Coast Guard stops 30 Cuban migrants at sea since Thursday
Since October, the U.S. Coast Guard and Customs and Border Protection have stopped more than 400 Cubans at sea who were attempting to migrate to South Florida.
If the trend continues, federal authorities are on track to be the busiest they’ve been in five years patrolling the Florida Straits.
Last Thursday alone, the Coast Guard and Customs and Border Protections Air and Marine Operations stopped a total of 30 people in three separate incidents, all between 35 and 45 miles south of Key West.
All of those people were returned to Cuba aboard the Coast Guard Cutter Raymond Evans Tuesday, the agency said.
Migrant activity continued over the weekend in the Keys when 15 people from Cuba made it to shore on Summerland Key in the Lower Keys early Saturday morning aboard a small, wooden homemade boat.
On Sunday, the Coast Guard rescued three people who the Border Patrol confirmed were Cuban migrants from a sinking boat about four miles off the coast of the Middle Keys city of Marathon.
The federal government tracks migration by the fiscal year, which begins and ends in October. Right after fiscal year 2017, when the Obama administration ended the United States’ “wet-foot, dry-foot” policy, maritime migration between Cuba and South Florida decreased precipitously — to the point where in fiscal year 2020, only 49 people were caught making the dangerous journey.
The “wet-foot, dry-foot” policy provided a legal incentive for people from Cuba to take the risk of getting in often barely-seaworthy boats and setting sail for South Florida. It allowed those who reached the shore and set foot above the high-water mark to stay in the country and apply for permanent residency after a year.
Those caught at sea were taken back to Cuba. Since it ended, so did the incentive. Now, anyone from Cuba stopped at sea or caught after they’ve arrived in the states is returned.
Due to deteriorating political and economic conditions within the island nation, however, more and more Cubans are willing to take the chance of being caught and even losing their lives at sea.
In fiscal year 2021, the Coast Guard stopped a total of 838 Cuban migrants. The agency said Tuesday that the number is already at 410 less than three months into the current fiscal year.
This story was originally published December 14, 2021 at 5:12 PM with the headline "Coast Guard stops 30 Cuban migrants at sea since Thursday."
