Chess Piece: The Elián González Story
At the turn of the millennium, a five-year-old boy from Cuba found off the Florida coast on Thanksgiving became the most talked about child in America. Elián González had left Cuba with his mom and a dozen other migrants, trying to make it to the U.S. but on the way, the boat capsized. Elián’s mother drowned. Before she did, she tied her child to an inner tube, saving his life. Relatives in Miami — Cuban exiles — took the boy in. His father in Cuba wanted him back. The ensuing international custody battle over Elián González became its own mini Cold War, pitting Cuban exiles in Miami against supporters of Castro’s regime on an island just 90 miles away. The fight over Elián’s future came down to neighbor against neighbor, family against family. Now, 25 years later — we revisit his story through the voices of people who lived it firsthand. ________________ Want to support our independent journalism? Join Futuro + for exclusive episodes, sneak peaks and behind-the-scenes chisme on all our latest podcasts. www.futuromediagroup.org/joinplus.
Episodes
On Thanksgiving 1999, five-year-old Elián González was rescued at sea near the Florida coast after his mother and others drowned on a make-shift boat, fleeing from Cuba. His miraculous survival would make global headlines, but Elián would be put in the middle of a dramatic familial feud and two enemy nations — highlighting the very Cuban experience of family separation.
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In 1999, two Florida fishermen found a cherub of a boy named Elián González in the sea on Thanksgiving. The boy had floated alone for days. His mother managed to save her son’s life by strapping him to an inner tube before she drowned. Elián's father in Cuba desperately tried to get his son back.
Our host, investigative journalist Peniley Ramírez, was also separated from her family by the Florida Straits. When Peni was 11 years old...
After Elián’s Thanksgiving rescue at sea, he was released to relatives in Miami. Just a day later, the Cuban government sent a note: the boy’s father and Fidel Castro wanted Elián back. Tensions between the U.S. and Cuba had long been high, and relations were about to be tested to the extreme as the Thanksgiving miracle became an international custody battle. Just over a week after his rescue, on Dec. 6, 1999, Elián turned six year...
While authorities decided how to proceed, Elián stayed in Little Havana with his Miami relatives, including with his older cousin turned mother figure, Marisleysis. The Cuban American community in Miami rallied around the family, arguing that Elián would only be free in the U.S., and that sending him back to Cuba was sentencing him to a life under the Communist regime.
This idea was fueled by traditional exile ideology, a set of be...
Throughout the ordeal, Elián's father always insisted he wanted the boy to return to Cuba. But many Cuban Americans speculated that Juan Miguel wasn't operating under free will — but rather under threat, and in the shadow of Fidel Castro.
As the Miami family refused to hand Elián over to his father, tensions boiled over and negotiations began. The Attorney General, lawyers and other negotiators tried to bring the two sides together...
As negotiations failed, the U.S. government had been carefully planning for the possibility of taking Elián by force. Then on Easter Weekend, the order came. Armed agents stormed the house in a pre-dawn raid, armed with tear gas and semi-automatic rifles. They smashed down the door of the Miami home where Elián's relatives were keeping him.
Donato Dalrymple, the man who had rescued Elián at sea, grabbed the boy and hid with him in ...
In the aftermath of the raid, agents brought Elián to Washington D.C. where father and son would finally reunite. But Elián and his dad were stuck in the United States while the court case played out — and while Miami burned with rage at what many Cuban Americans saw as a deep betrayal by the federal government.
Peniley reflects on the power of reunions. As Elián was reunited with his father, his cousin Marisleysis was in despair. ...
Elián and his dad went back to Cuba in June 2000, just four months before the US Presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore. Miami Cubans, hurt and angered by President Bill Clinton’s handling of the Elián case, resolved to vote against the Democrats and for the Republicans in what was called el voto castigo — the punishment vote.
To understand the political influence of Cuban-Americans, the stakes, and lasting impact...
Peniley tells us the story of Elián after he returned to Cuba, where he studied engineering, fell in love and had a daughter. Back in his country, Elián became a favorite of Fidel Castro, much to the chagrin of Miami Cubans. Peniley reflects on Elián's journey and her own relationship with Cuba. She speaks to her children about her and Elián's Cubanismo.
This season's cover art by Ranfis Suárez Ramos.
Original Material Appeared ...
After taking you through the Elián González story, we’re sharing some reporting and interview content that didn’t make it into our narrative series.
This week, Peniley and producer, Tasha Sandoval, sit down to reflect on their experiences reporting on this project, particularly through their perspectives as Cubans: Peniley, a Cuban who grew up in Cuba, and Tasha, a second-generation Cuban-American.
During the Elian saga, the Cuban ...
In the final episode this season, Peniley reflects on the throughline of the Elián story: family separation.
In an extended interview with Cuban American historian Ada Ferrer, we share her family’s story of separation and reunification. Her mom left Cuba when she was pregnant with Ada in 1963, soon after the revolution. They left behind her 9-year old brother, Poly, or Hipólito, playing in the yard without telling him they wouldn’t...
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