Recent crackdown on illegal visits does little to end traffic

By TRACEY EATON / The Dallas Morning News

HAVANA – Austin resident Dan Snow can't vote. Can't own a gun. Can't even go fishing where he wants to.

His crime?

He hopped on a plane and went to Cuba, the forbidden island, land of Fidel Castro and rumbling '59 Chevys.

"I'm a travel felon," said Mr. Snow, 63, the only American to have served jail time for going to Cuba.

He's the most extreme example of a trend – people thumbing their noses at Uncle Sam and going to Cuba despite a decades-long ban and a recent Bush
administration crackdown on travel to the island.

Most travel to Cuba from the United States is prohibited, although the U.S. government does allow some visits for business, educational and cultural purposes.
Travelers range from musicians and artists to lawmakers and students.

Despite the ban, more than 79,000 U.S. residents journeyed to Cuba last year, legally or illegally, not including about 140,000 Cuban-Americans, Cuban officials
say. Others calculate the numbers differently, but all agree that tens of thousands of Americans are traveling to Cuba each year.

The interest in Cuba continues to rise, said Benjamin Treuhaft, 54, who organizes trips to Cuba for American piano tuners.

"People want to come with us to Cuba, and they aren't even piano tuners. I tell them no," said Mr. Treuhaft, head of a program called "Send a Piana to Havana."

Mr. Treuhaft's travels are allowed under what American officials describe as "people-to-people" contact. That is, ordinary Americans meeting Cubans. Spreading
ideas. Sharing the American way.

Trendy destination

The island has long been a hot spot for Americans. When Cuba's night scene had its heyday in the 1950s, American celebrities including Errol Flynn, Spencer Tracy
and Betty Grable were among the visitors.

In more recent years, Cuba has again become a chic destination. Havana's Hotel Nacional has what it calls the "Hall of Fame," several walls decorated with photos
and paintings of celebrities who have been to Cuba over the last half century

Visitors have included musicians Peter Frampton, Herbie Hancock and Jimmy Buffett, actors Woody Harrelson, Johnny Depp, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny
Glover and Forest Whitaker, baseball great Hank Aaron, supermodel Naomi Campbell and director Oliver Stone. Former Texas Gov. Ann Richards and Jean
Kennedy Smith, sister of former President John F. Kennedy, have also been among recent visitors.

Others go to Cuba illegally, but just how many is uncertain, said John Kavulich, director of the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council in New York.

Mr. Kavulich said he believes that Cuban officials overestimate the number of Americans going to the island illegally. He has tried to track the number of U.S.
travelers by obtaining statistics from such transit countries as Mexico, Canada and Jamaica, and calculates that more than 27,000 Americans went to Cuba illegally
last year.

The number of authorized travelers – including journalists, businessmen, academics, students and Cuban-Americans – was more than 137,000, he said.

Despite the president's crackdown, pressure to lift the ban has been growing on Capitol Hill.

Members of Congress last month debated whether the American ban on travel to Cuba should be lifted. Four Republicans and four Democrats in the House have
vowed to work for improved exchanges with Cuba, starting with lifting the travel ban..

On Thursday, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, whose department enforces the travel ban, told the Senate Appropriations subcommittee that he agreed with a
suggestion of the committee chairman, Sen. Byron Dorgan: U.S. money would be better spent chasing terrorists than tracking down Americans who visit Cuba, he
said.

"If I had the discretion for applying the resources, I would agree with you completely," Mr. O'Neill told Mr. Dorgan, a Democrat from North Dakota, at a
subcommittee hearing

Pricey punishments

Supporters of lifting the ban say that American freedom is being restricted in the interest of punishing Cuban President Fidel Castro.

Illegal travelers – including Marilyn Meister, a 75-year-old retired teacher who went to Cuba for a bicycling trip – have been slapped with fines of up to $7,500. The
Treasury Department issued 766 such fines last year, up from 188 in 2000.

President Bush's top Latin American diplomat, Otto Reich, has indicated that the administration's Cuba policy is under review and that the restrictions on the island
nation will likely be tightened further.

Mr. Reich, testifying on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, defended the travel ban and the embargo on commerce with Cuba.

"One way we can help... is not throwing a lifeline to a failed, corrupt, dictatorial, murderous regime," he said. "We're not going to do it. We are not going to help
Fidel Castro stay in power by opening up our markets to Cuba."

Similar travel restrictions exist for other countries. U.S. sanctions against Libya prohibit all financial and commercial transactions by U.S. citizens unless licensed by
the Treasury Department, and U.S. passports are not valid for travel to Libya, according to the State Department. U.S. passports also are not valid for travel to Iraq.

'Sense of selfishness'

The administration hard line against Cuba does have its supporters.

Dennis Hays, executive vice president of the Cuban American National Foundation, a powerful anti-Castro lobby group, said he supports the crackdown.

As it is, he and others contend, there is a kind of apartheid tourism in Cuba.

Ordinary Cubans aren't allowed to enter the big tourist hotels, and workers receive substandard wages – usually $15 or so per month.

Americans who go to Cuba have "an ingrained sense of selfishness," Mr. Hays said.

"It's like they say, 'I don't give a damn about the treatment of our neighbors. I want to go fly-fishing or lay on the beach.' "

But not all travel to Cuba is bad, he said. Americans who go to Cuba and stay in private homes and eat at private restaurants should be encouraged, he said. The
same goes for those who go to the island and donate books to the private libraries that have sprung up, he said.

Mr. Snow said he believes Americans ought to go to Cuba to get to know the island and to see that Cubans are genuine, sincere and friendly toward Americans.

"All I say is, give us our freedom to travel or quit saying this is the most free country in the world," he says.

Ordinary travelers

Over the last 20 years, Mr. Snow estimates, he has taken more than 20,000 Americans to Cuba. Most have gone on fishing trips, although drought conditions in the
last five years have cut into that business and more of his travelers are ordinary tourists, not fishermen.

Some of his customers, he says, have had such a good time in Cuba that they've returned as many as 40 times.

In 1988, the U.S. government prosecuted Mr. Snow for his travels to Cuba. He served a 90-day jail term and five years' probation. He also lost his voting rights for
life and was fined $5,300.

He said he paid the fine at a rate of $100 per month for about a year then stopped paying, telling U.S. officials to jail him if they wanted.

They did not.

Nowadays, he said, tens of thousands of Americans travel to Cuba illegally every year.

"The more that go, the better," Mr. Snow said. "They tell their friends and next year 90,000 will go. And the next, 120,000. Then 200,000. And then the ball will be
rolling in our favor.

"I think I'm the person that the good Lord appointed to win back our freedom to travel," he said. "Why should everybody else be able to go to Cuba and not
Americans? Why can we go to China and Vietnam, but not Cuba? The whole thing's a joke. It's ridiculous, for a free country to control the right of Americans to
travel."