Another group of Cuban migrants arrives in the Keys
A group of four migrants from Cuba arrived in the Florida Keys early Monday morning.
The group landed on the shores of the Upper Keys village of Islamorada shortly before 2 a.m., according to Agent Adam Hoffner, division chief of U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Miami operations.
The arrival happened five days after Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officers stopped a twin-outboard engine boat in the Middle Keys that was overloaded with fuel canisters, GPS units and other equipment that led federal officials to investigate whether it was heading to Cuba to pick up migrants.
Details of Monday’s landing were not immediately available.
Both incidents happened amid a surge in maritime migration from Cuba to South Florida not seen since the waning days of the so-called “wet-foot, dry-foot” policy, which allowed those from the island nation who set foot on U.S. soil above the high-water mark to stay in the country and apply for permanent residency after a year.
Those caught at sea were returned to Cuba.
The Obama administration abruptly ended the program in January 2017 in one of its last foreign policy decisions. Sensing it was coming to a close as then-President Barack Obama sought to mend diplomatic ties with the communist government, migration from Cuba to the states spiked in 2016 and 2017, then dropped dramatically in the immediate years after.
From Oct. 1, 2017, to September 2018, for example, the Coast Guard stopped 1,468 Cubans at sea who were trying to reach the U.S. By 2020, the Coast Guard only stopped around 50 migrants from Cuba along the Florida Straits.
However, as the political and economic situation within Cuba began to deteriorate about two years ago, people started leaving the island again in large numbers, despite the incentive that wet-foot, dry-foot offered being long gone.
From Oct. 1, 2020, to September 2021, the Coast Guard encountered 838 Cubans at sea on their way to South Florida. Since Oct. 1, 2021, however, that number has already reached 1,257 people.
Over the past two weeks, the Coast Guard has returned more than 120 people to Cuba who were stopped at sea off the Florida Keys in 17 different interdictions.
The Coast Guard returned 70 people to the island Friday and 55 more migrants on Monday.
Additionally, Federal officials are still investigating a bizarre incident that happened earlier this month when 15 people from three former Soviet bloc countries hopped off a sport fishing boat that was tied up to the pier at Southernmost Beach on Duval Street in Key West.
The agency released a statement this week stressing that the journey over the Florida Straits is dangerous and often proves deadly for migrants.
“We urge family members in the United States to dissuade their loved ones to make this dangerous journey,” Lt. E’Bria Karega, with Coast Guard District Seven, noted in a statement. “We are fortunate these people were reported in good health because that is not always the case.”
This story was originally published April 11, 2022 at 6:53 PM.
