A new national poll shows bipartisan support for U.S. actions in solidarity with pro-democracy demonstrators in Cuba — with the broadest backing for U.S. efforts to provide internet to the people on the island.
Conducted by the Republican polling firm Echelon Insights, the poll surveyed 1,143 registered voters as part of a monthly online panel. The poll, provided first to the Miami Herald, showed relatively small differences between Democratic and Republican voters on some key questions.
A majority of voters surveyed (64%) reject the Cuban government’s version that the U.S. embargo is to blame and says the communist government is most responsible for the conditions that led to the uprising. Seventy two percent of Republicans, 61% of Democrats and 58% of independents agreed with that statement.
A bipartisan majority (65%) wants the U.S. government to work with private companies to provide internet access to the people in Cuba. Although Cuban American Republicans have been rallying about this issue, the survey found the strongest support among Democrats (71%) and independents (65%) although a clear Republican majority (60%) also back those efforts.
“One surprising takeaway is that the Cuba issue is now bipartisan when it used to be a very strongly Republican issue,” said Patrick Ruffini, founder and partner at Echelon Insights. The poll results underscore “that this is a unifying issue for the American people. There is no downside for Biden’s coalition of voters. People are united in support of the protesters and increasing internet” access for the Cuban people.
For instance, a plurality (41%) of those surveyed said they favored President Joe Biden showing public support for the demonstrators on the island — 44% of Republicans and 41% of Democrats. Independents were more likely to say they wanted events to unfold on their own (40%). Twenty-two percent of all respondents say they were unsure about how Biden should respond.
Biden came out July 22 with a strong statement condemning “unequivocally ... the mass detentions and sham trials” following the protests, and stating his support for “the brave Cubans who have taken to the streets to oppose 62 years of repression under a communist regime.” He also said his administration was working with civil society organizations and the private sector to find ways to circumvent the regime’s Internet censorship efforts.
He also imposed sanctions on Gen. Alvaro Lopez Miera, the head of Cuba’s Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces and the Ministry of Interior’s Special Forces Unit known in Cuba as Boinas Negras — Black Berets — for their role in suppressing the protests.
It is unknown which respondents were aware of these actions before participating in the poll since it was conducted between July 19 and July 23. The measures were announced July 22.
The protests that shook the six-decade-old communist regime on July 11 have become a national news story, with 68% of those surveyed saying they have heard about the demonstrations.
“There is also pretty strong bipartisan agreement on the Cuban responsibility for what is happening as opposed to deflecting blame on U.S. sanctions,” said Ruffini.
The biggest share of those polled (48%) also said the appropriate response from the U.S. government is to impose more sanctions on the island’s regime. Both a majority of Republicans (57%) and the largest share of Democrat respondents (45%) back a stronger response to the Cuban government crackdown on protesters.
Only a quarter of respondents, among them a slightly bigger share of Democrats (29%), said they are “somewhat” or “strongly opposed” to additional sanctions, while 36% of overall respondents believe it is best to “let the protests unfold on their own without intervening.”
On Wednesday, the Senate’s foreign affairs committee approved a bipartisan resolution condemning the Cuban government’s violent response to the demonstrations.
“As the Díaz Canel regime continues its campaign of violent repression, disappearances, and arbitrary imprisonment to try to crush Cuba’s pro-democracy movement, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is speaking unanimously in absolute solidarity with the thousands of Cubans risking it all to liberate themselves from the iron hand of dictatorship that has crushed their spirit for more than 60 years,” said Bob Menendez, D-N.J., the committee’s chairman.
“I am very proud to lead this effort to make it clear Democrats and Republicans are united in saying we will not overlook, romanticize or try to explain away the Cuban regime’s brutal oppression of simple human and democratic rights, or its total disdain for the aspirations of its own people,” Menendez said.
Echelon’s online panel, which included 416 voters registered as Republicans, 231 as independents, and 481 as Democrats, was conducted between July 19 and July 23 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points.
According to a statement provided by the firm, respondents recruited through the online panel were matched to voter data provided by L2, a national voter database. “The data was weighted to known demographic and voter turnout characteristics of the registered voter population derived from U.S. Census Bureau estimates and the national voter file,” the statement says.
In general, online panels are less efficient than phone surveys in reaching people that do not regularly use the internet or those who prefer speaking in languages other than English. All questions were asked in English.
Another national online poll also coming out Wednesday found a similar percentage (36%) of registered voters who said the U.S. should not get involved in the events happening in Cuba. The Hill-HarrisX poll conducted between July 20 and 21 found a smaller percentage (24%) of respondents in favor of imposing sanctions on the Cuban government. But it is difficult to compare the results because each poll asked different questions, had a different sample size, and had different margins of error.
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