From the archives: Protesters strategize to keep Elian in U.S.

This article was originally published in Newsday on January 8, 2000

Washington - The fate of 6-year-old shipwreck survivor Elian Gonzalez remains awash in a political sea as anti-Castro groups Friday plotted strategies rife with unprecedented legal issues to delay his return to his father in Cuba.

Desperate to stave off the boy's scheduled departure by next Friday, the boy's Miami relatives filed for his custody in Florida State Family Court on Friday as sympathetic members of Congress proposed granting him U.S. citizenship and subpoenaed him to testify before a congressional committee.

Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.) said he subpoenaed Elian to testify before the Committee on Government Reform on Feb. 10, so that he will remain in the country while the courts can consider his case. Anyone under congressional subpoena is barred from leaving the country.

Committee sources told the Associated Press it was highly unlikely the boy would actually be called to testify. Burton said the subpoena would "ensure that no precipitous action is taken." Protesters vowed to clog the streets of Little Havana, and even shut down access to Miami's airport Monday in a show of power, while presidential candidates took shots at Wednesday's ruling by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

President Bill Clinton again backed federal immigration officials, saying "they followed the law and the procedures" and asked challengers of the decision to do the same.

"This is a volatile and difficult case," he said. "We need to keep this out of the political process as much as possible within the established legal channels." INS Commissioner Doris Meissner made what legal experts called a predictable ruling that the father had rights to the custody of Elian, who was rescued Thanksgiving after his boat capsized, killing his mother and 10 other Cuban asylum-seekers.

Juan Miguel Gonzalez, Elian's divorced father, wants his son brought back to Cuba, a request that President Fidel Castro supports. A Miami-based cousin and great uncle of the boy, however, charge his return would take away his freedom and possibly harm him emotionally.

After two interviews with Juan Gonzalez in Cuba, Meissner ruled the father had standing to decide immigration issues for the child. Attorney General Janet Reno backed that decision despite a request to overturn it by the Miami relatives.

Those relatives filed on Friday an emergency petition in Florida State Family Court in Miami to give temporary custody of Elian to his great-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez. The matter was before a judge late Friday.

Georgetown University Law Professor Paul Rothstein said if the motion succeeds, it would raise "an unprecedented question of what takes primary jurisdiction, the state court or INS." Traditionally, federal decisions have had precedence over state court rulings, and federal courts may have to decide the issue.

Even if the tactic ultimately fails, it may succeed in buying time for Congress, which returns on Jan. 24, to vote to make Elian a U.S. citizen.

Congress has enormous powers over immigration issues.

According to Sen. Connie Mack (R-Fla.) and other Republicans, conferring citizenship on Elian would preserve the father's rights to see his son and, more importantly, would preserve the boy's rights to live in freedom.

It also could buy the boy's relatives time to mount legal challenges in state or federal court.

Yesterday, aides for Mack and Florida Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen were drafting Elian's citizenship bill. Mack aide Nancy Segerdahl said, "It simply maximizes his options." If Elian were granted citizenship, even if he returned to Cuba, he could decide to live in the United States after he became an adult and could bring in other family members, Segerdahl said.

Rothstein called this subpoena "unprecedented" and called it a "bad policy." On the campaign trail, Republican presidential candidates uniformly slammed the INS decision.

Democrat Bill Bradley said "the boy should stay here" but the courts should decide. In a departure from Clinton, Vice President Al Gore called for a "temporary visa" for Elian and the right of his father to come here to state his wishes "on free soil."

William Douglas contributed to this report.