Cuban-American Rep. Díaz-Balart fought for refugees in the U.S. Who champions them now?
Former Miami Republican U.S. Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, who died Monday at 70 after a battle with cancer, was a political towering figure in Miami's Cuban exile community — a fierce opponent of Fidel Castro and a devoted advocate for a free Cuba.
Sadly, Díaz-Balart is yet another Cuban exile outlived by the communist Castro regime, which today remains in power after 66 years.
His life was emblematic of the Cuban exile experience — a narrative of loss, resilience and an unbreakable will to fight against oppressive governments. His fight extended beyond Cuba to Nicaragua and El Salvador, always championing the right of immigrants fleeing tyranny to find refuge in the United States.
Unfortunately, no one in Congress today plays that role quite like he did.
An unwavering dedication to human rights and immigrant advocacy defined his legislative career. Among his most historic achievements in Congress was codifying the U.S. embargo on Cuba through the Helms-Burton Act, ensuring that only an act of Congress could lift it. He also played a crucial role in passing the Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act, a 1997 law that allowed individuals from Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala who entered the U.S. during a period of political unrest in their home countries to apply for a green card and a path to citizenship.
Such a law would never get off the ground today.
Díaz-Balart was among the first to help establish Cuban Americans as a powerful and influential voting bloc within the GOP, helping shape local, state and national politics for decades, just as President Ronald Reagan, the first to seriously court the Cuban vote, was elected.
An intellectual with sharp political instincts, Díaz-Balart was fully fluent in English and became the first young Cuban exile politician to gain recognition beyond exile circles. He initially entered politics in South Florida in 1982 as a Democrat but, disenchanted by what he saw as the party's leniency toward communism, switched to the Republican Party in 1985. He was first elected to public office in the Florida House in 1986 and, then, in the Senate. He ran for Congress and won, representing Florida's 21st District from 1992 to 2011. Today, his younger brother, Mario Díaz-Balart, holds the redistricted seat.
'Lincoln's influence in framing the debate on U.S. policy toward Cuba, centered on democracy, freedom and human rights, cannot be overstated. He was the intellectual giant among our delegation,' former Republican U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who served years with Díaz-Balart, told the Editorial Board. 'He was the author of some of the most consequential pieces of legislation to punish the oppressors of the Cuban people.'
Mario Díaz-Balart described him as a 'defender of the silenced and oppressed.'
Politics ran through the Díaz-Balart family's blood, as did their fierce opposition to Castro. His father, Rafael Díaz-Balart, was a majority leader in Cuba's House of Representatives. But Diaz-Balart's opposition to Castro was more than political — it was deeply personal. His aunt, Mirta Díaz-Balart, was Fidel Castro's first wife, making Castro, briefly, his uncle by marriage.
This familial connection did nothing to soften his criticism of the Cuban regime. If anything, it fueled his resolve.
Known for his fiery rhetoric, Díaz-Balart consistently condemned the Cuban government's human rights abuses and authoritarian rule. For nearly a decade, his speeches in Congress often echoed the frustrations and hopes of countless Cuban exiles in Miami yearning for their homeland's freedom.
Even after retiring from Congress in 2011, Díaz-Balart never stopped fighting for a free Cuba. Through legal and consulting work, he remained deeply engaged in Western Hemisphere affairs, offering insights and support to initiatives promoting democracy on the island.
His passing is a profound loss to the Cuban exile community, particularly to the first wave of exiles who arrived in the U.S. in the early 1960s, and to all immigrants who came to the U.S. seeking freedom and safety.
He was a beacon of hope, a voice that never wavered from loudly demanding 'Viva Cuba Libre!' and standing up for what's right.
