Chris Smith: “Mr. Chairman, in evaluating all of the proposed legislation, any kind of diplomatic or administrative initiative…”

“Mr. Chairman, in evaluating all of the proposed legislation, any kind of diplomatic or administrative initiative vis-a-vis Cuba, it is important to keep these following principles in mind: First, such actions must be calculated to emphasize the status of the Castro government as a rogue regime with whom the civilized nations of the world should have no dealings. Second, our actions must be calculated to hurt the dictatorship and not the Cuban people. Finally, we should make it clear that Cuba will receive a warm welcome back into the family of free and democratic nations. By this standard, we have made some terrible mistakes, such as the 1994 Clinton-Castro antirefugee agreement. We made this agreement just a few months after the Castro regime had brutally murdered 40 men, women, and children who were trying to escape from Cuba on the vessel the Thirteenth of March. The agreement gave the Castro government just what it wanted, an end to the longstanding United States policy of accepting people who escape from Cuba.”