BY MICHAEL PUTNEY

Recent polls say that President Bush is in trouble with Cuban-American voters. The polls are interesting but fairly meaningless: The Cuban vote is Bush's to lose. My gut feeling is that this November, as in 2000, Bush will get most of it. The only question is: Will he get 80 percent, as he did four years ago, or about 60 percent, as a new poll indicates? The difference could swing the election in Florida.

That's just one reason why the Cuban vote is so important. Florida has 9.3 million registered voters, of whom 450,000 are Cuban American. But there are probably at least that many, born in the United States, who identify themselves as Cuban American but are listed on voting rolls only as ''Hispanic.'' That fuzzes the allegiances of second- and third-generation Cuban Americans who share more with their parents than a love of ropa vieja and a hatred of Fidel Castro. Most share a high regard for GOP presidents and candidates, who are perceived as tougher on Castro than Democrats.

Bush's problem with Cuban-American voters is one largely of perception -- and it is one largely of his own making. He is the victim of rising expectations, which he is responsible for raising. Like every Republican since Ronald Reagan, Bush has come to Miami numerous times and thundered, ``¡Cuba, sí; Castro, no!'' But after four decades of such talk, Cuban Americans want to see some action. They thought that Bush was the guy who would provide it. After all, brother Jeb understands la causa cubana well and has his brother's ear. Then, too, Cuban Americans expected some kind of reward from Washington after contributing generously to Bush's campaign and turning out to vote en masse and en bloc for him in 2000.

But many feel that all they've gotten in return is rhetoric, not action. Last August, 11 Cuban-American state lawmakers wrote Bush a letter asking him to act as well as he talks tough about Castro. A poll taken in January among Hispanic Republicans in Miami-Dade County shows that 70 percent agree with the lawmakers.

Even the governor said that it ''wasn't right'' when his brother's administration repatriated a dozen Cubans who had hijacked a ferry and tried to reach Florida. Several got long prison sentences.

The president had given Cuban exiles reason to believe that he would not let such things happen. In a major Cuba policy speech in Miami on May 20, 2002, Cuban Independence Day, Bush promised to beef up Radio and TV Martí. It hasn't happened. He promised to provide U.S. college scholarships to the children of Cuban political prisoners and negotiate direct mail service. That hasn't happened either. He also promised to crack down on Americans who travel to the island illegally. That has happened.

Treasury Secretary John Snow proudly trotted out the latest statistics on the crackdown during a visit to Miami in February. He said that 264 cases had been opened by Treasury's Office of Foreign Asset Control, the agency that licenses travel to Cuba. If the Bush administration's Cuba policy is, at the least, inconsistent, do the Democrats offer an alternative? Not much of one. John Kerry told me recently that he's ''tough on Castro'' and opposes lifting the embargo. That's not what he told The Boston Globe in 2000 when he said that a review of the embargo was ''way overdue.'' Kerry also told me that he ''voted for the Helms-Burton legislation to be tough on companies that deal with (Castro).'' In fact, Kerry voted against Helms-Burton precisely because it came back from conference with Title III, which would punish companies that trade with Castro. It's a provision that has been waived by both Presidents Bill Clinton and Bush.

Clinton won about 30 percent of the Cuban-American vote in 1996. It's possible that Kerry could approach that number with a well-conceived and articulated Cuba policy along with the active support of some prominent Cuban-American leaders. The first thing that Kerry should do is stop misrepresenting his voting record on Cuba.

There is an opening for Kerry among Cuban-American voters. He won't get through it by trying to get to the right of Bush.