F3ollowing the federal indictment of Raul Castro, leading Florida Gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds called the action a historic moment more than six decades in the making.
“This is a day of justice for the Cuban people, a day of justice for Cuban Americans in Florida, and all across the United States of America,” said Byron Donalds, crediting President Trump and Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche for what he described as a swift and decisive move.
The indictment centers on the 1996 shoot-down of the Brothers to the Rescue on mission to deliver aid to Cubans escaping the regime.
“Raul Castro gave the order to shoot them down, to shoot them out of the sky,” Donalds said. “Well, today there will be justice done here in America.”
Donalds expressed hope that any trial would be held in Florida, saying Castro should “face a jury of his peers in the nation that stands for freedom and liberty and opportunity, not dictatorship, not despotism, and not communism.”
Looking beyond the indictment, the congressman outlined a vision for a post-Castro Cuba, stressing that the regime itself must fall. “First and foremost, the regime has to end,” said Donalds. He called on Florida’s infrastructure, ports, airports, and investment channels to play a central role in stabilizing and reopening Cuba as a free society, while drawing a firm line: “Florida will fully cooperate with a free Cuba. Florida will not cooperate with a new dictatorship.”
Donalds also took aim at Democratic colleagues pushing a War Powers resolution he views as an obstacle to U.S. efforts to pressure the Cuban regime, “you have Democrat senators who want to stop the United States government and stop President Trump from doing what he can to help free Cuba from more than 60 years of totalitarianism and dictatorship, but then the same Democrats will come here and lecture everybody in America they’re the only ones that stand for freedom, that stand for democracy? Give me a break. they’re lying.”
Donalds concluded, “that war powers resolution is indicative of the fact that the Democrats will tolerate totalitarianism on their watch. They will watch people starve. They will watch people be oppressed and they won’t lift a finger, but they’ll go to their cocktail party and talk about how they stand for freedom and liberty and democracy. Give me a break”
