Cuban tourists who never leave U.S. get easy immigration path

Cuban tourists who never leave U.S. get easy immigration path
Sally Kestin and Megan O'MatzContact Reporters
Sun Sentinel

Cubans assure the U.S. they are coming as tourists, then stay
permanently. Because of their unique status, the

Waves of Cuban immigrants are pouring into the United States on rickety
boats or via eight-country treks through Central America. But others are
taking a faster, safer route: Flying to Miami on visitor visas and then
staying — and the United States allows it.

Other foreigners who overstay visitor visas face deportation and can't
legally work or receive public benefits. But Cuban tourists have a quick
path to legally remain in the U.S.: They just don't leave. And some even
collect welfare.

The disparity underscores the unique treatment Cubans receive over every
other immigrant group, a special status ever-more easily exploited as
U.S.-Cuba relations thaw.

The annual number of visitor visas the U.S. awarded to Cubans more than
doubled from 2011 to 2014, from about 14,000 to 35,000. U.S. officials
declined repeated requests to identify how many of those visitors
overstay, but one Cuban affairs expert estimated as many as 40 percent have.

Cuban immigration overall has increased dramatically since President
Obama announced renewed diplomatic relations last December. Experts
suggest the rush is driven by fear among Cubans on the island that the
U.S. may soon revoke its special immigration rules for Cubans.

Even before Obama's historic announcement, changing rules in both
countries were already easing travel restrictions for Cubans. In 2013,
Cuba stopped requiring exit visas, allowing its citizens to more freely
leave and stay abroad for up to two years while still keeping their
homes and benefits on the island. That same year, the U.S. broadened its
rules for visitor visas for Cubans, making them good for five years and
for multiple trips instead of just one, six-month visit.

The United States issues visitor or B-2 visas for family visits,
tourism, medical treatment or personal travel. To obtain one, Cubans
must demonstrate to a U.S. Foreign Service officer that they do not
intend to stay for good in the U.S.

Most are denied. Two-thirds of the applications from Cubans for visitor
or business visas were rejected in 2014, according to the U.S. State
Department.

Interviewers look for ties to Cuba, such as family or assets on the
island, that make the applicants more likely to return. Older people
with deeper roots in Cuba may have a better chance making their case.
For those who are approved, if they stay and apply for residency later,
the U.S. does not penalize them.

One elderly Cuban couple who used the visitor route, Pura Espinosa and
Pablo Marichal of Hialeah, came to see their daughter five years ago.
Marichal suffered two heart attacks, and the couple stayed, said
daughter Maria.

After a year, they became legal residents and qualified for Supplemental
Security Income (SSI), welfare for poor seniors and the disabled. Now in
their 80s, they receive $510 a month from the federal government, food
stamps and free health care through Medicaid.

"They're in a much better situation here,'' Maria Marichal said. "We're
very grateful to God and the U.S. government for the help they've given
us.''

Most Cubans streaming into the United States now are arriving without
visas at all. More than 46,000 arrived in Florida in the fiscal year
ending in September, up from 29,758 the year before, according to the
Florida Department of Children and Families. Most are traveling overland
through Central America to Mexico and entering Texas, arriving in the
United States illegally, without visas.

Cubans who use tourist visas as an immigration path are not considered
refugees, yet they get many of the advantages America extends to most
Cuban immigrants under policies dating back to the Cold War.

Cubans who make it to U.S. land — including visitors who overstay their
visas — are eligible after just a year to become legal residents under
the Cuban Adjustment Act, a 1966 law meant to provide refuge to Cubans
escaping the communist government. With residency, these new immigrants
can work legally, obtain a driver's license, and — thanks to Miami's
Congressional representatives — collect Supplemental Security Income, or
SSI.

The most generous of government welfare programs, SSI is not available
to most immigrants until they become U.S. citizens. Congress carved out
Cubans as an exception in the 1990s welfare reform.

But the Social Security Administration in about 2000 began denying SSI
claims for Cubans who came as visitors. That prompted court challenges
and intervention by two influential Cuban-American lawmakers, U.S. Rep.
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and her colleague at the time, Lincoln Diaz-Balart.

The decision "has caused confusion and concern in our community,''
Diaz-Balart wrote to the Social Security commissioner in April 2005. The
next month, the agency reversed the policy.

Since then, Cuban visitors who remain and become legal residents have
been eligible for SSI, which in turn entitles them to Medicaid.

Diaz-Balart and Ros-Lehtinin did not respond to requests by the Sun
Sentinel for comment.

Jorge Duany, director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida
International University, estimates as many as 40 percent of Cubans who
come on visitor visas have stayed in the U.S.

"If you do get this type of visa, you know you're only allowed to come
for a period of time,'' he said. "It's not supposed to be used to get a
benefit.''

Most Cuban-Americans think Cubans who overstay tourist visas should not
then be eligible for public benefits, according to a December poll of
423 Miami-Dade County residents by the Sun Sentinel / Florida Atlantic
University.

Sixty-nine percent said Cubans who overstay should not be allowed to
apply for public assistance. Only 16 percent said they thought Cubans
who immigrated as visitors should be eligible for benefits; the rest
were not sure. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.8 percent.

Mireya Agnoli of Naples, Florida, is one Cuban-American who thinks its
wrong for Cubans to assure the United States they are coming only to
visit, but then stay. She came to the U.S. from Cuba as a youth and
right away began working to help her father, a house painter. She now
owns a cleaning company.

"I have been working … paying into Social Security. I am 59 years old
and I am still working," she said.

"Our immigration policy is not right because once they get here, then
those of us that have worked our whole entire lives now have to maintain
them. Because they come and get all kinds of assistance and they never
contributed anything."

momatz@tribpub.com or 954-356-4518

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