Representative Maria Elvira Salazar (R-FL) has written to State Secretary Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, demanding an investigation into South Florida companies that are potentially evading sanctions placed on Cuba.
For instance, many of these companies offer "tourism packages," "logistics," car sales, and door-to-door shipping, despite the United States prohibiting tourism to Cuba.
Moreover, these businesses are owned and operated by associates of the communist regime in Cuba, such as the recently-detained Jorge Javier Rodríguez Cabrera, a friend of one of the late Raúl Castro's grandchildren.
"It is not unthinkable that many of these companies have been created with the knowledge and consent of the communist regime," Rep. Salazar suggested.
As a result, she continued, "My constituents want their government to look into this flaunting of the law. They feel it is an insult to all of their hardships in building new lives as Americans that some people would seek to undercut the fight for freedom in Cuba. Every dollar that slips through sanctions undermines U.S. policy and strengthens the hand of oppressors in Havana."
Rep. Salazar, the daughter of Cuban exiles, has been one of the foremost critics of the regime in the United States, most recently denouncing Cuba's exportation of medical workers as a form of modern-day slavery.
"I've been calling this out for a long time, and the Trump Administration gets it: Cuban doctors in the so-called 'medical missions' are modern-day slaves of the regime," the Florida Congresswoman said, adding, "We must keep strangling the regime, because we know exactly who profits from the money each country pays for these doctors: the Castro elite and their repressors."
In June, Salazar condemned the European Union (EU) resuming dialogue with the Cuban regime, declaring, "This week, the EU resumed its dialogue with the Cuban regime—while students protest across the island, blackouts worsen, and hunger deepens. The Cuban people can't endure another day of dictatorship."
