Cuban-born pop star Gloria Estefan is calling on President Joe Biden to do more to signal U.S. support for Cuban citizens as they protest their communist government.
In a lengthy Instagram post published Friday, the “Rhythm Is Gonna Get You” singer pleaded with the White House — and other world allies — to assist the Cuban people in their fight for freedom.
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“FREEDOM FOR CUBA!” Estefan wrote. “My heart hurts for the Cuban people on the island & what they’ve already gone through for over 62 years…But now they are saying ENOUGH despite the beatings, the murders [and] incarcerations, the abuses of power, the starvation [and] the attempted destruction of their spirits!”
“They need our support [and] that of the democratic [and] free countries of the world,” she continued. “The United Nations [and], very especially, the United States, must strongly condemn the repressive [and] violent measures being taken by the Cuban government against their own people! Spread the images, spread the word!”
Other Cuban-American celebrities have also raised their voices.
Last week, UFC fighter Jorge Masvidal condemned Cuba’s communist regime as a “killing machine” and said he will use his platform “to do what I feel is correct — what I feel like everybody should be doing — [which] is fighting against oppression, dictatorships, communism, and anything of that nature.”
“I want to shed some light on Cuba,” Masvidal said in the minute-long video, peppering his comments with explicit language. “[T]his oppression has been going on for 61 years. It’s not just because of the pandemic or it’s not just because they just ran out of medicine, because they’ve been out of medicine; they’ve been out of resources and food, because of the corrupt government, the extreme corruption over there where only a few at the top eat and everybody else just has to suffer.”
Rapper Pitbull, whose real name is Armando Christian Pérez, said in an explicit video of his own, “We need to stand up, step up, and if you don’t understand what’s going on, then you need to wake the [expletive] up. Not only is this a Cuban event, Cuban thing — this is a world event. This isn’t about politics, this is about saving lives. This is about unity, not division, and the bottom line this is about taking action.”
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Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, which boasts a sizable Cuban population, is urging Biden to step in by “providing internet access to the people of Cuba standing up against communist oppression and demanding a voice after decades of suffering under a cruel dictatorship.”
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) has sent a similar message, calling on Biden “to facilitate open and free internet for the people of Cuba” because, without it, the Cuban people “can more easily be monitoried, suppressed, detained, and brutalized by the regime without accountability.”
Brendan Carr, the head of the Federal Communications Commission, signaled last week it is possible for the U.S. government to provide basic internet access to Cubans in the wake of the corrupt government’s decision to restrict citizens’ access to social platforms and throttle mobile web services in Havana.
He said there is “an urgent need right now” for internet amid the ongoing freedom protests in Havana and other cities across the country.
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