Cuban Americans in Florida call for Sunshine State ‘veto’ of Tom Emmer’s Speaker bid

Tom Emmer and other lawmakers on a state visit to Cuba. Photo via Cuba Minrex.

As U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer emerges as a leading prospect for House Speaker, Florida’s Cuban American community voices its increasing concern.

“He is probably one of the most sympathetic Republicans in Congress toward the regime in Cuba and for normalizing relations,” said Christian Cámara, president of Chamber Consultants.

Almost immediately after Emmer emerged as a candidate to lead the House, Florida political observers wondered if his history supporting trade with Cuba would be disqualifying for Florida representatives.

During former President Barack Obama’s administration, Emmer provided an air of bipartisanship to efforts to open diplomacy with the communist nation 90 miles off Florida’s shore. In 2015, he filed legislation, the Cuba Trade Act, which would have lifted the Cuban embargo.

But for many in South Florida’s Cuban American community, the worst sin for Emmer came when he traveled to the island nation. He posed for photographs with representatives of the communist government in the Foreign Ministry.

“All that does is legitimize an unelected regime,” Cámara said.

As recently as 2018, Emmer issued statements encouraging the opening of relations with Cuba. “While transitions take time, if Congress is serious about repairing American-Cuban ties and improving the well-being of the Cuban people, we must take action to reset relations and ensure the next 60 years are not filled with the same outdated, unproductive and shortsighted rhetoric and policies of generations past,” he said after the election of current Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel.

Within the house, there’s an opposition file being passed among members on the Majority Whip’s moderate views in the past, including his positions on Cuba, according to The Washington Post.

Florida Politics emailed Emmer’s office about whether his positions have changed in recent years. He has not responded.

It’s these stances that frustrate Miami-Dade County Commissioner Kevin Cabrera.

“He would appear to have some sort of sympathy, that he’s on the side of opening relations with Cuba,” Cabrera said, “but as we know, the only thing that does is further enrich that regime.”

Jorge Bonilla, a Florida political consultant of Puerto Rican descent working in South Florida, posted on social media that an Emmer Speakership would insult many Republican voters in Florida’s Cuban American community.

“Tom Emmer’s support for ending the Cuban Embargo should’ve disqualified him from any leadership position within the GOP conference, let alone Speaker of a GOP-led House,” Bonilla posted on X.

Cámara said in some ways, it speaks beyond the moral outrage of supporting Cuba’s communist government. Regardless of potential political differences about embargo philosophy, Cuban Americans are a famously Republican demographic.

“Cuban Americans are the most steadfast, reliable voting we have for the party,” he said. “For the national party to pick one of its leaders, the titular head of the party as we don’t have the presidency and don’t have the Senate, for it to be a guy who has been to Cuba and advocated for normalization with Cuba, that’s a slap in the face.”

Moreover, Florida’s congressional delegation has 20 Republican members. Other candidates for Speaker have seen their candidacies undone by that many members in opposition.

Notably, a bulk of Republicans in Florida have rallied around U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds, a Naples Republican running for Speaker. He holds a hard line on Cuba, like most Florida Republicans.

But Donalds and Emmer are two of nine candidates seeking the Speaker’s gavel, hoping the entire GOP conference will support them on the floor.

But if a handful of votes ousted McCarthy and undid U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan’s candidacy, Cámara suggested Florida should wield the power to veto Emmer.