Bernie Sanders Fidel Castro Funny Pictures
Sanders's Comments on Fidel Castro Provoke Anger in Florida
Bernie Sanders told "60 Minutes" that it would be "unfair" to say "everything is bad" about Cuba's Communist revolution.
MIAMI — Comments from Senator Bernie Sanders praising aspects of the Communist Cuban revolution drew a forceful rebuke on Monday from Cuban-Americans, Florida Democrats and several of Mr. Sanders's opponents, who cast him as too extreme in his views to represent the party as its presidential nominee.
Mr. Sanders's remarks threatened to undercut his candidacy in the nation's largest presidential battleground state as he seeks to build momentum on a broader scale after a series of early primary victories. In Florida, Mr. Sanders stands to alienate not just Cubans but also a far more diverse group of Latinos, including Colombians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, than the ones he won overwhelmingly in Saturday's Nevada caucuses.
"I'm totally disgusted and insulted," said Lourdes Diaz, the president of the Democratic Hispanic Caucus in Broward County, who is Cuban-American. "Maybe this will open people's eyes to how super, super liberal and radical Bernie is. I'm not going to defend him anymore. I'm over it."
In a "60 Minutes" interview that aired Sunday night on CBS, Mr. Sanders said he opposed "the authoritarian nature" of the Cuban regime.
"But you know, it's unfair to simply say everything is bad," Mr. Sanders told the host, Anderson Cooper. "When Fidel Castro came to office, you know what he did? He had a massive literacy program. Is that a bad thing? Even though Fidel Castro did it?"
Mr. Cooper noted that many political dissidents remained imprisoned in Cuba.
"That's right," Mr. Sanders acknowledged. "And we condemn that."
"Unlike Donald Trump, let's be clear, I do not think that Kim Jong-un is a good friend," Mr. Sanders added, emphasizing a contrast with President Trump that Democrats have tried to sharpen. "I don't trade love letters with a murdering dictator. Vladimir Putin, not a great friend of mine."
The comments ricocheted across Miami, a bastion of Cuban exiles where any defense of Mr. Castro is considered a disqualification for those seeking public office. Many Cuban-Americans are Republicans, but those who are Democrats have been increasingly worried that Mr. Sanders's views on authoritarian leaders in Latin America could cost the party support among Hispanic voters — whom Republicans have been courting for the past year.
Mr. Sanders, a Vermont senator, has cast himself as a democratic socialist in the vein of social democrats in Europe. But though as a candidate he likes to compare his policies to those of Denmark, in the past he has expressed praise not only for Mr. Castro in Cuba but also support for the Sandinistas in Nicaragua — troubling stances in Florida, a magnet for Latin Americans fleeing political unrest in Managua, Havana and Caracas.
Mr. Sanders doubled down on his comments in a CNN town hall on Monday night, arguing that many people in Cuba were "illiterate" when Mr. Castro came to power.
"I think teaching people to read and write is a good thing," he said, adding that he has been "critical of all authoritarian regimes all over the world," including Cuba, Nicaragua, Saudi Arabia, China and Russia.
Sensing an opening to remind voters about Mr. Sanders's more left-wing views, three of his opponents pounced on the Castro clip from "60 Minutes."
"Fidel Castro left a dark legacy of forced labor camps, religious repression, widespread poverty, firing squads, and the murder of thousands of his own people," Michael R. Bloomberg, the former New York mayor whose campaign ads have flooded the Florida television airwaves, wrote on Twitter. "But sure, Bernie, let's talk about his literacy program."
Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., tweeted: "After four years of looking on in horror as Trump cozied up to dictators, we need a president who will be extremely clear in standing against regimes that violate human rights abroad. We can't risk nominating someone who doesn't recognize this."
Cristóbal Alex, a senior adviser to former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., called Mr. Sanders's comments "dangerous" and "deeply offensive to the many people in Florida, New Jersey and across the country that have fled political persecution and sought refuge in the United States."
Mr. Sanders might have little to worry about in the Democratic race: Florida does not hold its primary until March 17, after bigger states such as California and Texas.
But Florida Democrats fear what a Sanders nomination could mean for the general election in November. Local political operatives said they were inundated with phone calls and text messages from elected officials, candidates and activists worried that down-ballot candidates could suffer. Some wondered privately if they should disavow Mr. Sanders now.
Mr. Sanders's campaign said his views have remained the same and argued that President Barack Obama made a similar allusion to Cuba's educational gains in a 2016 speech in Havana.
"Senator Sanders has clearly and consistently criticized Fidel Castro's authoritarianism and condemned his human rights abuses, and he's simply echoing President Obama's acknowledgment that Cuba made progress, especially in education," Mike Casca, the campaign's communications director, said in a statement.
But Mr. Obama, who praised Cuba's "enormous achievements in education and in health care," had made a historic policy overture and was not in the middle of a primary campaign.
As condemnation of Mr. Sanders's remarks grew, Terrie Rizzo, the chairwoman of the Florida Democratic Party, issued a statement that did not mention him but clearly distanced the party from the presidential front-runner.
"Candidates need to understand our immigrant communities' shared stories, as well as provide solutions to issues that matter to all Floridians including access to affordable health care and rejecting a Trump economy that works only for the very rich," she said.
Representatives Debbie Mucarsel-Powell and Donna Shalala, Miami Democrats who flipped their competitive congressional districts in 2018 and face challengers this fall, quickly denounced Mr. Sanders's comments.
"He's way off," Ms. Shalala told reporters in Miami Beach. She urged Mr. Sanders to meet with her constituents and hear about their experiences firsthand.
Hector Caraballo, a former political prisoner in Cuba who founded the Miami-Dade Cuban American Democratic Club, said no one familiar with Mr. Sanders's political career could be surprised by his views.
Miami Democrats expected grainy video clips of Mr. Sanders's most objectionable commentary to resurface during the campaign. What galled Mr. Caraballo and others was that Mr. Sanders made new remarks showing no evolution on his opinions, in spite of decades of hardship in Cuba.
"This just confirmed what I think of him as a leader," Mr. Caraballo said. "We have very little time left to avoid a political disaster."
Evelyn Pérez-Verdía, a Latino issues strategist who is Colombian-American and routinely advises her clients about the nuances among Hispanic voters from different countries, said the danger of Mr. Sanders's views on Cuba was that voters who fled other regimes were also likely to feel insulted.
She said Mr. Sanders and his advisers "don't understand the tentacles of what they're doing."
"He's basically saying to Cuban-Americans, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans, 'Your pain is not a big deal,'" said Mike Hernández, a Democratic political consultant and Cuban-American. "And that's not a strategy to win the state of Florida."
Mr. Hernández said he would not vote for Mr. Sanders if he were the nominee against Mr. Trump: "I'll write someone in," he said.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/24/us/bernie-sanders-fidel-castro-florida.html
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