The campaign of the Democratic candidate for the White House, Joe Biden, criticized this Wednesday the ban on sending remittances to Cuba decreed by President Donald Trump, which will lead to the closing of Western Union on the island.
“In the midst of a global pandemic in which families are suffering deeply on the island and around the world, President Trump is denying Cuban-Americans the right to help their families,” Florida campaign strategic advisor Christian Ulvert said in a statement.
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The Democrat recalled that Western Union “is the largest remittance service” in Cuba and that its closing “will be painful for Cuban families, especially the oldest and most vulnerable, both on the island and in the United States.”
“Trump’s war on family remittances is a cruel distraction from his administration’s failure to promote democracy in Cuba,” said Ulvert, adding that the “presumed support of the president for the Cuban people is nothing more than empty rhetoric.”
Cuba confirmed this Tuesday the upcoming closing of the 407 Western Union payment points in the country due to the sanctions announced last weekend by the Trump administration, which prohibit the sending of remittances from the United States to the island through official means.
That closure is scheduled for November 26, when the ban on sending money to the island through companies controlled by the Cuban Armed Forces takes effect.
Foreign companies that want to operate in Cuba must have a state counterpart and Western Union has monopolized the cash reception service on the island since 2016 through an association with Fincimex, linked to the military conglomerate GAESA.
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The Democratic candidate for the U.S. vice presidency, Kamala Harris, assured this Tuesday in an interview with EFE that if she and Biden get to the White House they will repeal the restrictions that Trump has imposed on the island, although the end of the blockade will not happen “soon.”
She said that the embargo is law and that an act by of Congress is needed to lift it or that the president determines that a democratically elected government is in power in Cuba, adding that they don’t expect any of these things to happen anytime soon.
