A bipartisan effort by U.S. Senators has introduced a Senate resolution expressing the United States’ solidarity with the San Isidro Movement in Cuba, which is comprised of independents artists and activists that have recently been targeted by the Cuban regime for protesting in support of their right to freedom of expression. New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez (D), the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Florida Senator Marco Rubio (R) led the effort.
The effort “calls for the immediate release of arbitrarily detained artists and activists from the San Isidro movement, urging governments and legislatures across Europe and Latin America to renew their support for democratic activists in Cuba.”
Speaking on the effort, Rubio expressed that “the Cuban regime continues to target artists, dissidents, activists, academics, and journalists and the members of the San Isidro Movement are not exempt from the Diaz-Canel’s and Castro’s repression.” He also stressed that the bipartisan effort condemns “the latest wave of brutality by the Cuban dictator against the Cuban people.”
Senator Menendez also commented on the resolution, affirming that the lawmakers “stand in total solidarity with the courageous artists and activists in Cuba’s San Isidro Movement and join their call for greater respect for freedom of expression and social rights in the island.”
Menendez further detailed that “footage of the regime’s own culture minister physically attacking members of the San Isidro Movement makes one thing clear to the world: the Cuban people are still violently repressed and imprisoned.”
He made the call for “Europe, Canada, and Latin America to join us in shining a light on this reprehensible situation and standing up for democratic values in Cuba.”
