The Miami Machine:
Cuban American Terrorists Triumph in Election 2000
by Felix Martinez  12/13/00

The call came over the airwaves as it had so many times before. On Wednesday, November 22, Radio Mambí (WAQI-AM 710) and La Poderosa (WWFE-AM 670) reverberated with the cries of political advocates, among them U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and state Sen. Mario Diaz-Balart, urging people to descend on the Stephen P. Clark Government Center in downtown Miami. 

Enraged Republican operatives imported from dozens of states needed help. The Republicans, mainly congressional staffers, already had filled the county-election department reception area, banging on doors and shouting in protest of a decision to count ballots away from public view. A number of them even had accosted a local Democratic Party stalwart, chasing after him in the false belief he had stolen a ballot. 

It was no secret which political party the majority of local Cuban Americans supported. Stung by Elian Gonzalez's violent removal in April, a popular slogan in Little Havana this past summer was "Mr. Clinton, we will remember in November." 

But this time few heeded the call. In fact only one anti-Castro exile organization of the scores that operate in South Florida reinforced the Republicans. Vigilia Mambisa mustered about 25 people for a demonstration outside the county hall, where they gamely shouted, "We want Bush! No more Gore!" Leading them in the chants through his bullhorn was Mambisa president Miguel Saavedra. He and some of the others, encouraged by GOP officials, would continue to follow the Republicans throughout the week as the demonstrations moved from Miami-Dade to Broward and then on to Palm Beach.

For more, see: http://www.miaminewtimes.com/issues/2000-12-07/metro.html

By Peter Dale Scott
Date: 12-07-00

Strident broadcasts from a violently anti-Castro radio station influenced the Miami-Dade Canvassing Board's decision to reverse itself and vote to stop recounting ballots. The radio station's founding was sponsored by the Reagan-Bush administration. PNS correspondent Peter Dale Scott is author of Deep Politics and the Death of JFK and co-author of Cocaine Politics. Scott's website is http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott.

If Gov. George W. Bush wins the presidency because votes in Miami-Dade County were not recounted, consider it a payback for past favors granted Cuban terrorists by George Bush Sr.

When the Miami-Dade Canvassing Board reversed itself and voted to stop recounting ballots, at least one of the three members said his decision was influenced by the vehement protests of Radio Mambi.

This stridently anti-Communist station is an arm of the violently anti-Castro Cuban American National Foundation (CANF), founded in 1981 by a former CIA terrorist, Jorge Mas Canosa, with the encouragement (some say, at the behest) of the newly elected Reagan-Bush administration.

Author Gaeton Fonzi, who has deep roots in the Miami Cuban community, has written that the CANF was "secretly seeded" by the "public diplomacy" program set up at the time by CIA Director William Casey "as cover for a covert domestic propaganda effort."

Certainly the Reagan-Bush administration showered federal funds on Radio Marti, which beams anti-Castro propaganda into Cuba. As president, Bush established TV Marti and shielded it against the criticism that no one in Cuba could see it.

Mas Canosa was chairman of the advisory board on broadcasts to Cuba, and kept tight control over the activities of the two stations.

But from the outset the CANF was involved in more than propaganda. It quickly became a haven for former CIA terrorists, many of them known to Mas Canosa from the era when he himself plotted to blow up a Cuban ship for the CIA.

For example, Mas Canosa appointed the brothers Guillermo and Ignacio Novo to the CANF's "Information Commission." The two were implicated, though ultimately not convicted, in the September, 1976 assassination of former Chilean Ambassador Orlando Letelier. At that time, George Bush was director of the CIA.

For the rest of this most important article, see
http://pacificnews.org/jinn/stories/6.24/001207-miami-dade.html

Miami's Cuban Americans May Get The Last Word
By Peter Dale Scott
Jinn Magazine, Issue No. 6.24 : 11/27/00 - 12/11/00
The Online Magazine of the Pacific News Service

Date: 12-04-00

The Clinton administration willingness to defy Miami's Cuban-American community in the case of Elian Gonzales was widely seen as a sign that the community had lost its political muscle. But the decision to stop recounting votes in Miami-Dade suggests that it's the Cuban Americans who are getting the last word. PNS correspondent Peter Dale Scott is author of Deep Politics and the Death of JFK and co-author of Cocaine Politics. Scott's website is http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott.

The Clinton administration's hard-nosed action in returning six-year-old Elian Gonzales to his family in Cuba was widely interpreted as a sign that Miami's Cuban American community was losing its political clout.

