Nikki Fried calls for Cuban ‘liberation’

As protests continue in Cuba, Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried took a position Tuesday firmly with those seeking “liberation” from “communist oppression.”

“The Cuban people are exhausted from a lack of food, medicine, and other resources that don’t allow basic needs to be met. As they ask for our solidarity in their call for liberation from Cuba’s communist regime — we must answer that call and stand with them. It’s crucial that the world is aware of their struggle, everyone who supports freedom should join in helping spread their message through our nation and across the globe. Those of us fighting for democracy share the same goal, a democratic Cuba free from 62 years of communist oppression,” Fried asserted.

Fried’s statement came via her gubernatorial campaign, not her official Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services office.

The statement puts Fried firmly on record against the communist regime.

Yet her rhetoric didn’t go as far as that of the chair of the Florida Democratic Party itself.

Florida Democratic Party Chair Manny A. Diaz, a Cuban American, condemned the Cuban government’s response as “a call for bloodshed.”

“As I write this, the Cuban government is showing the world that it is nothing more than a repressive tyranny, holding on to a failed and cruel economic and political model,” Diaz said in a written statement Sunday.

“Miguel Diaz Canel’s orders to beat and arrest peaceful protesters, and his calls for confrontation between his supporters and the protesters are basically a call for a civil war within the island. Make no mistake, this is call for bloodshed, while the country suffers one of its worst humanitarian crises in decades,” Diaz added.

Fried’s statement was much closer to that of U.S. Rep. Val Demings, the frontrunner for the Democratic Senate nomination next year.

“The voices of the Cuban people must be paramount. It is their nation’s future being decided. It is my hope that Cuba’s path will be one of democracy and unalienable human rights,” she said in a written statement. “I strongly support the peaceful protesters in Cuba as they struggle for their right to create their own future. I condemn all violent repression of the Cuban people by the current regime. Violence against protesters is unacceptable. The suppression of the free press is unacceptable. The Cuban people, like all people, deserve democracy, liberty, health, security, and prosperity. U.S. policy must support the protesters, their safety, and their right to self-determination.”