JULY 18, 2016 12:55 PM

25 Cuban migrants come ashore in the Keys


​Three separate landings from Key Largo to Middle Keys

Migration flow shows no sign of slowing
Group arriving at Ocean Reef said they were at sea for six days




Thirteen Cuban men sit on the curb of a Key Largo gas station after arriving from what they said was a four-day sea journey from their homeland to the United States. Monroe County Sheriff’s Office
BY DAVID GOODHUE
dgoodhue@keysreporter.com

In less than two days, 25 Cuban migrants arrived in the Keys in three separate landings.
On Sunday, 13 men arrived in Key Largo on a “single-engine rustic vessel,” said Supervisory U.S. Border Patrol Agent Adam Hoffner. The men told Border Patrol agents they spent four days at sea.

On Monday morning, around 5 a.m., nine Cuban men arrived at the Ocean Reef Club community in north Key Largo, also in a single-engine rustic craft. They told Border Patrol agents that their journey from Cuba took six days.

Around 10 a.m. Monday, three men came to shore at the Middle Keys community of Key Colony Beach.

Since all the migrants made it to dry land, they will likely be allowed to stay in the United States and apply for permanent residency after a year.

U.S. policy toward Cuba considers all arriving migrants refugees. Under the so-called “wet-foot, dry-foot” change made in 1995 to the Cuban Adjustment Act, all Cubans leaving their homeland who are stopped at sea are sent back. All who step foot on U.S. soil can stay.

The number of Cubans fleeing their country has spiked recently following thawing diplomatic ties last year between the Obama administration and the Castro regime. Many Cubans fear that with strengthening relations between the neighboring countries, the logic at the root of wet-foot, dry-foot no longer applies and the policy may soon end.

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