The Democrats have gotten most of their political ducks in a row on domestic policy. Everyone supports abortion, men using the ladies’ room, and radical environmentalism or has been told to leave the party.

Foreign policy is a little more complicated.

Apart from the split between American Jews and the Left over Israel, there’s the split between Latin Americans and the Left over Cuba.

The split is obviously sharpest among Cubans and Venezuelans in Florida leading to catastrophic election results in 2020 that ought to be credited as much to AOC as a revitalized Republican base in Florida led by Governor Ron DeSantis.

The latest protests in Cuba have only sharpened the split with Black Lives Matter and AOC’s DSA, along with House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Gregory Meeks coming out for the Cuban Communist regime, while the Biden admin tries to appease both sides.

The ‘both sides’ approach has typically involved condemning the violent suppression of the protests while calling for watering down or ending the embargo. 

But the issue isn’t rhetoric, it’s emotion.

Florida Democrats have begged the Biden admin and national Dems to show strong emotional support for Cubans. The Left equally wants a strong condemnation of the embargo and “American capitalism and imperialism”. Satisfying both sides is impossible. The Left wants full relations with Cuba while Cuban-Americans want to see pressure on the regime.

Much as on Israel or Iran, the Left is winning the policy battle even while Democrats keep pandering to Cuban-Americans, as they do to Jews and Iranian refugees in America, hoping that the rhetoric will obscure the policy. But when protests are happening in the streets, hollow rhetoric can’t cover up reality.