{"id":232168,"date":"2020-12-23T13:16:49","date_gmt":"2020-12-23T18:16:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/?p=232168"},"modified":"2020-12-23T13:28:02","modified_gmt":"2020-12-23T18:28:02","slug":"joe-garcia-i-dont-want-to-be-an-ambassador-what-i-want-is-to-serve-my-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/cuba-usa\/joe-garcia-i-dont-want-to-be-an-ambassador-what-i-want-is-to-serve-my-community\/","title":{"rendered":"Joe Garc\u00eda: \u201cI don\u2019t want to be an ambassador, what I want is to serve my community\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Jos\u00e9 Antonio Garc\u00eda, better known in Miami as Joe, was appointed executive director of the Cuban American National Foundation at the beginning of the new century, he didn\u2019t even know what Cuba smelled like. Now, two decades later, he has been to the island five times and has conversed with important officials and academics. Those trips have allowed him to polish his vision of the land of his parents and grandparents. Joe was born in Miami Beach in 1963.<\/p>\n

He was a Democratic leader and a congressman from that party in the federal House of Representatives. He is a controversial politician in Miami because he tends to advocate topics that most disagree with. He does not hide that the economic embargo is counterproductive for both countries, and since the last decade he has been advocating the normalization of ties between the two countries and, even more, for an improvement in the treatment of Cubans residing in the United States.<\/p>\n

Whenever Barack Obama, as a presidential candidate and later as the president, visited South Florida, Joe Garc\u00eda was usually his host. One day it occurred to him to take him to eat Cuban fritters. Later, he organized a lunch for him at a hotel in the city and got the Foundation to support him electorally. The lunch was unique. That year Obama was elected president with the promise that he would change relations with Cuba.<\/p>\n

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Barack Obama visited the Mago de las Fritas on one of his trips to Miami led by Joe Garc\u00eda. Photo: Getty.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The morning that the United States reopened its embassy in Havana, Joe Garc\u00eda was next to then Secretary of State John Kerry. It was when his work behind the scenes with the White House to improve relations was discovered. Now he has just achieved the impossible: to negotiate a shipment of humanitarian medical aid. Many of his friends and opponents bet that his efforts will continue because, as one says, once you open a gate it\u2019s very difficult to close it.\u201cJoe is an asere in the purest sense of the word,\u201d said an academic there. \u201cHe is one more Cuban, upright\u201d despite the fact that he was born in Miami Beach.<\/p>\n

How did this trip with donations happen and why did you decide to do it?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

When the pandemic appeared, we thought that the worst would happen in Cuba based on what we saw in the United States. A few weeks after it started, information began to reach us about the difficulties in Cuba. The original idea was not a donation. We didn\u2019t want it because it leads to a lot of publicity: \u201cLots of straw and little rice.\u201d We wanted to establish a mechanism so that first-rate health care, and family support, could be harmoniously combined, and to establish a lasting and sustainable mechanism. Because we knew that this need would be sustained over time, and that the more time passed, the more necessary that mechanism would be, beyond any propaganda or public relations pretense.<\/p>\n

In the end, it did not happen as we wanted at first: that the help from family to family on the island could be linked and guarantee that the same people on this shore would contribute to those on the other shore in the best possible way. In the end we succeeded because the company that organized the donation also sent two containers of family aid to Cuba with soap and toothpaste donated by more than 7,000 residents in the United States to their relatives on the island.<\/p>\n

Health donation sent by Cubans in U.S. arrives in Cuba<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n