DOS CAUDILLOS

Trump is English for Putin

You’d think that immigrants and their families would identify with Biden immigration policy. But here in Baghdad By the Sea, many Cuban immigrants and their families, including three (3) Cuban American members of Congress, oppose entry of approximately 100,000 Cuban nationals who voted with their feet to flee Communism but are unable to enter the US.

Obviously the political situation is Miami Dade County is too complicated for the rest of the country, but IMHO while they were sleeping, Cuban American influence enabled GWB and Trump to become president. Some members of GWB’s cabinet weere born in Havana.

The latest cultural dispute involves a highway sign that equates Trump to Castro. “No los a dictadores - no a Trump.” Those pictured are Fidel Castro and Donald J. Trump. Translation: “No dictator — No Trump!.”

One protestor told Telemundo 51 in Spanish that it was disrespectful to Cuba, Cubans, Trump and the U.S. Many others protested. Trump’s Hispanic Communications Director, Jaime Florez, said their camp is not surprised by the sign.

“It’s another sign of the desperation of President Biden’s campaign, and of the Democratic Party, that are realizing that they’ve flat-out failed with Hispanics. If there’s someone that’s showed us that he doesn’t have any interest in being a dictator, it’s President Trump,” See Briana Trujillo, “PAC behind 'dictator' billboard comparing Trump to Fidel Castro says more is coming: The Miami billboard was getting everything from laughs to heated responses from the area's heavily Latino residents. NBC, June 20.

For many Cuban emigres, Castro was the devil. Any acknowledgment, any attempt at negotiation with Cuba is seen as an acquiescence to godless Communism. On the other hand some want a caudillo, a strongman like Fulgencio Batista, Francisco Franco, Juan Peron, etc to lead.

In 2020 Trump was able to convince many exiles - even some Democrats — that Biden was a pinko if not a commie. In local media and on talk radio the accusation is that any Democrat is a commie.

But, in fact, Trump said he’d be a dictator on is first day — to attack his political enemies. He identifies with dictators, Chinese, North Korean and especially Putin.

Cuban emigres and the media remain obsessed with Cuba. Headline articles every day monitor the visit of the Russian fleet to Havana. For some reason Hispanic media does not cover the Trump/Putin relationship. Like Putin, Trump has a history with Cuba.

“In early January 2017, when the Cuban government was looking for insights into President-elect Donald Trump, his former campaign chief, Paul Manafort, traveled to the island to meet with “Castro’s son,” according to a U.S. Senate report. The recently released Senate Intelligence Committee report on Russia’s interference in involves a the 2016 presidential election states that Manafort claimed the meeting was arranged by Brad Zackson, the former exclusive broker for the properties of Trump’s late father, Fred Trump. Manafort left the Trump campaign in August 2016, mired in scandal over his undisclosed work as a lobbyist for a pro-Russian political party in Ukraine. As a result of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia, Manafort was sentenced to more than seven years in prison for tax and bank fraud. But in early January 2017, Manafort did not know that the FBI was investigating him. On Jan. 15, just days before Trump’s inauguration, Manafort emailed Kathleen T. McFarland, about to be confirmed as the deputy national security adviser in the new administration, the Mueller report says. “I have some important information I want to share that I picked up on my travels over the last month,” wrote Manafort, who later told the FBI that the email, never answered by McFarland, had to do with Cuba.

Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article245247980.html#storylink=cpy

To an ol’ Havana watcher like me, it was reasonably certain that although it was illegal to negotiate with Cuba, Trump had been interested in opening a Trump Habana. Just like Trump Moscow.

Trump’s major tactic is to picture himself as a strongman. To the emigres, more macho than Biden.

At the same time, Putin surely must be their enemy. If the Democrats want to neutralize or even flip them, they must communicate that a vote for Trump is a vote for Putin to Spanish media.

Besides, Trump brings temporary visa workers to his properties like the Doral and Mar a Lago to displace locals. After all Trump was the poster boy for employer sanctions for using illegal workers on his job sites.

If I were doing PR, I’d morph Trump’s face into Putin’s and back. Here’s the Lincoln Project attempt in 2020:

The alternative to reeducating them, in the mind of most local experts, is to hire thousands of babalus to hold bembes and offer sacrifices to support Biden.