Obama Repeals Wet Feet Dry Feet Policy

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

President Barack Obama on Thursday ended the so-called "dry feet, wet feet" policy that allowed Cubans to enter the United States without visas and remain in the country legally until obtaining their residence.

In a statement released by the White House, the outgoing president noted that this measure adopted during the Bill Clinton administration in the mid-1990s responded to "another era" and that from now on Cubans arriving in the United States will be treated "Like any other immigrant."

"With immediate effect, Cubans who try to enter the United States illegally and do not qualify for humanitarian assistance will be subject to their return," Obama said in the statement. "The Cuban Government has agreed to allow the entry of Cuban citizens who have been ordered to return, as it has done with those intercepted at sea."

This announcement, with which the President seems to close the transformation of relations with Cuba, represents a notable change in US immigration policy towards Cubans, who since the 1960s have had a special process to receive a residence permit under the Cuban Adjustment law.

From now on, to benefit from this law, Cubans will have to enter the United States legally, either with a visa or the permission of the immigration authorities.

According to President Obama, the normalization of relations between the two countries makes the "dry feet, wet feet" policy obsolete and places Cubans in the same category as citizens of any other country who want to emigrate to the United States.

"We will continue to welcome Cubans as we welcome immigrants from other countries, according to our laws," he said.

The policy put in place by Clinton after the rafters crisis of 1994, when a wave of refugees reached the coasts of Florida, provided that every Cuban who set foot on American soil obtained automatic permission to stay in the country and received permanent residence afterwards. one year and one day.

He who was intercepted at sea had to return to the island, unless he was considered a political refugee.

According to the AP agency, a senior administration official admitted that the Cuban government has not given any guarantee about the treatment that those who are repatriated to the island will receive, but recalled that anyone who is afraid of retaliation or suffers persecution has the right to ask political asylum in the United States.

Another of the measures repealed this Thursday was a provision that favored the desertion of Cuban doctors, considering that it was damaging to the Cuban health system. "As I said in Havana, the future of Cuba is in the hands of the Cubans," Obama concluded.

The president's decision a few days before handing over power to Donald Trump, who could nullify this change because it was a presidential decree, has already generated controversy among the Cuban community in the United States, which each year brought tens of thousands of compatriots. that until now benefited from this measure.

The Miami Herald newspaper, citing statistics from the Border and Customs agency, noted that in the border sector of Laredo, Texas alone, more than 36,000 Cubans entered the United States last year.

Representative Bob Menéndez, of Cuban origin, criticized this change, which he framed in a series of "recent ill-conceived changes" that "reward the regime" chaired by Raúl Castro and that last year buried its historic leader.

"Today's announcement will only serve to tighten the knot with the Castro regime in the neck of its people," added the New Jersey Democrat.