Miami Herald ELIAN outing in Washington brings criticism in Miami (Bagley connections) May 9, 2000 Author: Frances Robles [Excerpt] WASHINGTON -- For the first time since flying to the nation's capital aboard a U.S. Marshals Service plane two weeks ago, Elian Gonzalez appeared in public over the weekend -- at the home of a Washington, D.C., power broker who opposes the Cuba trade embargo.
The boy's presence Saturday at the tony Georgetown home of Smith Bagley, grandson of tobacco magnate R.J. Reynolds and a big-time Democratic donor and fund-raiser, inspired criticism in Miami. ``What's he doing there?'' Spencer Eig, attorney for Elian's Miami relatives, said Monday. ``It doesn't look right.''
But a source close to the Cuban Interests Section said the idea behind the party was innocent enough -- to get the Gonzalezes out of the Wye Plantation, a rural estate where they have lived in seclusion with Cuban visitors for two weeks. ``It had to do with going out of their way to show he's not a hostage,'' said the source, who asked not to be identified.
The choice to hold the outing at the Bagleys made sense, the source said. Bagley is a wheeler dealer married to the former U.S. ambassador to Portugal. Elian was hardly his first famed guest: He's hosted Bill and Hillary Clinton, Barbra Streisand and Gen. Colin Powell.
Bagley offered $10,000 to Bill Clinton's legal defense fund and is the money behind the Arca Foundation, an organization devoted to more contact and fewer trade restrictions with Cuba. As chairman, Bagley heads what is much like the Cuban American National Foundation of the other side of the Cuba debate.
Arca's $72 million has offered millions to organizations that sponsor things like university study in Cuba and marine projects. In 1998, it gave $75,000 to the Miami-based Cuban Committee for Democracy, whose chairwoman is Elena Freyre. The group actively argues for a less hardline U.S. posture toward Cuba.
Bagley is a former national finance chairman of the Democratic Party. ``Smith Bagley is financier of not the anti-embargo movement, but the pro-Castro movement,' said Jose Cardenas, director of the Cuban American National Foundation's Washington office. ``He's openly hard-core, low-key but very committed. He and his wife are the prototypical power couple -- wanting to impress their similarly minded friends with, `We are so tied in that we can serve up to you Juan Miguel and the little raft boy.' It bugs me.'' [End Excerpt]
Leftwing stooges create another front for Castro*** The Cuba Policy Foundation is headed by Ambassador Sally Grooms Cowal, who acts as its president. If you can remember back to the Elian Gonzalez debacle, Sally Grooms Cowal was the individual whose other group, Youth for Friendship, "hosted" the Cuban boy in the Rosedale mansion after he was taken by Janet Reno's agents in Miami. The Rosedale compound, which is in Maryland, is owned and operated by Youth for Friendship. Additionally Grooms Cowal, was a former deputy assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs under President George Bush in the late 1980s. She has also served as ambassador to Trinidad and Tobago. The CPF (Cuba Policy Foundation) is bankrolled by the Arca Foundation.……………. Communist Cuba is the main focus of Arca's Foreign Policy grants list, and although it gives money to other international and domestic institutions, it annually gives a substantial amount of funds to causes dealing with communist Cuba. In 1999 alone, the Arca Foundation gave to over 19 organizations that are sympathetic to revolutionary Cuba.
The Arca Foundation's records denote that it has spent over $3 million dollars since 1995 devoted to institutions that ignore human rights in Cuba, but fight aggressively to drop US sanctions to the rouge nation. The Arca Foundation which is run by the R.J. Reynolds tobacco heir Smith Bagley, has silently worked in the background with institutions and Castro sympathetic Democratic politicians working to end economic sanctions against the dictatorship. ***
House Group: Ease Cuban Sanctions (Cuba Policy Foundation: Smith Bagley)***"Ending the Cuban embargo is a bipartisan issue," said Sally Grooms Cowal, who was U.S. ambassador to the Caribbean nations of Trinidad and Tobago during the administrations of the first President Bush and President Clinton. She is now president of the Cuba Policy Foundation. ***