Heres the Miami Herald story on Cuba travel: regards everyone, docmoss Defiant travelers to Cuba paying a price Number of fines issued by U.S. increases sharply BY TIM JOHNSON tjohnson@krwashington.com WASHINGTON -- U.S. citizens who defy restrictions on travel to Cuba increasingly are returning stateside to find an unexpected souvenir: a letter from the feds demanding they pay $7,500 or so in fines. The number of such penalty letters has spiked, and unsuspecting U.S. travelers are yelping in surprise at the potential cost of their travels. ``I think it's very stupid,'' said Donna, a 64-year-old retired social worker in Chicago who asked that her last name not be used. After a bike trip in Cuba, she got notice in June that the Treasury Department plans to levy $7,650 in fines against her. ``They should leave people like me alone who do no harm.'' ^From May 4 to July 30, a division of the U.S. Treasury Department that monitors travel to Cuba sent out 443 letters seeking average fines of $7,500 -- a sharp increase from the 74 letters mailed from Jan. 3 to May 3. Those receiving penalty letters include New York City high school students and teachers, scuba divers, cyclists, a Massachusetts bird watcher, a Santeria buff from the Pacific Northwest -- a panoply of Americans intrigued by the tropical communist bastion of President Fidel Castro and willing to wriggle under the legal trip wire. Interest in Cuba has surged despite -- or perhaps because of -- a longstanding law that forbids U.S. citizens from spending money on the island. The travel restrictions are now in roiling waters as the White House and Congress veer in sharply different directions on policy toward Cuba. Staking out a hard line, President Bush pledged July 13 to detect and punish those who visit Cuba illegally ``to the fullest extent with a view toward preventing unlicensed and excessive travel. . . . '' DENYING FUNDS A majority of the U.S. House, meanwhile, wants to facilitate travel to Cuba. On a 240-186 vote, the House on July 26 denied the executive branch any funds to enforce the travel restrictions. The measure now heads to the Senate, where observers say it could pass in the fall. Caught in the middle are people like Anne, a 78-year-old retiree in the Pacific Northwest who recently decided to sate her ``curiosity'' about the tropical island -- restrictions notwithstanding. ``I wanted to go to Cuba, and the way [politics] were going I figured I'd probably be dead before they'd allow me to go,'' she said in a telephone interview, asking that her last name not be used. ``Everyone else is going there. Why can't we? Europeans, Canadians, English, everyone is there -- except us.'' She decided to travel through Toronto -- a common gateway -- but found U.S. immigration officials peppering her with questions on her return through the Toronto airport. ``They are trying to catch people, and they are watching people getting off the plane from Havana,'' she said. RISKS WERE MINIMAL For many years, restrictions were enforced with little vigor. Lawyers counseled potential travelers that risks were minimal. ``My advice to people was, `It's not legal to go to Cuba but enforcement is low and the fines are not very big,' '' said Michael Ratner, head of the Center for Constitutional Rights, a New York City advocacy group that provides counsel for travelers facing fines from the Treasury Department. Those days appear to be over. Now, dozens of alarmed travelers are calling the center each month, penalty letters in their sweaty palms. ``They are pretty shocked by this,'' Ratner said. The steady rise in penalty letters, which actually dates to the end of the Clinton administration, coincides with a growing fascination with Cuba -- spurred by the popularity of its music and dance, and scores of media reports portraying the island as a romantic destination trapped in the 1950s. Many reports gloss over the legal problems connected to a visit there. Government-sanctioned travel to Cuba is growing steadily, most of it licensed by the Treasury Department. The New York-based U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, atrade group, estimates that 173,000 U.S. citizens visited Cuba last year. It says some 22,000 Americans went without authorization, risking fines. Under the Trading with the Enemy Act, U.S. citizens are barred from spending any money in Cuba -- making travel there all but impossible. Certain categories of U.S. citizens -- researchers, students, religious workers, journalists, athletes, humanitarian workers, lecturers, business executives and Cuban Americans with family on the island -- are allowed to travel under specific or general licenses. For those who do not fit into these categories, or ignore the law, criminal penalties are possible, although civil penalties are far more common. Civil penalties may range up to $55,000 in fines. The Treasury Department sends U.S. citizens suspected of illegal travel to Cuba a questionnaire. If federal officials then believe the suspect has broken the law, they send a ``pre-penalty notice'' alleging ``reasonable cause'' and listing the amount of the proposed fine. In the past, many people receiving such notices called lawyers and began negotiating payment with the Treasury Department. Others, though, demanded hearings to fight the fine. Demands for hearings essentially shelved the matter, and officials say it was due to a lack of administrative judges. Now, the department says, judges from the Environmental Protection Agency will come to Treasury to begin hearing the travel cases. Even so, some lawyers are eager to challenge the fines. ``My assessment is that they are afraid to go after this very vigorously. Politically, they are way out on a limb to begin with,'' said Arthur Heitzer, a lawyer in Milwaukee. TOURISM DISGUISE Some opponents of Castro say the door to Cuba, while only slightly ajar, still is too far open. ``A lot of the travel is very thinly disguised tourism. When people go as tourists and pay money to the tourism hotels, they hurt rather than help the Cuban people,'' said Dennis Hays, executive vice president of the Cuban American National Foundation, an exile lobby and advocacy group. In Congress, the issue does not fall neatly along partisan lines. Some conservatives, including Cuban-American legislators, say a windfall of tourist dollars would only pump life into a moribund communist regime in Cuba. Others counter that U.S. citizens should be allowed to travel where they please and bring American values with them in people-to-people diplomacy. The Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of restrictions on travel to Cuba in the early 1980s, but lawyers say they feel they have grounds for a new legal challenge. They contend that fine amounts are set arbitrarily and politically motivated to reward the Cuban-American lobby in Florida and New Jersey that largely supported President Bush's election last year. Richard Newcomb, the head of the Office of Foreign Assets Control in the Treasury Department, denies that the law is applied unfairly: ``We apply this evenhandedly and across the board. . . .'' Declining to give numbers, a Treasury spokeswoman said people with Hispanic surnames are also receiving the penalty letters. If Newcomb is correct and the law is applied fairly, a growing number of Cuban Americans can expect to receive penalty letters soon for violating the restriction that limits travel to the island to once a year for family visits. ``The group of travelers . . . who most violate the travel regulations are people of Cuban descent,'' said John Kavulich of the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council. But some see the current crackdown as compensation to the Cuban-American community engineered through Newcomb's division. ``He's got the best-trained wet finger in the wind,'' said Richard Nuccio, a former special advisor on Cuba to the White House in the mid-1990s. ``He's been able to detect wind shifts and move accordingly.''