The Daily Signal - Whatever Happened to Those Pro-Democracy Protests in Cuba?

Episode Date: September 20, 2021

Thousands of Cubans took to the streets in July to protest the county's communist government. But since then, two months later, we have heard very little about the pro-democracy movement in Cuba.  Many of the individuals who led the protests are now in prison, says John Suarez, executive director at the Center for a Free Cuba. Despite that, Suarez says he remains hopeful for Cuba’s future.  “[T]here's a profound desire by Cubans for change,” Suarez says, adding that what is needed now “is international solidarity, not just in the United States, but from the democratic world more broadly.”   Suarez joins “The Daily Signal Podcast" to discuss the strength of the pro-democracy movement in Cuba and how America can play a role in moving the Caribbean island nation toward freedom.   Also on today’s show, we read your letters to the editor and share a good news story about a simple way you can say thank you to two U.S. military veterans.  Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We'd love to talk, business. This is the Daily Signal podcast for Monday, September 20th. I'm Doug Blair. And I'm Virginia Allen. What happened to the protests in Cuba? In July, Cubans took to the streets in protest of the communist government. But we have heard little to nothing about Cuba in the past two months. John Suarez, the executive director of the Center for Free Cuba,

joins the show today to discuss what is happening in Cuba now. And if there is still an active effort to challenge the communist regime. We also read your letters to the editor and share a good news story about how you can help thank two veterans for their service this month. Before we get to today's show, Doug and I want to tell you about the most popular resource on the Heritage Foundation website, The Guide to the Constitution. More than 100 scholars have contributed to create a unique line-by-line analysis of our Constitution. The guide is intended to provide a brief and accurate explanation of each clause of the Constitution as envisioned by the framers and as applied in contemporary. law. There has never been a more important time to have an understanding of our founding document. So if you want to learn more about the Constitution, go ahead and visit heritage.org

slash constitution or simply search for heritage guide to the Constitution. Now stay tuned for today's show coming up next. What happened in Cuba? Over the summer, we saw a wave of pro-democracy protests across the nation. Is this movement still alive or is? did the communist Cuban regime succeed in shutting it down? Here to answer those questions is executive director of the Center for a Free Cuba. John Suarez, John, thank you so much for being here. Thank you, Virginia.

It's an honor to be able to share this space with you. The movement is still alive because unfortunately, the underlying conditions that drive it continue. We have a 62-year-old communist dictatorship that has prevented Cuba. from being the authors of the protagonist in their own lives, first and foremost, and that's been aggravated over the last couple of years during COVID, because this regime has tried to take advantage of the situation to further tighten down its totalitarian grip over the population. And in December of 28th, they announced that they were shutting off travel

from countries that Cubans normally traveled from on January 1st, including the United States, Dominican Republic, Panama, Haiti, and other places. places where many Cubans would get the food, medicines, and other supplies that they need, while at the same time maintaining tourism open from Russia and other places that had much higher levels of incidents of COVID coming in and causing outbreaks in places like Matanzas, which is near Vadadero, one of the tourist areas. So what the Cubans always won, they weren't being allowed to get the things they needed. Internally, Cubans aren't allowed to fish. It's very difficult for them to do because of the communist regime strictures.

Farmers can only sell to the state. The state is very inefficient, so we have a lot of crops that are rotting. And if they would try to sell it to folks in their communities, they would be fined in jail. And so you have a situation where people are going hungry, crops are rotting, they're not able to get medicines and supplies from outside.

And then to add injury to insult in June, they announced that they were going to stop the dollar circulating in the country, which most Cubans were getting dollars from relatives in the U.S. And this was a way to frighten Cubans into turning in dollars they had saved up and would use in the black market over to the government. So I think those series of actions by the government aggravated an already difficult situation. Protests had been breaking out in Cuba for many years, but they tended to be isolated when they were planned. State security would be able to intervene ahead of time. For example, the summer that you had the George Floyd protests in the United States,

a young man was shot in the back in Cuba by the police by name of Hansel. He was cremated quickly. The family was complaining that this was an injustice. And when activists try to organize, just the announcement that they were organizing a protest, homes were surrounded, people were detained, and nothing could be done. What was different on July 11th with the demonstrations that took place was that they were spontaneous. They were not planned. So state security didn't have an opportunity to preempt it.

