Exclusive: Senator Carlos Guimenez said he is “more than ever” to return to his Cuba homeland over the weekend after 64 years and see the island free from dictatorship.
Gimenez, R-Fla, the only Cuban-born member of Congress, joined the Congressional delegation (Codel) at the US-controlled Guantanamo Bay Military Base.
The Gimenez family – Carlos Sr., Mitzi, Carlos and Mitzian – left the country when the future Miami Fire Chief, Miami-Dade County mayor and House member were only six years old.
“Now I have visited the only free part of Cuba, so I want to make sure the rest of the island is also free from this communist tyranny,” Gimenez said in an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital.
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Future Carlos A. Gimenez, his mother Mitzi and sister Mitzi Anne are seen in Cuba before the family fled to Miami in 1960 (Courtesy: Rep. Carlos Gimenez)
“I was already excited. I’m really excited now. …I’ve always wanted that (to see Cuba freed), but now I’ve made a pledge that I won’t come back until the whole island is free.”
The lawmaker said his memories of Cuba remained in a “20-second” video snippet in his memory, and his feelings for Cuba began to swell when he first took the island’s outlines to the plane’s outlines to Guantanamo Bay.
“It was the first time I’d seen it in nearly 65 years – how beautiful it is – it’s such a special place, and in reality, it’s a group of thugs, dictators and oppressors ruin it.
Guimenez said he could imagine his grandparents living in Oriente, adjacent to the province of Guantanamo.
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Future Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez can be seen in a passport photo taken a little after arriving in the US (Courtesy: Rep. Carlos Gimenez)
The lawmaker was born in Havana, but he said that half of the people lived in Manzanilo ranch in Oriente every year.
“There are certain memories that I’ve had for a long time jumping into my head, and all of them came back. I was back and thankful. It was emotional.
However, visiting his hometown remained out of the question of the Cordle. Guimenes described a potentially fatal security barrier between Guantanamo Bay and the rest of Cuba.
East Berlin has Checkpoint Charlie, with DMZ restricting travel in North Korea and South Korea, but the border between Guantanamo Bay and Cuba on the mainland has been strengthened by hundreds of thousands of landmines planted by the regime.
Representatives of the Cuban government tend to meet their US counterparts monthly in a bunker near Guantanamo Bay, but are intended for basic management purposes only, not diplomacy.
Lawmakers learned that there have been no such meetings in the past few months.
The Republican leader calls the USSS director’s “sloping roof” defenseman “Final straw”: I’m 70 years old and “can run around all day.”
Rep. Carlos Guimenez. (Rep. Gimenez)
Headed by Alabama Rep. Mike Rogers, Caudre, chair of the House Armed Services Committee, has directed illegal immigrant criminals to be detained by Gitmo under ice oversight following an executive order from President Donald Trump.
Rogers said in a statement that Cordell met with US service members assigned to the base and law enforcement officials responsible for “promoting the removal of some of the worst offenders.”
“Border security is national security and we are proud of the role the Department of Defense has played in protecting our country and ending invasions at our southern border,” Rogers said.
Since 2002, just over 780 of the 780 total immigrant detention cases remain in Gitmo.
In 1966, the Cuban workers at the base were given options, Gimenez said: either returning to the Cuban Proputer or working for a lifetime. Approximately 40 of these workers are still alive in Gitmo and will not be able to return home for the rest of Cuba. Many are in the ’80s and there are still living facilities for seniors at the base, he said.
Guimenes has long defended a peaceful yet decisive end to a seven-year dictatorship led by Miguel Diaz Canel, the hand-picked successor to the late Raul Castro, who had previously been handed over from his brother.
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Cuban dictator Miguel Diaz Canel Bermudes. (AP)
Democrat Cuba could become America’s best friend in the Caribbean region, Gimenez said. Many Florida also consider Cuba just 90 miles from Key West’s famous southernmost buoys, which is also a national security concern.
With Trump at the helm and a focus on new and improved foreign policy and national security, Gimenez said in an interview that “every work is in place.”
“It’s a matter of will. I certainly have a will – this is the time. Now is the time,” he said Monday.
“I just want to see anything I can do to make it happen.”
Charles Kraitz is a reporter for Fox News Digital.
He joined Fox News in 2013 as a writer and production assistant.
Charles covers the media, politics and culture of Fox News Digital.
Charles is a Pennsylvania native and graduated from Temple University with a Bachelor of Arts in Broadcast Journalism. Story tips can be sent to charles.creitz@fox.com.
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