Click here to send the letter.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Fox News
12 minutes ago
- Fox News
Liberals, anti-Trump figures bash ABC for suspending Terry Moran over anti-Trump social media rant
Liberal pundits and anti-Trump figures slammed ABC News for suspending longtime correspondent Terry Moran after he ranted on social media about President Donald Trump and Stephen Miller. "They can clutch their pearls and act mad but this is spot on from Moran," Tommy Vietor, a co-host of "Pod Save America," wrote, reacting to Moran's deleted social media post that referred to both men as "world-class hater[s]." Moran called out Trump and Miller on social media early Sunday morning and proceeded to delete the post. An ABC News spokesperson told Fox News Digital in a statement that Moran was suspended, saying, "The post does not reflect the views of ABC News and violated our standards." "MAGA, I thought you all defended free speech and the First Amendment, right? Why are you so upset about Terry Moran's comments? Stop being such snowflakes, right? Stop looking for safe spaces. Man up," posted left-wing writer Wajahat Ali, who edits "The Left Hook" Substack. Joe Walsh, a former GOP congressman who joined the Democratic Party this year, said, "shame on you, @abcnews." "Way to NOT stand up for a free press," he added. In another post on X, Walsh called the suspension of Moran "utter b-------," and said, "You're the free press. You don't do what the authoritarian in the White House tells you to do. Thank you @TerryMoran for having the courage to speak the truth." "What Moran reported was demonstrable fact. Indisputable fact. Yet they suspend him. This is the advantage that Trump and his ilk have. They are so beyond the moral pale, so beyond normality, that it is considered impolite, impolitic, or intemperate to describe them as they are," Lincoln Project co-founder George Conway wrote. Medhi Hasan, a former MSNBC host who started his own publication, Zeteo, directed his criticism at the Trump officials who defended the president and Miller. "Snowflakes. Pretend free speech warriors. Getting journalists suspended and calling for their firing. Hypocrites," Hasan wrote. Hasan also posted on Bluesky that Moran's suspension was "'ironic given Moran went out of his way to not embarrass Trump over the president's delusion about the doctored MS13 photo, repeatedly saying 'let's agree to disagree' and 'let's move on' but they still got him suspended. You can't appease these people ever." Moran interviewed Trump about his first 100 days in office, during which Trump repeatedly called out Moran and ABC News. Trump accused Moran of "not being very nice" during an exchange about the deportation of illegal immigrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia. "They're giving you the big break of a lifetime," Trump told Moran. "You're doing the interview, I picked you because, frankly, I never heard of you, but that's OK. I picked you, Terry, but you're not being very nice." Far-left former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann re-posted Moran's attacks on Miller and Trump, and called out Bob Iger, the CEO of Disney, which owns ABC News. "Another coward named @RobertIger responded by letting ABC News suspend Terry indefinitely for telling the truth," Olbermann wrote. "I have copied Terry's words here and I encourage everybody, journalists especially, to do the same, or cut and paste what I've written, and put it out under your name." Others also called on their followers to share Moran's deleted post. Ron Filipkowski, editor-in-chief of MeidasTouch, a liberal website, said Moran's suspension was a product of corporate journalism. "Independent journalism is when you can write what Terry Moran wrote without getting in trouble. Corporate journalism is when you can't," he wrote. ABC News did not immediately return a request for comment. Moran's suspension for airing his thoughts comes as public trust in the media continues to steadily erode. A Gallup survey last year showed a record-low 31 percent of Americans expressed at least a "fair amount" of trust in the media to accurately report the news. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt responded to Moran's post on X, Sunday, calling it "unhinged and unacceptable."
Yahoo
15 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Elon will lose fight with Trump, Musk's father tells Russia
Credit: Tsargrad TV Elon Musk will lose his fight with Donald Trump and made a 'mistake' by challenging him, his father has said. Speaking at a political conference in Moscow, Errol Musk claimed his billionaire son was suffering 'PTSD from the White House' and blamed his row with the US president on 'stress'. 'Trump will prevail – he's the president, he was elected as the president. So, you know, Elon made a mistake, I think. But he is tired, he is stressed,' he told Russian media. Last week, Elon Musk and Mr Trump traded insults after the Tesla chief executive denounced the president's sweeping new tax and spending Bill as 'a disgusting abomination'. He also called for the president's impeachment and claimed the Republican was 'in the Epstein files' – US government intelligence documents on Jeffrey Epstein, the late paedophile financier. In response, Mr Trump threatened to cancel US government contracts with Mr Musk's companies, which include SpaceX. Errol Musk told Izvestia, a Russian daily newspaper: 'You know they have been under a lot of stress for five months – you know – give them a break. 'They are very tired and stressed, so you can expect something like this.' Despite the pair's war of words, Mr Musk said he still believed his son's relationship with the president could be mended, describing the row as 'just a small thing' that would 'be over tomorrow'. He made the comments during an appearance at Future Forum 2050, a conference attended by Kremlin heavyweights and led by Alexander Dugin, a Russian ultra-nationalist philosopher often described as Vladimir Putin's 'brain'. Errol Musk was also pictured sitting next to Sergei Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister. At one point he praised Putin as a 'very stable and pleasant man' and blamed Western media for projecting 'nonsense' about Russia. It came as Stephen Bannon, Mr Trump's former chief strategist, claimed that in April Elon Musk had a physical altercation with Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, down the corridor from the Oval Office. Mr Bannon said: 'President Trump heard about it and said: 'This is too much,'' according to The Washington Post. A source told the newspaper that concerns were also raised over Mr Musk's alleged drug use. Mr Musk, the world's richest man, helped bankroll Mr Trump's 2024 presidential campaign. He was then hired to head the new Department of Government Efficiency, controversially tasked with downsizing the federal workforce and slashing spending. The tech entrepreneur stepped back from the role late last month, ending a turbulent 130-day stint in the administration. On Saturday, the US president said his relationship with Mr Musk was over, and warned there would be 'serious consequences' if Mr Musk switched his allegiance to the Democrats and funded rival candidates. Credit: Reuters Delighting in the row, Russian MPs have offered political asylum to the South African-born businessman. Last week, Dmitry Novikov, the deputy chairman of the state Duma committee on international affairs, said Moscow would welcome him to the country 'if he needs it'. Senior Putin allies have also mockingly offered to help mediate between the two men. 