Celebrities and journalists of Cuban descent did not mince words while expressing their satisfaction following the death of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro Friday night.
Cuban-born singer Gloria Estefan posted a photo to Instagram Saturday of a boat full of Cuban refugees with a message denouncing Castro as a leader who sanctioned the “annihilation of those with an opposing view, the indiscriminate jailing of innocents, the separation of families, the censure of his people’s freedom to speak, state-sanctioned terrorism and the economic destruction of a once thriving & successful country.”
“Although the death of a human being is rarely cause for celebration, it is the symbolic death of the destructive ideologies that he espoused that, I believe, is filling the Cuban exile community with renewed hope and a relief that has been long in coming,” Estefan wrote.
Former MLB star Jose Canseco took to Twitter to recall how Castro forced him to leave Cuba for the U.S., which is why “I can’t say I feel anything for his death.”
Can’t say I feel anything for his death. There is a reason many defected to USA
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 26, 2016
I was born in Cuba and Fidel Castro was our leader. Came to the USA because of him.
— Jose Canseco (@JoseCanseco) November 26, 2016
Journalist Soledad O’Brien, of Cuban heritage, called Castro a “legend and dictator” and tried to sort out the complicated nature of the Cuban people’s relationship to its longtime leader.
At the cost of dictatorship and killing your enemies and jailing those u don’t like and killing your economy. Quite a cost. https://t.co/d0OfHY9z08
— Soledad O’Brien (@soledadobrien) November 26, 2016
Legend and dictator. He was very complicated. And for many Cubans a hero (at first) bc he got rid of Batista and gave the finger to the US. https://t.co/xvO8Uiazga
— Soledad O’Brien (@soledadobrien) November 26, 2016
Cuban model and television host Daisy Fuentes tweeted a Clarence Darrow quote about showing “satisfaction” at Castro’s obituary.
#FidelCastro dead at 90 #Cuba ? pic.twitter.com/wo6caxgNDY
— Daisy Fuentes Marx (@DaisyFuentes) November 26, 2016
Gossip blogger Perez Hilton, born Mario Armando Lavandeira to Cuban parents in Miami, released a video of his mother crying tears of joy at the news of Castro’s death.
Actor Andy Garcia, who was five when his parents left Cuba for Miami, released a statement to the Hollywood Reporter expressing his “deep sorrow” for “all the Cuban people both inside and outside of Cuba that have suffered the atrocities and repression caused by Fidel Castro and his totalitarian regime.”
“The executions, persecution and imprisonment of political dissidents and the LGBT community, denial of free press, elections and religious freedoms, continue to be his legacy,” Garcia continued. “He claimed that history would absolve him, but it can also condemn him.”
Many lawmakers also weighed in on the news, including the first Cuban-American elected to Congress, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who fled Cuba when she was eight.
A tyrant is dead + a new beginning can dawn on the oppressed island of #Cuba.#Cuban ppl must b guaranteed #liberty, #democracy, #humanrights
— Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (@RosLehtinen) November 26, 2016
“The only thing that Fidel has been successful in, has not been health nor education, or human rights or democracy, it’s been holding onto power — which is easy to do when you don’t have elections,” she told CNN.
