Should
Treasury Dept track terrorists funds or Cuba travelers?
O'Neill
Veers From Bush Policy
March 15,
2002
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON
(AP) -- Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill says that if Bush administration
policy would let him, he would cut back on tracking down and fining
U.S. citizens who travel to Cuba.
Those resources would be used better in chasing terrorists, O'Neill
said at a Senate hearing Thursday where his comments were a departure
from official policy.
``If you were a retired little old lady from Illinois, a school teacher
who is now interested in a bicycling tour of Cuba, and then a year and
a half later got a fine from the Treasury Department, you'd be apoplectic
about it,'' Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., told O'Neill at a hearing by
his Senate Appropriations subcommittee.
``I'm wondering whether you think it's such a particularly wise use
of resources to ratchet up more energy toward enforcing a law like this
at a time when ... it's a time to chase terrorists,'' Dorgan said.
O'Neill bypassed the chance to criticize Fidel Castro or his 43-year
tenure in Cuba, never mentioning the man or the island by name.
``If I had the discretion for applying the resources, I would agree
with you completely,'' O'Neill said. He urged a review of laws ``that
tell us what we must do'' and appealed for changes that would ``provide
sensible discretion.''
His position on enforcing the travel ban was directly at odds with that
of President Bush, who pushed for increased enforcement last summer
and in January.
A White House spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment on
O'Neill's remarks.
Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., a longtime critic of Castro, took issue with
O'Neill's stance and suggested it might get the Cabinet member in trouble.
``I don't think he's expressing the policy of the Bush administration,
and I don't know if you should give him Mike Parker's telephone number
as to what happens when people go before Congress and begin expressing
opinions that are not part of the head coach's game plan,'' said
Graham, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.
The president fired Parker as civilian head of the Army Corps of Engineers
last week, shortly after Parker criticized Bush's proposed budget for
the Corps.
The White House issued a statement later Thursday attributed to O'Neill
saying the secretary fully supports the administration's travel ban.
``I am not seeking any change in the law or our enforcement of it. ...
If any of my comments indicated otherwise that was not my intention,''
he said in the statement.
Dorgan is one of many in Congress who want to ease commerce and U.S.
travel restrictions, saying it would increase farm and pharmaceutical
exports while also giving visiting Americans the chance to promote democratic
values among ordinary Cubans.
The senator did not accept O'Neill's contention that he lacked the discretion
he needs, saying the Treasury has the ability to make choices.
Enforcement of the ban has been increasing, from 188 in 2000, the Clinton
administration's final year, to 766 in 2001, the Bush administration's
first year, Dorgan said at a hearing last month.
The ban actually bars U.S. citizens from spending money in Cuba, which
is why it is enforced by the Treasury Department.
That ban, as well as strict limits on commerce, were heartily endorsed
Tuesday by a State Department official.
Cuban-born Otto Reich, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere
affairs, argued before the Center for Strategic and International Studies
that the United States should not be ``throwing a lifeline to a failed,
corrupt, dictatorial, murderous regime.''