'We are ready to facilitate the conclusion of a peace deal between D and E for a reasonable fee and to accept Starlink shares as payment. Don't fight, guys!' said Dmitry Medvedev, the former Russian president, referring to Mr Musk's satellite internet network. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Yahoo
15 minutes ago
- Yahoo
White House budget request slashes funding for tribal colleges and universities
In President Donald Trump's budget request, he's proposing slashing funding for tribal colleges and universities, including eliminating support for the country's only federally funded college for contemporary Native American arts. If the budget is approved by Congress, beginning in October, the more than $13 million in annual appropriations for the Institute for American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, would be reduced to zero. It would be the first time in nearly 40 years that the congressionally chartered school would not receive federal support, said Robert Martin, the school's president. 'You can't wipe out 63 years of our history and what we've accomplished with one budget,' Martin said on Friday. 'I just can't understand or comprehend why they would do something like this.' The college, founded in 1962, has provided affordable education to thousands of Native artists and culture bearers, including U.S. poet laureate Joy Harjo, painter T.C. Cannon and bestselling novelist Tommy Orange. It's the only four-year degree fine arts institution in the world devoted to contemporary Native American and Alaskan Native arts, according to its website. Martin said he has spoken with members of Congress from both major political parties who have assured him they'll work to keep the institute's budget level for the next fiscal year, but he worries the morale of students and staff will be affected. Martin said he also spoke with staff in the office of U.S. Rep. Tom Cole, a member of the Chickasaw Nation and chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. Cole, a Republican and former member of IAIA's board of trustees and a longtime advocate in Congress for funding that supports tribal citizens, was unavailable for comment. Breana Brave Heart, a junior studying arts and business, said the proposal shocked her and made her wonder: 'Will I be able to continue my education at IAIA with these budget cuts?' Brave Heart said she started organizing with other students to contact members of Congress. 'IAIA is under attack," she said, "and I need other students to know this.' Martin said that amid the Republican Trump administration's crackdown on federal policies and funding that support diversity, equity and inclusion, trust responsibilities and treaty rights owed to tribal nations have also come under attack. 'It's a problem for us and many other organizations when you've got that DEI initiative which really is not applicable to us, because we're not a racial category, we're a political status as a result of the treaties," he said. 'We're easily identified as what this administration might refer to as a 'woke'.' Democratic Sen. Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico said the cuts are another example of the Trump administration 'turning its back on Native communities and breaking our trust responsibilities.' "As a member of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, I remain committed to keeping IAIA fully funded and will continue working with appropriators and the New Mexico Congressional Delegation to ensure its future,' Luján said in a statement to The Associated Press. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The congressional budget bill includes roughly $3.75 trillion in tax cuts, extending the expiring 2017 individual income tax breaks and temporarily adding new ones that Trump campaigned on. The revenue loss would be partially offset by nearly $1.3 trillion in reduced federal spending elsewhere, namely through Medicaid and food assistance. A Jan. 30 order from the Interior Department titled 'Ending DEI Programs and Gender Ideology Extremism' stated that any efforts to eradicate diversity, equity and inclusion in the department's policy should exclude trust obligations to tribal nations. However, earlier this year, several staff members at the other two congressionally chartered schools in the country — the Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Haskell Indian Nations University in Kansas — were laid off as part of Trump's push to downsize the federal workforce. In a lawsuit filed in March, both institutions reported that some staff and faculty were rehired, but the Bureau of Indian Education notified those people that might be temporary and they may be laid off again. 'It shows what a president's values and priorities are, and that's been hard,' said Ahniwake Rose, president of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, an organization that represents more than 30 Tribal Colleges and Universities. "That's been hard for our staff, our students, our faculty to see that the priority of the administration through the Department of Interior might not be on tribal colleges." In its budget request this year, the Interior Department is proposing reducing funding to the BIE's post secondary programs by more than 80%, and that would have a devastating affect on tribal colleges and universities, or TCUs, which rely on the federal government for most of their funding, said Rose. Most TCUs offer tribal citizens a tuition-free higher education, she said, and funding them is a moral and fiduciary responsibility the federal government owes tribal nations. In the many treaties the U.S. signed with tribal nations, it outlined several rights owed to them — like land rights, health care and education through departments established later, like the BIE. Trust responsibilities are the legal and moral obligations the U.S. has to protect and uphold those rights. The Interior Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
