President Obama to Ease Restrictions on US-Cuba Relations?

News has emerged lately of potential changes in US policy towards Cuba that would loosen long-standing restrictions.  According to some reports, President Obama is readying to partially undo obstacles to travel and to slightly open avenues for economic support long blocked by a decades-old embargo.

However, these proposed alterations will barely begin to approximate the real changes that have been demanded by MADRE and other social justice organizations for decades: an end to the embargo, a lifting of the travel ban and a normalization of US-Cuba relations.  Instead, the changes in the making from President Obama’s Administration would merely set back the clock to Clinton-era policies and only undo the more severe restrictions imposed by the Bush Administration.

Cuba has been the target of the longest-running embargo in US history, which has blocked access to necessities like food and medicine and undermined the well-being of Cuban women and families.  Travel restrictions hamper the ability of Cuban families to visit each other and restrict people’s freedom of movement.  Some members of the US Congress have recognized that these are failed policies and have voted HR 4645 through the House Committee on Agriculture, taking an important step towards an end to the embargo and travel ban.

President Obama is right to begin to undo these restrictions, but the job is only partially-done.  As new announcements of these incremental changes to US-Cuba policy emerge, we must continue to call for a complete end to these unpopular and harmful policies.