Delegate Plaskett Criticizes Obama’s Planned Visit To Cuba; Says Virgin Islands Being Neglected

ST. CROIX — Virgin Islands Delegate to Congress Stacey Plaskett has issued a statement on President Barack Obama’s planned visit to Cuba next month, coming on the heels of a deal signed on Tuesday between the United States and Cuba, restoring commercial air traffic for the first time in 50 years, and allowing dozens of new daily flights to bring hundreds of thousands more American travelers a year to the island beginning this fall.

Following the signing, the U.S. Department of Transportation opened bidding by American air carriers on as many as 110 U.S.-Cuba flights a day, which is more than five times the current number, and these flights will be commercial and open for all Americans, as compared to the current setup that allow for only chartered trips.

The restart of commercial flights will be the most significant development in U.S.-Cuba trade relations since Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro announced in late 2014 that they would begin normalizing ties after a half-century of Cold War opposition. According to the New York Times, the Obama administration is eager to make rapid progress on building trade and diplomatic ties with Cuba before Mr. Obama leaves office, and the coming weeks are seen as particularly crucial to building momentum ahead of a trip he hopes to make to Havana by the end of March.

“Today is a historic day in the relationship between Cuba and the U.S.,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said after he and Transportation Minister Adel Yzquierdo Rodriguez signed the deal in a ceremony at Havana’s Hotel Nacional on Tuesday. “It represents a critically important milestone in the U.S. effort to engage with Cuba.”

The U.S. Department of Transportation expects to award the new routes by the summer. The winning airlines must then negotiate their own deals with Cuba.

But Mrs. Plaskett on Thursday criticized Mr. Obama for wholeheartedly embracing Cuba while the Virgin Islands remain in need of aid in various sectors. She said it is irresponsible of the president to embrace the transformation of Cuba without fully assessing the impact the island’s reemergence as a global player will have on the territory’s economy, more pointedly its tourism product — which could be diminished as cruise ships and airliners divert to the nascent and exotic location.

Here is the delegate’s full statement: “While I have been supportive of the President renewing relations with Cuba in the past, and support the implications of his historic visit to the future development of the island, I want to remind the Administration that there are American territories in the region with more pressing needs.

“Over the past several months, I have continued to press this issue with President Obama, his Cabinet members and with my colleagues in Congress, through letters, speeches on the House floor and in sidebar discussions. At each juncture, I remind them of the Constitutional responsibility of Congress to the well-being of the territory and of all of its citizens.

“Renewed diplomatic and economic relations with Cuba present real challenges to the territory, specifically, in competition for U.S. tourism dollars and as a potential diversion of port and manufacturing opportunities in the Caribbean.

“In my discussions with the Obama Administration and fellow lawmakers I have emphasized the need for the United States to prioritize the interests of its own island territories above the interest of diplomatic relations with Cuba.

“I view it unwise and irresponsible to fully embrace a changing dynamic with Cuba in the absence of a careful and deliberate recognition of the economic impacts on our community and on the future of the people of the territory.

“Investments in Virgin Islands capital improvements for basic infrastructure needs, such as roads, ports, schools and hospitals, must be a priority addressed by Congress in accordance with its Constitutional obligation above any potential aid to the Cuban government.”