Dive Brief:
- Florida’s higher education governing board announced that its travel ban to Cuba would not be lifted now that the country will be removed from a U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism.
- The Bradenton Herald reports that state officials will require public schools to wait until diplomatic relations are officially renewed, for which there still is no timeline.
- Critics are calling the announcement a political overreach and arguing it will continue to limit the academic freedom of public university professors, according to the article.
Dive Insight:
President Barack Obama announced in December he planned to reopen diplomatic ties with Cuba but, so far, that has been limited to expanded travel allowances and the upcoming removal of Cuba from the terror sponsor list. Florida’s higher education officials, pressured by the powerful anti-Castro Cubans in Miami, have taken the delay in opening full diplomatic relations as an opportunity to hold onto travel restrictions many assumed would have faded because of the terror list revision.