But in fact bitterness over that action may have cost Al Gore the presidency -- even though he broke with the administration over the decision to let Elian return home.

The Miami-Dade refusal to recount votes can certainly be seen as one more blow in the fight over Elian that supposedly ended last spring.

Miami Mayor Alex Penelas led the Cuban American revolt against the Justice Department last spring. Elections supervisor David Leahy of the Miami-Dade Canvassing Board, who voted to stop the recount, works for Mr. Penelas.

For the rest of this dynamite story, see http://pacificnews.org/jinn/stories/6.24/001204-miamis.html 

The irresistible ascension
of John E. Sweeney
by Toby Eglund, The Gully

DECEMBER 1. Among the legions of Republicans who will cash in their chips if George W. Bush gets to the White House is the heretofore nationally obscure U.S. Representative John E. Sweeney, an upstate New York Republican insider.

The suddenly prominent Mr. Sweeney is credited for giving the signal for last week's productive Republican fracas inside the Miami Dade county offices, after which the canvassing board abruptly canceled a hand recount of votes that would have helped Al Gore. "Street-smart New York Rep. John Sweeney, a visiting GOP monitor, told an aide to "Shut it down," and semi-spontaneous combustion took over," The Wall Street Journal's Paul Gigot admiringly wrote...

...Last year, for example, Sweeney voted in favor of the Child Custody Protection Act, which makes it a federal crime for anyone other than a parent to transport a minor girl across state lines to get an abortion "and circumvent state parental-consent laws." The bill, approved by Congress and now waiting on the Senate pipeline, was introduced by Miami Republican congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, of Elian fame.

Ros-Lehtinen, who is Cuban-American, was protesting against the recount outside the Miami-Dade county building last week while Sweeney was getting ready to utter his fateful phrase inside. Both she and Representative Lincoln Diaz-Balart, the other Cuban-born Republican in the U.S. Congress, had called on Cuban-Americans to join the protest, in on-site interviews granted to Radio Mambi, Miami's biggest Spanish-language station...

For the rest of this article, see
www.thegully.com/essays/america/001201sweeney.html

...However, a civil case was later brought by eleven Dade County absentee voters and resulted in overturning the Suarez election. In that case, the jury found that Suarez and his staff did engage in vote fraud, specifically tampering with 5,000 absentee ballots. In an interview this morning, Suarez told FEED that he was "in no way involved in any wrongdoing," and boldly promised to run for the office yet again in the next election.

What is most stunning, though, is that Suarez now sits on the executive committee of the Miami-Dade Republican party and was specifically involved this year in helping get out the Republican vote. Suarez, who told FEED that he is working to become the committee’s chairman, said that leading up to last night’s election he "helped fill out absentee ballot forms and enlist Republican absentee voters in Miami-Dade County." If the 2000 or so disputed votes in the Palm Beach area are in fact returned from Buchanan to Gore, these same ballots may very well decide the presidential election in the coming hours.

"Dade County Republicans have a very specific expertise in getting out absentee ballots," he said. "I obviously have specific experience in this myself."

When told of this, Kendall Coffey, lead attorney in the original Suarez suit, said, "He said that?" Coffey, a recognized expert in absentee ballot law, added, "This is striking. Florida has a troubled history in absentee ballots. Republicans often tell voters that they can use absentee ballots if it is more convenient for them, but the law requires that there must be an inability or barrier to voting in person."

For more of this fascinating story, see http://www.feedmag.com/templates/daily.php3?a_id=1389

MIAMI -- (AP) -- A state appeals court Wednesday night upheld a decision by an exhausted Miami-Dade election board to drop its manual recount, an attorney for the board said. Democrats promised a state high court appeal.

The board decided to stop counting votes just hours after it agreed to count only disputed ballots to save time.

Murray A. Greenberg, a lawyer for the election canvassing board, said a state appeals court turned down a bid by Democrats to force the board and vote counters to get back to work.

The ruling is a serious blow to Al Gore's campaign, which sees Miami-Dade as a potential source of hundreds of votes that could help wipe out George W. Bush's 930 vote in official statewide totals.

Jenny Backus, a spokeswoman for the Democratic National Committee, said the Gore camp planned an appeal to the Florida Supreme Court.

The canvassing board's surprise decision to give up the hand count came earlier Wednesday -- after a morning of protests and bickering over access. Board members said they didn't have time to do the job....

..."We will abide by it,'' Greenberg said of the court's decision.

