by Merriam Ansara
We in Massachusetts are pleased and grateful that our Representatives and Senators in Congress have written to President Biden asking that he remove Cuba from the list of so-called State Sponsors of Terrorism, the SSOT, re-engage with Cuba and move towards full restoration of relations.
In June of this past year, we hand delivered a letter to each and every one of the MA Congressional Delegation in Washington, asking for this action. We are pleased that the majority, led by Rep. Ayanna Pressley and Rep. Jim McGovern, have heard their constituents and have now sent the letter that we have asked for to our President, urging him to fulfill his promise and respond to the call to alleviate the suffering of the Cuban people caused by the SSOT, the 243 Trump Sanctions and the Embargo. This letter is a result not just of the goodwill and comprehension of our elected representatives but of a grassroots movement by the people of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, led by Massachusetts Peace Action and the Democratic Socialists of America.
And we are not done. Our goal is to unite the entirety of our state, long a beacon of progressive actions in the United States, around the call to remove Cuba from the SSOT, lift the sanctions, end the embargo and restore the normal trade, financial, educational, cultural, scientific and social relations that the Commonwealth has had with Cuba historically, going back more than 200 years.
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Merriam Ansara has been a community activist and organizer since 1969. She is a member of MAPA’s Board of Directors as well as a leader of the Cuba Subcommittee of the Latin America and Caribbean Working Group.