SNA (Chicago) — Joe Biden was elected president of the United States on a platform of unifying the country through bipartisanship, but political divisions over the US policy on Cuba have revealed a major challenge to his message of national unity.

Widespread street protests against the Cuban government and the ruling Communist Party of Cuba began in early July this year, sparked by low medicine and food supplies, economic collapse, and the government’s mismanagement of the coronavirus pandemic.

In over forty cities across the island, Cuban citizens have taken to the streets to call for freedom and an end to the 62-year Communist dictatorship that has controlled the island since the end of the Cuban Revolution in 1959.

The government has responded harshly to the protests, seeking to crack down on demonstrators. President Miguel Diaz-Canel described protesters as “counter-revolutionaries” and “mercenaries” in a televised address. His government temporarily shut off the country’s internet services in order to prevent information about the protests from getting out to the international community via social media, while arresting at least dozens of protesters across the island.

The unrest reignited a contentious debate within the United States, a country whose government had long sought to overthrow the regime, and highlights the fractured political climate. Last month, thousands of protesters descended on Washington DC to march on the Cuba Embassy and the White House. The protesters, many of whom were Cubans and Cuban-Americans from south Florida, have demanded that Biden “liberate” the island.

Biden strongly condemned the Cuban regime’s response to the protest, noting that “Cuban-Americans are hurting… because their loved ones are suffering.” He went on to call the situation “quite frankly, intolerable.” The administration placed sanctions that were “made in connection with actions to suppress peaceful, pro-democratic protests” and promised additional sanctions, as well as efforts to assist Cuban dissidents.

Many on the right have called for Biden to take stronger action against the Cuban government. Republican Senator Ted Cruz called the president’s response “lukewarm at best.”

Most recently, Florida Senator Rick Scott, Republican, called for the Biden administration to “hold the Castro regime accountable” while also demanding that the president request “proof of life” for every protester arrested by the Cuban government.

Some Cuban exiles have gone as far as to call for US military intervention on the island.

Biden’s response to the Cuba crisis hasn’t pleased progressives either. While conservatives have focused the blame for the Cuban crisis entirely on the Communist regime, progressives such as Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have called for Americans to “name the US contribution to Cuban suffering: our sixty-year-old embargo.”

Ocasio-Cortez tore into the Biden administration’s policy towards Cuba, specifically the ongoing embargo and sanctions, tweeting that she rejects “the Biden administration’s defense of the embargo. It is never acceptable for us to use cruelty as a point of leverage against everyday people.”

While Biden has taken measures to form a more widely accepted policy on the matter, such as consulting Cuban-American leaders, Cuba is an enduring political dilemma. The contentious nature of the issue, as well as increased scrutiny of foreign policy after the withdrawal from Afghanistan, have the potential to make Cuba a political thorn in the side of the Biden administration for a long time to come.

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