Republicans welcomed the canvassing board's move. GOP protesters who earlier were yelling angry slogans erupted into applause and cheers. At least one Bush supporter broke down in tears.

``I think the Miami-Dade canvassing board realized that the rush to judgment simply couldn't go on,'' said U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R-Fla.

``We're happy that there's finality coming with respect to this election,'' added Al Cardenas, Florida's GOP chairman. ``Finally, we're getting some semblance of the rule of law here.''

Early results of the Miami-Dade hand counts had showed Gore gaining 157 votes on Bush in the first 135 of 614 precincts recounted.

Miami-Dade -- whose canvassing board has one Democrat, King, and two members who claim no party affiliation -- had been on track to complete a full hand recount Dec. 1. But late Tuesday, the state Supreme Court said they must be completed five days earlier, by this Sunday.

It was the second time the board had changed its mind about whether to conduct hand recounts. Last week the board initially voted 2-1 not to do any hand recounts. Then it decided to proceed with the recount when one member -- Myriam Lehr -- flipped her vote.

The board's earlier decision to stop the full hand count and focus only on the ballots with dimpled or partially separated chads -- the tiny pieces of paper in perforated punchcard ballots -- was met with a demonstration by Republicans.

About two dozen banged on the door of the room where the board was meeting, shouting ``Voter fraud!'' and ``Cheaters!'' They also swarmed a Democratic lawyer, and urged the police to arrest him for stealing a ballot. It turned out the ballot was a sample....

...He said the three members had hoped to retire to a room on the 19th floor -- a smaller place where they could have used machines to help count. But the Republicans and the media objected because they would have little access to watching the process.

Republicans had demanded that if the board makes any recount that it be all 654,000 ballots.

"You cannot count less than all votes. You either count all of them or you don't,'' said former Republican state Rep. Miguel De Grandy.

http://www.herald.com/content/today/digdocs/064486.htm

Jeb: Liaison to Anti-Castro Right

George Herbert Walker Bush's second eldest son, John Ellis or Jeb, was also linked to clandestine schemes in support of the Contras. Soon after congressional prohibition in late 1984, Jeb helped put a right-wing Guatemalan politician, Dr. Mario Castejon, in touch with Oliver North. Jeb acted as the Reagan administration's unofficial link with the Contras and Nicaraguan exiles in Miami.

Jeb was contacted in February 1985 by a friend of Castejon, who gave him a letter from Castejon to be passed on to then Vice President Bush. In his letter Castejon, a pediatrician and later an unsuccessful National Conservative Party presidential candidate, requested a meeting with George Bush to discuss a proposed medical aid project for the Contras. Jeb forwarded the letter to his father. In a March 3, 1985, letter, Vice President Bush expressed interest in Castejon's proposal to create an international medical brigade.

"I might suggest, if you are willing, that you consider meeting with Lt. Colonel Oliver North of the President's National Security Council Staff at a time that would be convenient for you," Bush wrote. "My staff has been in contact with Lt. Col. North concerning your projects and I know that he would be most happy to see you. You may feel free to make arrangements to see Lt. Colonel North, if you wish, by corresponding directly with him at the White House or by contacting Philip Hughes of my staff."

Castejon later met with North in the White House, where he also saw President Ronald Reagan. When Castejon returned to Washington for a second visit, he was introduced to members of North's secret Contra support network, including retired Maj. Gen. John Sing- laub and Contra leader Adolfo Calero. Castejon also met with a group of doctors working with Rob Owen, North's liaison with the Contras.

"He [Castejon] was offering us a pipeline into Guatemala," said Henry Whaley, a former arms dealer who said he was asked by his intelligence community connections to help Castejon. Whaley was optimistic about opening a new shipping route to the Contras through Guatemala. "If you can move Band-Aids," he reportedly said, "you can move bullets."

With Castejon, Whaley prepared a proposal to the State Department for the purchase of medical supplies for the Contras from the Department's newly established Nicaraguan Humanitarian Assistance Office. The document included requests for mobile field hospitals and light aircraft to evacuate wounded Contra guerrillas. Congress approved $27 million in "humanitarian" aid to the Contras in 1985. The Castejon proposal was hand-delivered to TGS International Limited in the Virginia suburbs of Washington. Whaley said he sent the report to TGS so it would be "quietly" forwarded to the CIA. TGS International is owned by Ted Shackley, who was CIA Associate Deputy Director of Operations when Bush Sr. headed the Agency in 1976-77.

