NOTICIAS

Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Transnational Crime, Civilian Security, Democracy, Human Rights, and Global Women’s Issues, today condemned the Obama Administration’s removal of Cuba from the State Sponsors of Terrorism List.

View Rubio’s remarks here in English and here in Spanish.

For TV stations interested in airing a broadcast quality version of Rubio’s statements, downloads are available here in English and here in Spanish.

Full transcripts of Rubio’s statements are available below:

“Well, the decision made by the White House today is a terrible one, but not surprising unfortunately. Cuba is a state sponsor of terrorism. They harbor fugitives of American justice, including someone who killed a police officer in New Jersey over 30 years ago. It’s also the country that’s helping North Korea evade weapons sanctions by the United Nations. They should have remained on the list of state sponsors of terrorism, and I think sends a chilling message to our enemies abroad that this White House is no longer serious about calling terrorism by its proper name.”

SPANISH VERSION OF STATEMENT

“La decisión de la Casa Blanca es lamentable, pero no me sorprende. Cuba, sin duda, es un país que apoya el terrorismo. Tienen fugitivos de la justicia americana viviendo en el país, personas que se han robado dinero de Medicare, incluso a alguien que asesinó un policía en los Estados Unidos hace treinta años, y por otra parte, el país que ha ayudado a Corea del Norte evadir sanciones internacionales en contra de ese país terrorista. Desafortunadamente esta decisión de la Casa Blanca va a mandar un mensaje muy peligroso a los enemigos y a los terroristas”.

Earlier this year, Rubio joined Senators David Vitter (R-LA) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) in a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder pressing for answers on the status of the fugitives the Castro regime is harboring, as well as the threats posed to the U.S. legal system by the administration’s removal of Cuba from the State Sponsors of Terrorism List. Holder has yet to respond to the Senators’ letter. Rubio also highlighted the Castro regime’s harboring of fugitives like Fuerzas Armadas de Liberacion Nacional Puertorriquena’s (FALN) bombmaker William Morales, and its support of terrorist groups like the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the Basque Fatherland and Liberty (ETA) in a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry last month.