House votes signal easing of embargo

 BY ANA RADELAT
 Special to The Herald

 WASHINGTON -- The surprise approval of anti-embargo measures in the House on
 Thursday night by an overwhelming margin has improved prospects for the lifting of some
 sanctions against Cuba this year, congressional sources said Friday.

 Propelled by support from farm and business interests, the anti-sanctions campaign is still
 opposed by Republican leaders in the House and Senate, but the two decisive House votes
 curtailing enforcement of travel and trade restrictions have exposed the vulnerability of
 the pro-embargo forces and created momentum for changes in the law.

 In an apparent rebellion against the Republican leadership, rank-and-file GOP members joined
 Democrats in a 301-116 vote to strip the Treasury Department of funding to enforce
 restrictions on the sale of food and medicine to Cuba.

 By a smaller margin, the House also barred the Treasury -- the principal overseer
 of embargo regulations -- from enforcing restrictions on U.S. travel to the island.

 While the House was acting, the Senate approved a separate Agriculture
 Department spending bill that contained a provision sponsored by Sen. John
 Ashcroft, R-Mo., that would allow food sales to a number of nations under trade
 sanctions, including Cuba.

 ``Both chambers have now taken a strong position,'' said Sen. Byron Dorgan,
 D-N.D. ``It is time to end this absurdity.''

 The Senate-approved bill must be reconciled in a House-Senate conference
 committee with a version of the Agriculture spending bill passed by the lower
 chamber that contains no mention of Cuba.

 The principal significance of Thursday night's votes is to give Senate negotiators
 greater leverage over their House counterparts in fashioning the ultimate bill. The
 votes indicate sentiment among rank-and-file House members to change the law,
 no matter how the leaders feel.

 Supporters of the move against sanctions ignored the pleas of House Majority
 Whip Tom DeLay, R-Texas, who called Fidel Castro's government an ``evil
 empire'' during the floor debate. ``We should not lift the embargo, we should screw
 it down tighter,'' he said.

 Ashcroft, Senate leader of the anti-sanctions campaign, said: ``Thursday's votes
 in our favor strengthens my hope for final action on genuine reform of our embargo
 policy.''

 Even Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., a strong embargo supporter,
 has become more pragmatic.

 ``Lott doesn't support trading with despots in Cuba, but he is realistic about the
 vote count,'' Lott spokesman John Czwartacki said Friday.

 Rep. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., who sponsored the measure to prevent enforcement of
 the food-trade ban, said he did so because House leaders had prevented a vote
 on an anti-sanctions provision sponsored by Rep. George Nethercutt, R-Wash.

 In a maneuver designed to prevent a vote, the leaders in late June demanded that
 Nethercutt and pro-embargo Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Lincoln Díaz-Balart,
 both Miami Republicans, fashion a compromise that, in retrospect, appears to
 have lacked widespread support.

 Under this plan, GOP leaders would ask House and Senate negotiators to accept
 this compromise instead of Ashcroft's anti-sanctions legislation in the final
 Agriculture Department spending bill. Until Thursday night, there had been no
 actual vote in the House on this issue, and thus no gauge of House sentiment.

 The frustration over this unusual maneuver contributed in large part to the margin
 of victory for the anti-embargo measures Thursday night.

 ``This is the first time those of us who oppose unilateral sanctions have been able
 to get a vote on this issue,'' Moran said. The success ``improves the chances that
 ranchers and farmers can make ends meet.''

 SHOWDOWN

 Thursday night's action sets up a showdown between Senate negotiators who
 want a broader opening of trade with Cuba -- in support of the Ashcroft measure --
 and House conferees who want the more restrictive compromise fashioned by
 GOP leaders.

 Although the measures may never become law, they disclosed the overwhelming
 anti-embargo sentiment in the lower chamber and may force House conferees to
 accept the Ashcroft measure.

 Díaz-Balart dismissed the House action to prevent enforcement of Cuba travel and
 trade bans as merely a ``skirmish'' in a much larger war over the embargo.

 But it energized the anti-sanctions camp, which has been divided over accepting
 the so-called ``Nethercutt deal'' brokered by House leaders. The deal would open
 the door to sales of food to Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea and Sudan, but prevent
 the use of public and private financing in those sales, rendering the action
 practically useless.

 OPENING FORESEEN

 Now anti-sanctions leaders are more optimistic that Congress will approve a
 substantial opening of trade to Cuba and the other nations under sanctions.

 Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., who visited Havana this month, said the latest House
 action would allow Senate supporters of relaxed sanctions to demand
 improvements when the House and Senate negotiate the final farm bill -- either
 next week or after Congress returns from summer recess in September.

 Before the House vote, Roberts said he was pessimistic about the prospects of
 easing the embargo this year. But now he says he may sponsor a Senate
 amendment banning enforcement of restrictions on food sales to Cuba in order to
 ``keep up the momentum.''

 ``He's hopeful that we'll see some substantial sanctions reform,'' said Roberts'
 press secretary Betsy Holahan.

 The Washington Post Service contributed to this report.