Jeb had another Contra connection in his involvement with Miguel Recarey, Jr., a right-wing Cuban who headed the International Medical Centers (IMC) in Miami. In 1985 and 1986, Recarey and his associates gave more than $25,000 in contributions to political action committees controlled by then Vice President Bush. In 1986, Recarey hired Jeb, a real estate developer, to find a new headquarters for IMC. Jeb was paid a $75,000 fee, even though he never located a new building.

In September 1984, two months after IMC's $2,000 contribution to the Dade County Republican Party, which was headed by Jeb, the vice president's son contacted several top HHS (Department of Health and Human Services) officials on behalf of IMC. "Contrary to rumors, [Recarey] was a good community citizen and a good supporter of the Republican Party," one official of the HHC remembered Jeb telling him in late 1984. Jeb successfully sought an HHS waiver of a rule so that IMC could receive more than 50 percent of its income from Medicare.

Leon Weinstein, an HHS Medicare fraud inspector, worked on an audit of IMC in 1986; he has charged that IMC used Medicare funds to treat wounded Contras at its hospital. *31 The transaction was arranged by IMC official José Basulto, a right-wing Cuban trained by the CIA, who arranged for Contras to receive treatment in Miami. Basulto was praised for his commitment by Felix Rodriguez: "He has been active for a decade in supporting the Nicaraguan freedom fighters ever since the Sandinistas took power, and is constantly organizing Contra support among Miami's Cuban community. He has even been to Contra camps in Central America, helping to dispense humanitarian aid."

At the same time as Recarey was providing medical assistance to the Contras, he was embezzling Medicare funds. IMC, one of the largest health maintenance organizations in the United States, received $30 million a month for its Medicare patients, clearing $1 billion in federal monies from 1981 to 1987. While he headed IMC, Recarey's personal wealth jumped from $1 million to $100 million, U.S. investigators believe.

"IMC is the classic case of embezzlement of government funds," according to Robert Teich, the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration's Office on Labor Racketeering in Miami. Reich described IMC's skimming Medicare funds as a "bust-out" where money was "drained out the back door." A Florida state investigator concluded in a 1982 report that some federal funds IMC received "are being put in banks outside the country."

Recarey's links to the Mafia also raised eyebrows in Washington. "As far back as the 1960s, he had ties with reputed racketeers who had operated out of pre-Castro Cuba and who later forged an anti-Castro alliance with the CIA," the Wall Street Journal reported. The Journal added that the late Santos Trafficante, Jr., the Mafia boss of Florida, "helped out when Recarey needed business financing." Trafficante, a major drug trafficker, joined a failed CIA effort to assassinate Cuban President Fidel Castro in the early 1960s.

Recarey's access to Republican circles was probably one reason he was able to rip-off U.S. tax dollars for so long. He hired former Reagan aide Lyn Nofziger, the public relations firm Black, Manafort, Stone and Kelly, which was close to the Reagan White House, and attorney John Sears, a former Reagan campaign manager, to look out for his interests in Washington. Recarey fled the United States in 1987 to avoid a federal indictment for racketeering and defrauding the U.S. government. The Bush administration has made no effort to extradite him from Venezuela where he is currently living.

JEB LINKED TO SMUGGLERS AND THIEVES
Jeb Bush has also been linked to Leonel Martinez, a Miami-based right-wing Cuban-American drug trafficker. Martinez, who was linked to Contra dissident Eden Pastora, was involved in efforts to smuggle more than 3,000 pounds of cocaine into Miami in 1985-86. He was arrested in 1989 and later convicted for bringing 300 kilos of cocaine into the U.S. He also reportedly arranged for the delivery of two helicopters, arms, ammunition, and clothing to Pasto- ra's Costa Rica-based Contras.

Federal prosecutors in Miami have a photograph of Jeb and Martinez shaking hands but won't release the photo to the public. Whether Jeb was aware of Martinez's drug trafficking activities is not known, but it is known that Leonel and his wife Margarita made a $2,200 contribution to the Dade County Republican Party four months after Jeb became the chair of the local GOP.

It is also known that Martinez wrote $5,000 checks to then Vice President Bush's Fund for America's Future in both December 1985 and July 1986 and made a $2,000 contribution to the Bush for President campaign in October 1987.

