Will Obama visit Cuba?
The White House isn’t ruling out a presidential trip to Cuba after President Obama on Wednesday announced sweeping new changes to relations with Havana.
“If there’s an opportunity for the president to visit, I’m sure he wouldn’t turn it down,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said, adding that he assumed “like many Americans, he has seen that Cuba is a place where they have a beautiful climate and a lot of fun things to do.”
{mosads}”I certainly wouldn’t rule out a presidential visit,” Earnest added, noting that just a month ago Obama had visited Beijing.
“It is not unprecedented for us to go places and interact with countries,” he continued, despite disagreements over human rights.
Later, asked about the possibility in an interview with ABC News, Obama said he did not “have any current plans” to visit the island — but declined to rule it out.
“Let’s see how things evolve,” he said.
Earlier Wednesday, Obama announced that “high-ranking officials” would visit the island as part of an effort “to re-establish diplomatic relations that have been severed since January of 1961.”
“Where we can advance shared interests, we will, on issues like health, migration, counterterrorism, drug trafficking and disaster response,” Obama said.
Secretary of State John Kerry said Wednesday that his assistant secretary for the Western Hemisphere, Roberta Jacobson, will travel to Cuba to lead the U.S. delegation for the next round of U.S.-Cuba migration talks.
Kerry also said he looked “forward to being the first secretary of State in 60 years to visit Cuba.”
Broadly, the administration has said it would ease travel restrictions to the country, as well as restrictions on exports to Cuba. The government is also allowing U.S. financial and telecommunications firms to establish more of a foothold in the island nation.
— This story was updated at 5:25 p.m.
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