Don’t Talk to the FBI! New Orleans Agents Intimidate Cuban Solidarity Activist — Fight Back! News

New Orleans, LA – On June 25, FBI agents called Cuban solidarity activist Jack Reno Sweeney to question him about his work. They visited his former apartment a week before the call, and called his mother on June 24. They called his mother a second time two days later.

This intimidation occurred after Reno Sweeney received Cuban diplomats in the city from May 22 to 24. The visit promoted solidarity between the people of New Orleans and the Cuban people and challenged the U.S. trade and aid embargo on the island.

Fight back! interviewed Reno Sweeney about the trip and the FBI harassment. He is a good example of what to do when an agent shows up at your door – do not talk to the FBI. The FBI will try to find ways to mislead you, call at odd hours, show up at your home or work, contact family, or whoever they can get a hold of. Either way, tell them you have nothing to say. If you have an attorney, you can tell them to have your legal representative contact them. Jack Reno Sweeney is the co-chair of New Orleans DSA and a member of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization.

Fight back!: Describe your interaction with the FBI.

Jack Reno Sweeney: I had recently moved and when I got mail from my old apartment, I spoke to the new tenant for the first time, who I didn’t know. But she told me that there were two people looking for Jack Sweeney, dressed in suits. I wasn’t sure if it was the FBI, but it seemed most likely. I did think it had something to do with Cuba, because I had met with the embassy officials in Washington, DC, and had them come here. When I went to Cuba and met with various officials, including the president, I wasn’t questioned on the way back, like some people are. But somewhere in the back of my mind I suspected that this would happen if I did Cuba work, but it took a while for them to beat around the bush and contact me.

A week or two after that incident I contacted lawyers and did what I could to find out what was going on. I got a call from my mother and was told that two officers had gone to her house and left a card.

I didn’t tell her they were looking for me because I expected them to come to my house. I had just moved, but I had reported a change of address to the post office.

She calls them and they tell her that they believe someone they think is me is transporting two “visitors” from a country they are not allowed to disclose. They do not confirm that it was a visit from the Cuban delegation and they tell her that the car is still registered in her name. For whatever reason it was easier to find out which car the Cuban visitors were in, I guess.

My mother wasn’t really prepared, so she told me that I was going to receive two Cuban diplomats, and she doesn’t really know anything else. Then she called me and I told her that I hadn’t done anything illegal that would deserve special attention.

They call me the next morning and try to ask me questions directly.

I told them I wouldn’t talk to them without a lawyer present, and then they tried to get me into a coffee conversation with my lawyer present. I told them I would talk to my lawyer, but that I didn’t expect to get a call back.

Finally they call my mom back and say Jack doesn’t want to talk to us, and if she can tell us anything, please do. She said no, if Jack doesn’t want to talk to you, he doesn’t want to talk to you.

I have seen tinted black Suburbans, make and model, on my block in the last few years. You know, typical undercover cars. But I haven’t heard anything about them since.

Fight back!: Why do you think they wanted to question you? What were you doing regarding Cuba?

Jack Reno Sweeney: I have been interested in Cuba for a long time. Culturally, New Orleans and Cuba have many ties that were broken by the embargo. New Orleans and Cuban musicians have a lot of exchanges. I live very close to a statue of José Martí, there are not many statues of José Martí in the United States. The first place where the Cuban flag flew was in New Orleans.

After having been to Cuba myself and been so warmly welcomed by so many different people, and realizing how open and truly community-oriented the society was, I felt compelled to do everything I could to defeat the creeping narrative that the embargo is beneficial to the Cuban people, when in reality it is doing the greatest damage to the quality of life on the island.

Cuba has accomplished things that are difficult for us, the richest country in the world, to do. They have a similar life expectancy. There is also significant damage to the people in the United States because of the embargo, for example in the area of ​​medical research. I wanted to take that opportunity to break down this wall between the American people and the Cuban people.

The FBI wants to keep that wall up. They want to limit the information about what Cuba is really like, so people can’t do their own research and find out that they too are against the embargo.

It is an intimidation attempt to keep the lid on the anti-embargo organization and to try to determine who is trying to organize locally to end the embargo. This shows that local efforts to fight the embargo and state efforts to strengthen ties really undermine the US efforts to undermine the regime.

Fight back!: Can you tell me more about your delegation to Cuba?

Jack Reno Sweeney: Yes, we were there for four days. We met with different elements of civil society and government, including national unions, student organizations, representatives of ministries, people who work on climate issues, representatives of the National Assembly for People’s Power, the Cuban equivalent of the US Congress.

There were some cultural exchanges. There were many meetings, one of the most memorable was at CENESEX, the national institute for sex education, which was the guiding force for the Families Code that was adopted in 2022, the most progressive codification of LGBTQ rights in the world. That agency is headed by Mariela Castro.

We were there to learn by example how the goals of the labor movement in the United States could be realized in an environment that, frankly, is very similar to the United States, a society with great racial and cultural diversity.

We visited Committees for the Defense of the Revolution, which are basically neighborhood associations that function as a micro level of democracy for involvement in community issues. We learned how many people participated in the revision of the Constitution. We visited a hospital and delivered a lot of medical supplies. When we visited, we learned about a drug that treated diabetic foot ulcers and reduced 70% of amputations. But people in that hospital can’t use dialysis filters because of the embargo, so they had to come up with a whole procedure to clean dialysis filters, which can’t be reused. But they designed a way to do it because they had to.

Fight back!: What did you do with Cuban diplomats during their visit?

Jack Reno Sweeney: We spoke to representatives of the city council to try to get the ball rolling for an anti-embargo resolution. We spoke to the local district office of Congressman Troy Carter, who has been to the island several times and is against the embargo.

We introduced them to a lot of local groups that were interested in ending the embargo or otherwise. Many were interested because they were labor groups or student organizations that supported Cuba.

There are many things that people here in New Orleans can learn from Cuba, like dealing with climate change or organizing a multiracial social movement. It was a kind of reunion, because there was a lot of Cuban and New Orleans cultural exchange. There was an attempt to reconnect the people of Cuba and the people of New Orleans on a basis that is actually much more favorable than it was during the extractive colonialism before the revolution.

At the time, the same mafiosi who controlled the casinos in Havana were those who exploited the people in New Orleans, often with the tacit or explicit approval of the government.

I truly believe that the embargo will be lifted soon, and it can’t happen soon enough.

#NewOrleansLA #FBI #Political repression #end of embargo #cubalibre #Cuba