Martinez's construction company gave $6,000 in October 1986 to Bob Martinez (no relation), the GOP candidate for governor in Florida; he was governor from 1987 to 1991. At that time, Vice President Bush was serving as head of the South Florida Drug Task Force and later as chair of the National Narcotics Interdiction System, both set up to stem the flow of drugs into the U.S. While Bush was drug czar, the volume of cocaine smuggled into the U.S. tripled.

President Bush later appointed Bob Martinez in 1991 head of the U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy- the drug czar to succeed the controversial William Bennett.

for the full article, see The Family that Preys Together, Covert Action Information Bulletin, No. 41 (Summer 1992), pp. 50-59. The building that houses CANF's headquarters also happens to be owned and managed by IntrAmerican Investments, whose president is Jeb Bush.

Garcia said Cuban Americans went to bat for Lieberman when he first ran for the Senate, to block his Republican rival and incumbent Lowell Weicker, a former Connecticut governor.

Gore's change of position may have endeared him to some Cuban Americans, but the shift was seen poorly in the country, opinion polls showed. Most Cuban Americans vote Republican and are expected to do so once again in the November election in which the party has a tough anti-Castro platform that calls for active U.S. support for dissidents in Cuba.

© St. Petersburg Times, published August 9, 2000

MIAMI -- With Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman as his running mate, Democratic presidential hopeful Al Gore may win back alienated Cuban-American voters in South Florida.

Still smarting from the Clinton administration's handling of Elian Gonzalez, hard-line Cuban-American exiles can take heart from Lieberman's impeccable anti-Castro voting record.

In his 12 years in Congress, Lieberman has supported legislation to tighten the U.S. embargo against Cuba, including the 1992 Cuban Democracy Act and the 1996 Helms-Burton Act. He has also consistently backed funding for Radio and TV Marti, controversial government-financed stations that broadcast pro-democracy programming into Cuba.

Lieberman's Cuba connection dates to his 1988 Senate campaign when he challenged incumbent Republican Lowell Weicker, Connecticut's former governor.

Weicker was targeted by Cuban exiles after he met twice with Fidel Castro in Cuba and publicly advocated warming relations with the communist-run island. After one meeting, Weicker returned from Havana with a box of Cuban cigars, a present from Castro.

In a recent interview, Lieberman recalled being introduced that year to the late Jorge Mas Canosa, founder of the Cuban American National Foundation, by supporters within Miami's Jewish community.

"Jorge Mas Canosa and I really just struck it off," Lieberman said. "To me, part of the coming together was natural. I agreed with their position on Castro."

But there was also a financial side to his sympathy for the Cuban cause. His campaign won substantial financial backing from the CANF that helped Lieberman defeat Weicker by just 10,000 votes.

Lieberman has since proved a popular senator, and in 1994 he was re-elected in a landslide.

Cuban-Americans have continued to put their faith -- and money -- in Lieberman's stand on Cuban issues. This year, Floridians have donated more than $100,000 to his Senate re-election campaign, including major donations from the leaders of CANF.

"Joe Lieberman is a great friend of the Cuban cause," said Joe Garcia, CANF's director. "He's never missed one vote on Cuba and he's never failed to be with us."

Lieberman was one of a number of politicians who asked Attorney General Janet Reno to delay Elian Gonzalez' return to Cuba.

In his public comments on Cuba, Lieberman has lately shown some frustration with U.S. policy. He recently said that Castro no longer represented a national security threat to the United States.

"I am not happy with (the embargo) mostly because it hasn't brought about change," he told the Hartford Courant in May. But he added that the embargo remained true to the U.S. principles of opposing dictatorships and human rights abusers.

"I am still not for easing the embargo, unless we first see some actions by Castro," Lieberman said. "I'd like to see him grant more human rights for the people there. He needs to free some political dissidents. He needs to take concrete steps."

Lieberman also conceded that public opinion seems to be changing. "There certainly looks like a shift in opinion, both in Congress and the public. And that is away from the position I have taken."

Despite Lieberman's voting record, it may be too late to sway Cuban-Americans who make up 8 percent of registered Florida voters.

On Tuesday, Cuban radio commentators praised Gore's selection, but urged listeners to vote Republican.

Some Cuban-American Democrats in Miami who favor softening U.S. policy on Cuba were disappointed in the choice of Lieberman. "I think it's very good for the future of American democracy that Mr. Gore picked a minority as his running mate," said Max Lesnik, a Cuban-American commentator in Miami who is Jewish.

"But I don't think he (Lieberman) understands the Cuba issue. Like all politicians, he's in it for the money."

- Times researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report.