parcels, and certain transactions with telecommunications companies were loosened as well. Mid-level talks about immigration matters and postal relations have resumed. And we've turned off an Orwellian electronic billboard flashing political messages from our Interests Section in Havana.

These are positive steps, but they are only a start. So what comes next?

At a minimum, the administration should use the authorities that it has to reinvigorate people-to-people relations--to unleash the energy of the American people who want to help Cubans build their future. The policy worked in the past and enjoyed wide support in both countries.

When announcing expanded family travel, the President said, ``There are no better ambassadors for freedom than Cuban-Americans.'' But I think it's also fair to say that there are excellent ambassadors for freedom among the 299 million other Americans--religious faithful, teachers and students, environmentalists, scholars, doctors and nurses, political scientists, and artists--whose challenging minds, economic success, love for democracy, and advocacy of solid American values make them proud ambassadors as well.

The New York Philharmonic and its board of directors have been brilliant representatives of America on trips to North Korea, Vietnam and around the world. I don't understand why the administration recently blocked their proposed trip to Cuba. What are we afraid of?

Second, as we reinvigorate people-to-people diplomacy, the administration should review the programs that the Bush administration funded generously to substitute for it.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is already undertaking an investigation into the need to reform Radio and TV Marti--programming beamed into Cuba at a cost of $35 million a year. Many Cubans call TV Marti ``La TV que no se ve'' because it has never, in 18 years of broadcast, had a significant audience in Cuba. Report after report has documented that the Marti services are hindered by bad management, weak professional tradecraft, and serious politicization. We are looking at whether its business model--as a ``surrogate service'' exempt from many Voice of America standards and regulations--has failed, and whether the TV service should be closed entirely and radio should be integrated into the high-quality VOA services. We ought to be especially concerned that human rights activists in Cuba a key bellwether audience are unanimous in their view that the Marti brand must be repaired.

Meanwhile, USAID's civil-society programs, totaling $45 million in 2008, have noble objectives, but we need to examine whether we're achieving any of them. The Bush administration changed the program's focus from supporting the Cuban people to accelerating regime change, and the fact that some of our grantees have extravagantly high overheads has raised concerns about where all the money is going. It is also fair to ask whether these programs even work.

Bush's refocus on regime change made it difficult for Cubans outside declared antiregime groups to accept the informational materials or assistance offered--even if they had a burning desire for it. Our interests section used to distribute tens of thousands of books a year to Cubans across the political spectrum and the books could be seen, well-worn, in government and Communist party think tanks. Today, politicization has reduced the flow of information to many of the very same people eager to steer Cuba toward a better future.

The Foreign Relations Committee has begun a review of these programs. It is in the administration's interest to take the lead in overhauling them.

Finally, as I mentioned at the outset, I want to address legislation that will go even farther toward fixing our Cuba policy. S. 428, the Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act, does not lift the embargo or normalize relations. It merely stops our government from regulating or prohibiting travel to or from Cuba by U.S. citizens or legal residents, except in certain obviously inappropriate circumstances.

The Freedom to Travel to Cuba Act has strong support in Congress--33 sponsors in the Senate and 180 cosponsors for similar legislation in the House. I cosponsored similar legislation in the past, and I am proud to do so again. We are talking about restoring a fundamental American right--the right to travel--that is denied to Americans nowhere else in the world. Americans who can get a visa are free to travel to Iran, Iraq, Sudan, and even North Korea, and it makes no sense to deny them the right to travel to a poor island near Florida. There is a certain irony in the fact that Americans have to apply for licenses and wait, with little or no feedback, to travel to a country that we criticize for denying its

citizens the right to travel. The current ban on travel contravenes the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights' statement that ``everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.''

Free travel also makes for good policy inside Cuba. Visits from Americans would have the same positive effects as people-to-people exchanges, but on a larger scale. Visiting Europeans and Canadians have already increased the flow of information and hard currency to ordinary Cubans, with a significant impact on the country. Cuba's economic model, for sure, remains profoundly flawed, and human rights conditions remain dismal. But the hard-currency sectors of the Cuban economy have significantly altered workers' dependence on the regime, introduced material incentives that are changing economic culture, and raised expectations, if not demands, for greater improvements in the future. After years of Cuban government propaganda, Americans are even better positioned than Europeans and Canadians to be catalysts of change. We can do more if we let them.

That is one reason why all of Cuba's major pro-democracy groups support free travel. Freedom House, Human Rights Watch, and other groups critical of Cuba's government agree. Studies of change in Eastern and Central Europe show a direct correlation between contact with the outside world and the peacefulness and durability of democratic transitions.

This is a policy whose time has come. Numerous polls of Americans--of Cuban origin and otherwise--show strong support. Non-Cuban-Americans have long supported easing restrictions. But here is what is surprising: one recent poll found that 59 percent of Cuban-Americans-- the group most widely thought to oppose a change in policy--actually support allowing all American citizens to travel to Cuba. As the proportion of Cuban Americans who arrived after 1980 increases, support for free travel is only growing. In fact, even many Cuban emigres 65 years and older, once passionately opposed to it, now favor free travel. This is a sea change in the attitudes of Cuban-Americans, and we should not ignore it.

Change is in the air--in Havana, in Washington, and in major Cuban- American communities. I don't personally hold high hopes that the transfer of power from Fidel to Raul Castro and to the next generation of hand-picked loyalists portends rapid change, but it is obvious that the Cuba of today is not the Cuba of the 60s or even the 90s, and that our policy should not be stuck in time either. Cubans are searching for models for the future, and our economic system and democratic ideals appeal to them.

In September, when the Colombian rock star Juanes came to Havana, by some estimates as many as a million people came to hear the concert. From the stage, he looked out at the Cuban people and started a simple chant: Una Sola Familia Cubana. The crowd roared approval at the thought of ending the conflict between Cubans across the Florida Straits.

There is a hunger out there among the Cuban people. America should capitalize on it. They want contact with their own families, and they want contact with American people and American ideas.

There is no other country in the world to which we have closed our lives as long as we have to Cuba. The Berlin Wall fell 20 years ago, but the wall separating Americans and Cubans has yet to come down.

We have a choice to ignore change and resist it or to mold it and channel it into a new set of policies. After 50 years of trying to isolate and destroy, it's time to try working with the Cuban people and making a new future together.