And it started in one area just south of Havana, called San Antonio de los Banos, and it got out over social media. And this was sort of the game changer, because there are a lot of Cubans these days that have access to social media. They saw the protest taking place in this location, in large numbers, and then it multiplied across the island,

and you had tens of thousands of Cubans protesting. Wow, that's fascinating to hear that role that social media play. It was powerful. And it started on July 11th, and despite massive militarization, repression, I mean, we saw the videos that came out later of paramilitary forces going out with baseball bats, being brought off of buses that were brought in in large numbers to attack demonstrators. Other forces dressed in black firing on unarmed demonstrators, a video of that also came out. And the nominal president, Miguel Diascanel, who was placed in his current position by Raul Castro, calling for combat in the streets and mobilizing, as he said, communist and other revolutionaries to deal with the protesters.

Despite that, these protests continued from July 11th through July 13th. Thousands of people were rounded up. We know of hundreds of prosecutions that are ongoing in political showtrials, political show trials in many cases where they do not have lawyers representing them. The folks that, one of the driving forces behind the protest was a song called Patry and Vida, which was co-authored and produced by artists outside of Cuba and inside of Cuba. Those who are inside of Cuba, like El Funky, Michael Castillo-Sorbo, Luis Manuel Otero-Cantara, who appears in the video, are all.

Well, two are in prison, one's under house arrest. Luis Manuel Latero, if you might have recalled yesterday, was in Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People in an essay that was penned by Ai Wei Wei talking about him. And all of those individuals, they were essentially made up of, correct me if I'm wrong, but the Santa Cedar Movement was kind of the movement that was going through Cuba

and leading this pro-democracy movement. And those individuals, the artists, the individuals that wrote that rap song, they were really at the forefront and driving this movement, correct? Well, I think the music drove the movement. The problem is that the way the regime operates, there's no free press. The independent press is able to magnify itself or amplified itself mostly abroad, and some of it gets back into the population. The artists, though, have played an important role. Because of what happened last year, the Sanisian Movement organized a series of actions to defend one of their colleagues who had been unjustly jailed, and it escalated into a hunger strike at the Santa Cedar Movement. The regime responded by raiding, beating up, and detaining all the hunger strikers.

But then something curious happened. Hundreds of artists appeared outside the Ministry of Culture on November of 27th, and that was something that was also unheard of. And for several hours, hundreds of them just waited requesting to meet with the Ministry of Culture. to present their demands, one, that these individuals would be freed, and two, that artistic freedoms would be returned to Cuba. The San Jacedral movement emerges in 2018 when the regime further tightens down on artistic freedoms in Cuba with something called Decree 349, which basically requires any artists doing anything in Cuba to get permission prior to engaging in a work of art from the Ministry of Culture. And that's what drove this movement into its existence in the first place.

and the Ministry of Culture, when these hundreds of people met, they actually received them, they agreed to have a dialogue, and then as soon as they left, the regime went back to its own, its old pattern of breaking the agreement, slandering the participants, and that created a dynamic. Then in early February, you saw this song, Patria and Vida come out that spread throughout the island, sort of virally. And it did play a role in the protest, but I think the underlying conditions, was something that was beyond the San Jacedar movement itself, but the San Jacido movement lent a narrative to it.

So the Sanisidro movement is really kind of that grassroots a little bit more, you know, since, you say since 2018, they've been really leading this push towards democracy. And then the artist really added fuel to that fire. And I think that's so fascinating that from the arts movement, from people saying, I want to have freedom to explain. express myself in song, in art freely, that that is the thing that so specifically in July really, really drove this movement. That's true.

Very, very powerful. So you mentioned some of the artists we know are in prison for the leaders of the pro-democracy movement. Do we know for sure where they are? Have you spoken with any of them? Are they safe? Are they still organizing protests? Where do things stand?

Well, most of them are in prison. Some are in hunger strikes, Felix Navarro, who's a very important figure, who had been in prison previously back in 2003. I mean, this movement's been, there has been a pro-democracy movement in Cuba since the late 70s. Back then was focused more on human rights in the early 2000s with Olds Vald de Paya and the Christian Liberation Movement. There was the Varela project in which over 25,000 Cubans signed a petition calling for human rights reforms and democracy in Cuba. Felix Navajro was part of that movement that was gathering petitions and the response by the regime was to engage in a massive crackdown. And the organizers of the petition drive were sentenced. They were from 15 to 28 years in prison. They thought that would get rid of the movement then.

