Suffering for Citizenship: "Wet Foot, Dry Foot" and Cuban Exile Struggles for Inclusion

In discussions of the borders set up by the nation’s contradictory immigration policy, Cubans are often not included. Cubans are viewed as exceptional because the US’ historical open-door stance towards refugees fleeing... [ view full abstract ]

In discussions of the borders set up by the nation’s contradictory immigration policy, Cubans are often not included. Cubans are viewed as exceptional because the US’ historical open-door stance towards refugees fleeing the Castro government had granted them automatic asylum. But after the 1994 Balsero Crisis, Clinton’s “Wet foot dry foot” policy signaled the closing of that door. As Cubans began to be treated more like economic immigrants, the new policy illuminated links between the Cuban case and that of other Latino immigrants, whose claims to citizenship are often more precarious. This paper examines responses by Cuban Americans in Miami to “Wet foot dry foot” through an analysis of the coverage of the Balsero crisis in El Nuevo Herald. The coverage reveals that as a strategy to contest the new policy, the Balseros were depicted as sympathetic and courageous figures through illustrations of the pain and suffering the Balseros endured as they set out on the high seas. While such a move sought to affirm Cuban American claims to US citizenship and raise questions about the nation’s failures to meet moral obligations to its citizens, the tactic of pointing out suffering also affirmed the nation’s moralistic framing of the requirements that make migrants worthy of citizenship. By focusing on the contradictions in Cuban American responses to more restrictive immigration policy, and grappling with current U.S./Cuba policy changes, this paper raises questions about current battles waged by Latinos over various forms of U.S. border policing. In regards to Cuban exiles, given the tremendous changes in U.S./Cuba relations that have come down the pike during the Obama administration, the requirements for their refugee status will all the more come into question. Drawing upon Aihwa Ong’s arguments that notions of cultural citizenship can reinscribe dominant narratives that rank individuals according to individual achievements, failures, and the extent of their suffering, the paper grapples with how not only Cubans but other Latinos can contest such narratives through tactics that redefine and rethink what being included means.