MIAMI. The state threatened the ability of the Roman Catholic Church to host immigrant children when Archbishop Thomas G. Wensky of Miami attacked South Florida’s emotional jugular: he compared unaccompanied children who cross the border today to those who fled communist Cuba six decades ago. without their parents.
Offended by the comparison, angry Cuban-Americans called Spanish-language radio. Wrote letters to the editor. A discussion at the American Museum of the Cuban Diaspora denouncing the archbishop’s comments became emotional. Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican who has ordered his administration to stop renewing licenses for shelters, called the comparison to legally arrived Cuban expats “disgusting.”
Archbishop Vensky and his supporters, including another group of Cuban Americans, continued to advance. A press conference accusing the governor of politicking when the lives of children are at stake. The arrival of an unaccompanied Honduran boy who has recently been reunited with his parents in the United States. And in the following weeks, a wave of radio advertisements hit the radio, accusing the governor of indifference.
Even in Miami’s criminal politics, the skirmish was striking, revealing a deep rift between the former children of Operation Pedro Pan, a secret program run by the Catholic Church with the help of the State Department that resettled some 14,000 young Cubans after the island’s 1959 revolution. . In the past, the beneficiaries of the program, known as Pedro Pans, have largely avoided public disclosure of internal divisions. But for some of today’s Pedro Pans, either the comparison of the Archbishop of Vienna has gone too far, or Mr. DeSantis’ policies have gone too far.
“We are brothers and sisters and we are not at war with each other,” said Carmen Valdivia, who was born at the age of 12 in 1962. But, she added, the archbishop and his allies “put us in” in the debate. “And I am outraged by it.
Immigration once seemed like an untouchable political issue in Florida when Republicans feared tough measures would alienate Hispanics, who make up more than a quarter of the state’s population. President Donald J. Trump changed that when he won Florida in 2016 with a hard line on immigration. Mr. DeSantis did the same two years later.
New state laws followed: in 2019, Mr. DeSantis and the Republican-controlled Legislature banned so-called sanctuary cities and counties, even though most analysts agreed that Florida didn’t have them to begin with. Last year, a federal judge overturned part of the law, calling it racially motivated. The state has applied.
Last week, lawmakers sent Mr. DeSantis a bill he championed that would bar state and local agencies from doing business with companies operating as federal contractors transporting illegal immigrants. The state has not identified any such company, Politico reports.
In this climate, the archbishop’s analogy comparing Cuban children 60 years ago to mostly Central American children has now become particularly controversial.
The church’s position is that all children deserve help, even if they made it to American soil undocumented or with the help of hired smugglers. But critics argue that Operation Pedro Pan was different: it was an organized operation in which the children – most of them from upper and middle class families – arrived on commercial flights with visa-free travel, passports and vaccinations.
Because they fled communism, Cuban Americans enjoyed a special immigration policy that allowed them to stay in the United States more easily. They consolidated their power by working with both Democrats and Republicans in an attempt to keep the Cuban issue above a partisan struggle. Now, like so much else, this too has become corrupted by polarization.
“Pedro Pan’s legacy is so pure – such good news – and now it’s stuck in this controversy,” complained Thomas Regalado, former mayor of Miami and Pedro Pan.
In December, the governor directed the Florida Department of Children and Families not to issue or renew licenses to shelters that house unaccompanied minors who are not refugees, saying he objects to the fact that the federal government does not inform the state of immigrant numbers. . moves to Florida or who they are.
About 11,000 unaccompanied minors were transferred to Florida sponsors – shelters, foster families and relatives – between October 2020 and September 2021, and more than 4,000 between October 2021 and January 2022, according to the federal Refugee Resettlement Administration.
The office’s lawyers have since told the shelters they don’t need a state license to continue operating. But the state’s proposed new rule requires a state-federal resettlement agreement to be entered into before shelters can accept additional children.
The governor’s directive prompted Archbishop Vienna – a straightforward man with a penchant for cigars and motorcycles and a revving engine for a mobile phone ringtone – to write an essay in January denouncing the possibility that the Cutler Bay Church Orphanage could lose its license. It now houses about 50 children under Covid-19 protocols and is one of more than a dozen such shelters in the state, albeit the only one run by the Catholic Church.
The archbishop, the son of Polish immigrants, is familiar with Miami’s ethnic and racial divisions. For 18 years he was the parish priest of predominantly Haitian churches, celebrating Mass in Creole.
“I was connected with the Haitians when they arrived on a boat at the same time as the Cubans,” he recalled in an interview.
Cubans were considered political refugees, while Haitians were considered economic refugees. “But if you interview one of them, a Cuban or a Haitian, they will say, ‘I want to work’ or ‘I have no future in my home country,'” he said.
Today’s unaccompanied minors received only a passing mention when the Archbishop of Vienna and several bishops met with Mr. DeSantis in early February, the archbishop said. The night before, Mr. DeSantis and his wife, Casey, both Catholics, attended the Archbishop’s Holy Spirit Red Mass in Tallahassee.
The Archbishop of Vienna said that at the meeting he asked the governor for a “win-win” that would allow the governor to criticize what the archbishop called “chaotic” federal immigration policies while keeping shelters open. According to the archbishop, the governor did not interfere.
Four days later, Mr. DeSantis traveled to the American Museum of the Cuban Diaspora in Miami, where Ms. Valdivia, the museum’s executive director, hosted several more Pedro Pans. They shared the Governor’s view that it was unfair to compare them to today’s unaccompanied minors.
“There are a lot of bad analogies in modern political discourse, but to equate what is happening on the southern border with mass trafficking in people, illegal entry, drugs and everything else – with Operation Pedro Pan – is frankly disgusting. ,” Mr. DeSantis said.
Three days later, the Archbishop of Vienna held his press conference with another Pedro Panza group, a Honduran family, and Mike Fernandez, a wealthy health care executive who then funded radio ads against Mr. DeSantis.
“Children are children, and no child should be considered ‘disgusting’, especially civil servants,” Archbishop Vienna said, although the governor used the word “disgusting” to compare it to Pedro Pan’s program rather than unaccompanied minors themselves. .
A spokeswoman for Mr. DeSantis tweeted that the archbishop “lied.”
The Archbishop of Vienna admitted in an interview that his wording was “inaccurate” but stated that the only difference between Pedro Pan’s children and today’s unaccompanied minors lies in their countries of origin.
A political right that loves to defend religious freedom should allow the church to fulfill its mission, he added: “Religious freedom should be the freedom to believe and the freedom to act in accordance with those beliefs.”
Ms Valdivia said she didn’t want the shelter to close. But she said she supported Mr. DeSantis’ demand for more information about migrants.
She said she was particularly concerned about child abuse by smugglers.
Two members of the board of directors of the Archdiocese of Miami, a Catholic charity that runs the orphanage, resigned after the conflict, Ms. Valdivia said. Both were at odds with the archbishop on this issue. The executive director of the organization declined to comment, calling it an internal matter.
Last year, the archdiocese raised $10,000 for a program for unaccompanied minors at a Havana Nights-themed mojito and domino gathering on the rooftop of a Cuban museum.
Ms Valdivia said that the Archbishop of Vienna could still hold the event again this year as planned. She has already booked the date.
Kirsten Noyes contributed to the study.