I strongly condemn the sentencing of Anna Bensi and her mother, Caridad Silvente, to two years of restricted liberty after they recorded and shared an encounter with a MININT officer, part of the repressive forces of Cuba’s murderous communist-socialist dictatorship.
Anna and Caridad are not criminals. They are two courageous Cuban women who refused to be intimidated into silence. Punishing them for documenting what happened and speaking publicly about it is another example of the repression, intimidation, and fear that this dictatorship has imposed on the Cuban people for decades.
No dictatorship should be allowed to persecute its people simply because they speak, record, question, or demand their fundamental freedoms. When a regime fears a young woman, her mother, a camera, and the truth, it shows the world exactly what it represents.
This is also the reality that those who knowingly finance, enable, and do business with Cuba’s murderous communist-socialist dictatorship help sustain. Those accomplices and front men who live or operate from the United States and other parts of the world while profiting from relationships with the dictatorship should be ashamed of enriching themselves while the Cuban people continue to suffer oppression, persecution, and the denial of their most basic freedoms. No amount of profit can justify helping sustain a murderous communist-socialist system that keeps an entire people living under fear and repression.
I will continue to do everything within my authority and under the law to confront this communist-socialist dictatorship and those who unlawfully help sustain it. I have been clear and will remain clear: this dictatorship and its repressive apparatus represent a threat to the national security of the United States of America and to the stability of our region. We cannot ignore those who finance, facilitate, or profit from unlawful dealings that strengthen a regime responsible for decades of repression.
Anyone who conducts illegal business dealings with the Cuban dictatorship, violates applicable laws, sanctions, licensing requirements, or required authorizations should be held accountable to the fullest extent permitted by law. No individual or business should believe that profits place them above the law while the Cuban people pay the price through repression and suffering.
I stand firmly with Anna Bensi, Caridad Silvente, their family, and every Cuban who peacefully raises their voice for freedom. The world must continue watching Cuba and denouncing the repression carried out by the dictatorship and its security forces.
The Cuban people have suffered for far too long. They deserve to live free, choose their own future, and rebuild their country without dictatorship, political persecution, or fear.
Anna and Caridad are not alone. The Cuban people are not alone. We will continue raising our voices until Cuba is free.
God bless Miami-Dade County. God bless the people of Cuba. God bless the United States of America.
Dariel Fernandez
Tax Collector
Miami-Dade County
