Statement of Senator Patrick Leahy, Ranking Member, Senate Judiciary Committee, Hearing On "Cuba's

Oppressive Government And The Struggle For Justice" March 01, 2000

I regret that we are here today. I believe that the Elian Gonzalez issue has already been inappropriately politicized at the beginning of this Congress, and that a 6-year-old boy has been converted into a political symbol. A young boy belongs with his parent, not with distant relatives.

I recall that a Senate bill was introduced trying to keep this young boy in the country in the opening moments of this Congress and that the Republican leadership had contemplated ramming it through the Senate as our first item of business. The bill was never even referred to this Committee but held at the Senate desk for expedited action. Fortunately, the Republican leadership came to its senses.

Unfortunately, we are proceeding at this inappropriate time with this hearing in this Committee. I believe that even if we must have a hearing about this matter, the timing of this hearing is particularly ill-advised. This hearing occurs in the midst of federal legal proceedings brought by Elian Gonzalez' Miami relatives – indeed, there is a hearing scheduled on the government's motion to dismiss this case in just five days. The Judiciary Committee has a special obligation to avoid interfering in a particular case currently pending and being actively considered in federal court. We should avoid even the appearance of such interference. Indeed, our traditional practice of not interfering with ongoing cases is one of the many good reasons for our rule prohibiting the consideration of private relief bills while judicial or administrative proceedings continue. I regret that this hearing may call into question our adherence to that obligation. The Cuban-American relatives with temporary custody of Elian Gonzalez have said that they will respect the decision of the federal court in that matter, and we should respect the court's independence and ability to do its job. This abbreviated Committee hearing is no place to try to do factfinding, or worse, inflame the atmospherics surrounding that decision.

I regret that the majority rejected my request that this hearing be postponed. I had hoped that if this Committee were to have a hearing on Cuba and Elian Gonzalez, that we could hear from Rev. Bob Edgar, the general secretary of the National Council of Churches and a former member of the House of Representatives. The National Council of Churches has done important work in Cuba and on the Elian Gonzalez case, and Bob Edgar would have had a great deal to offer at this hearing. By the time we were informed that this hearing was to take place, however, Rev. Edgar already had a commitment elsewhere for today.

We will not be hearing from the United States Department of State nor will we be in a position to effectively consider the potential impact of the ongoing dispute over Elian Gonzalez on U.S. parents who are fighting to gain custody of their children in other countries. Mary Ryan, the Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs, has testified in the federal court case that a failure to enforce the INS' decision that Elian Gonzalez should be reunited with his father would "be inconsistent with the principles we advocate on behalf of the United States and could have potentially lasting negative implications for left-behind parents in the United States and for U.S. citizen children taken to foreign countries."

We will hear later from a U.S. parent who has struggled for years just for the right to see his children in Japan, and who believes, as do other American parents in similar circumstances, that to preserve American credibility we must practice what we preach and reunite Elian Gonzalez and his father. In fact, my office worked for months on such a case of an American child who was taken abroad by an estranged parent. Had it not been for the active intervention of the Government of Egypt, the child would not have been reunited with his American mother. I thank Walter Benda for being with us today to tell his story and to provide needed balance and perspective.

We will not hear from the Justice Department or the INS because they are involved in the ongoing litigation and therefore are unable to discuss it in this forum.

While it is politically expedient for some to want to relive the Cold War and to continue a decades-old opposition to the Castro regime without regard to its implications for our national interests and international position, I am troubled that this hearing and the House Committee subpoena issued for young Elian Gonzalez crosses into another dangerous arena in which we are using domestic political institutions to undermine lawful judicial authority for partisan gain. I find that most regrettable.

Let me be clear: I am a critic of the repressions of the Castro government. No one more than I wants the Cuban people to have the freedoms that we have. And I deplore the way Fidel Castro has used Elian Gonzalez to further his own feud with the United States. But as Senator Dodd has said, there are many good families living under bad governments. I strongly believe that the well-being of Elian Gonzalez will be better served by making sure that he has the support and love of his father and grandparents than in making him a symbol of the anti-Castro movement.

I also question why the principle asserted by those who want Elian Gonzalez to stay in the United States would not also apply to a small child from China or any other repressive government. Do the proponents of this citizenship bill believe that any child living in a Communist country is a victim of child abuse? If so, do they support granting citizenship to any child who arrives here from a Communist country, no matter how young, and no matter how the child's parent reacts? What about the billion children who live in countries marked by extreme poverty? Should they all be American citizens? That is what this bill implies, but I doubt that 10 percent of the American people would support that. In fact, 67 percent believe Elian should be returned to his father.

As someone who has traveled to Cuba and talked to Cubans from all walks of life, I believe that this entire controversy has served only to benefit Castro. Castro has used our refusal to return Elian Gonzalez to unite his people and once again consolidate his political position. Indeed, this set of events has further weakened our already ineffective policy toward Cuba and offered a perfect occasion for Castro to sharpen the "us against them" rhetoric that he has returned to repeatedly and successfully over his four decades of rule. In my view, the United States should be attempting to engage ordinary Cubans rather than antagonizing them by acting in such a heavy-handed way toward a 6-year-old child. This process of engagement should include both a lifting of the embargo and an increase in contact between Americans and Cubans – in other words, we should be tearing down the barriers between our countries, not building them ever higher.

Our policy toward Cuba today is misguided and counterproductive, and the tragic situation that has ensnared young Elian Gonzalez only confirms that fact. Since Elian was found clinging to an inner tube off the Florida coast, there has been a mad scramble to turn him into a "symbol" -- as one anti-Castro leader in Miami said -- of the Cuban exile community's years of frustration with Fidel Castro. Paraded in front of cameras and showered with gifts since his arrival in the United States, he has been portrayed as a destitute young victim of the Castro regime. It is true that Elian is a victim. He is the victim of a pitched battle which has been largely shaped by the political priorities of others rather than the basic but critically important needs of a small boy who has suffered the catastrophic loss of his mother.

In January I met with Elian's grandmothers. They told me that Elian and his father, Juan Gonzalez, have always had a close and loving relationship. They said that Elian regularly spent most days and nights of the week with his father, and that even though his father and mother had divorced they remained close friends. Today we will hear from Elian's uncle Manuel Gonzalez. Manuel Gonzalez lives in Miami, but he has come forward while recovering from a recent illness to tell us that Elian would be best off with his father, even if that means that he is returned to Cuba. He says that Juan Gonzalez is a good father who deserves to be with his son.

Indeed, no one has disputed that Juan Gonzalez loves his son, and no one has presented evidence that he is an unfit parent. It was entirely predictable that after a thorough investigation – in which Juan Gonzalez was twice interviewed at length – the INS concluded that his father is his lawful guardian with the sole right to make decisions about his future.

Reuniting Elian and his father is the right thing to do. As a grandparent myself, I cannot imagine anyone, especially people in a foreign country, telling me what is in the best interest of my grandchild, or, even worse, preventing me from seeing him.

Reuniting Elian and his father is the best thing to do to advance American interests – and the interests of American parents whose children have been taken abroad without their consent. Sadly, such abductions are not rare, and we should take no action that encourages them.

This boy belongs with his father, and we should rise above temptations to meddle and to prevent Elian from rejoining his father.