Castro pitched in for lawmakers visit

Posted on Thu, Jun. 08, 2006

CUBA
Castro pitched in for lawmaker's visit
A U.S. critic of the embargo against Cuba traveled there with his wife
and son, and the island nation paid part of the bill.
BY LESLEY CLARK
lclark@MiamiHerald.com

WASHINGTON - Rep. Charles Rangel, a frequent critic of the U.S. embargo
against Cuba, met with Fidel Castro on a trip to the island in 2002, but
only acknowledged that the Cuban government picked up part of the tab
when a watchdog group began making recent inquiries.

The New York Democrat changed his travel disclosure form for the April
2002 trip and reimbursed the Cuban government and a New York grocery
store owner $1,922 for his son's expenses after the Center for Public
Integrity, a nonpartisan group that focuses on open records, raised
questions about the trip. House ethics rules permit private sponsors of
lawmakers' trips to cover the cost of the member of Congress and one
relative -- in Rangel's case, his wife Alma, who also went on the trip.

The government watchdog group, which Monday released an extensive review
of congressional travel, noted that congressional travel disclosure
forms ``are supposed to make the sponsor and purpose of privately funded
trips transparent to the public.''

But according to the group, Rangel initially listed a group that was
conducting a bird study in Cuba at the time, the Minneapolis-based Sian
Ka'an Conservation Foundation, as the sponsor of the trip. On an amended
form -- filed in April -- Rangel added the Cuban government and grocery
owner John Catsimatidis as sponsors.

Rangel's chief of staff, George Dalley, told the center that Rangel and
his staff did not know the Cuban government had paid for part of the
trip until they were contacted by the group.

MISTAKE CORRECTED

''The most important thing is that Rangel corrected the mistake he
made,'' Dalley told the group. Calls to the congressman's office were
not returned.

The report also suggests that Rangel may have violated another House
ethics rule. His office did not say whether it had filed a required
report that a foreign government paid for some of his trip.

Congressional trips to Cuba are fairly routine -- but most are paid for
by private groups looking to establish trade ties with the island. The
same report showed that another critic of the embargo, Massachusetts
Democrat Rep. William Delahunt, went to Havana twice, courtesy of the
Lexington Institute, a Washington area think tank that has organized
trips to the island in the past.

Some Cuba observers, however, said they have wondered whether the Cuban
government has paid some expenses in an effort to foster relationships
with members of Congress, which in recent years has batted down efforts
to relax the embargo that prevents most U.S. companies from doing
business with Cuba.

''I have long suspected that the Cuban regime illegally finances and
arranges travel and other activities for members of Congress,'' said
Rep. Lincoln Díaz-Balart, a Miami Republican who is a staunch defender
of keeping economic sanctions against Castro in place.

A review of about 23,000 privately paid congressional trips from Jan. 1,
2000, through June 30, 2005, found no other reference to the Cuban
government, according to the analysis of congressional travel reports
compiled by the center, Medill News Service and American Public Media.

Philip Peters, who runs the Lexington Institute's Cuba program, said he
was entirely unfamiliar with the Cuban government financing trips. He
said the institute raises its own money to travel.

`NO DISCOUNT'

''I've never heard that the Cuban government offered to pay,'' Peters
said. ``When you are there, you pay the going rate, there's no discount.''

Rangel, who met with Castro as far back as 1988 as part of a
congressional trip, reported the 2002 trip was for ``education and fact
finding.''

According to the center, the group attended talks about bird
conservation, dined at the U.S. Special Interests Section (the American
diplomatic mission in Cuba) and met with Castro. The center noted that
Catsimatidis was interested in traveling to Havana ``to familiarize
himself with preparations for the consecration of a Greek Orthodox
Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Old Havana.''

Rep. Marcy Kaptur, an Ohio Democrat who was also on the trip, said at
the time that she and Rangel met with Castro and discussed the case of
an American who fought in the Cuban Revolution but was later executed.

Kaptur said at the time that top Cuban officials assured her they would
consider returning ''Yanqui Comandante'' William Morgan's remains.

His body has not been returned.

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