Instead, what happened was out of that crackdown arose the ladies and white, which were the wives, sisters, mothers, daughters, daughters, of these political prisoners who then took to the streets and protest demanding their loved one's freedom, led by Lada Poyan. They were able to obtain after nine, ten years, the freedom of all of those individuals that were jailed during the 2003 crackdown. In both cases, Osvaldo Paya Sardinias in 2012 and La Dauillon, 2011, the leaders of the movement died under suspicious circumstances. In the case of Lado Poyant after everybody was released and she announced that the movement will continue because it was a human rights movement and that the laws in place had not been changed. Therefore, there would be new prisoners of conscience. A short time after that, she suddenly became ill and in a

hospital surrounded by state security, which her family did not have easy access to, died. In the case of Vado Paya, in 2012, he was a victim of an engineered car accident involving state security. So the consequences are dire. Felix Navarro has been in a hunger strike now for a number of weeks. We fear for his life. Jose Daniel Ferrege, Garcia, another member who had been involved in the 2003 Varela Project has been missing. And we now know, in theory, where he's being held, they've released video, but his family has not been able to talk with him or see him. And obviously, the other great concern we have at this time for all these activists have been jailed. And also, many more that

newly joined this movement between July 11th and July 3rd. 13th is the issue of COVID. The regime has been underreporting COVID deaths and trying to spin its propaganda as a medical power, but the reality is we know anecdotally a lot of people are dying, a lot of prisoners have contracted COVID, and people who never should have been in prison in the first place. I can give you an example. A person that we put out a press release on a couple days ago, Vetthilio Mantilla was someone who went to prison this past December for wearing a T-shirt that said, you know, supporting San Isidro. He went to prison, he got out on July, in early July, then was accused of calling a police officer shameless during the protest between July 11th and 13th,

re-arrested, and now they want to add three years to his prison sentence, accusing him of having pro-freedom posters at his home. That's the actual formal charge. And there are hundreds of cases like that playing out right now. We are talking with John Suarez, the executive director at the center for a free Cuba. John, we were hearing so much in the news about the protests in Cuba and what was going on throughout July and then it just seemed like it was dead silent. Are there still any protests happening at all? And how do you see this movement moving forward? Well, there are protests taking place because it's the nature of what's happening is just causing people to respond. What the regime did in August was to pass a new law called Decree 35, basically threatening

people who videotape, who share things on social media with fines in prison, and also encouraging their cadres to physically assault them. So if they see somebody taking a video of a protest or some sort of atrocity being committed by the government, there is, one, if you're caught doing it, you can be fined in jailed. Two, if a regime agent is in vicinity or someone sympathetic to the regime, you can be physically assaulted and have the equipment you're using taken away from you. And third, they have said that those people that are caught using critical content will have their internet taken down. So it's going to be more difficult to get those images out. And that's, the other thing that happened, though, and I think it's important to highlight, is that the

timing of this occurred in the midst of other things happening internationally that sort of drowned out what was going on in Cuba. You had the earthquake in Haiti and then then Afghanistan. And that sort of dominated the headlines through the rest of July and August. And now there's an opportunity, I think, to go back and take a look at what's happening in Cuba. And I mean, these political trials, the repression, the images of the shootings and beatings taking place, I think, is something that needs to be revisited. And lastly, there needs to be deep concern over the whole COVID-19. situation. The regime is trying to sell that they have a number of vaccines that they're trying to use to profit from internationally. The vaccines have not been peer reviewed. They're using them on

children as young as two years old. Nobody else has been doing that with any of the other vaccines that have been peer reviewed. And we're getting information of people who've, in the case of QB, you have to get three shots of their vaccine, but folks that have done that are still getting sick with COVID. So the situation is quite grave. And what's the situation with the media there? Are the Cuban people, is the Cuban media able to report accurately? What is going on? Are they being repressed?

What's happening there? Cuba's media, it's a communist dictatorship. The media is controlled by the communist regime. There are independent journalists, but they are not legally recognized. And they have to use creative means to smuggle their stories out of the media. the island and then try to have them broadcast back in. And obviously the regime has been tightening up their grip over social media to try to shut those avenues down. And what do you make of America's media coverage of Cuba over the last two months? Do you think it's been fair and accurate?

I think that between July 11th going forward, I thought the reporting was by and large pretty good. I think that in some cases, I think, such as the New York Times, there was a bit too much emphasis on just the issue of medical, trying to look at it as something to do with medical shortages or just with COVID, and not listening to the people's cries for freedom for an end to the dictatorship and also the shots of down with communism. So, yes, there was an aspect to it that had to do with the failures in COVID-19, the failures of the regime to address food security issues on the island. But it goes far deeper than that because people recognize that it's the centralized, planned economy, the communist nature of the system that has created such a difficult situation

on the island that needs to change. And they were calling for that in the streets. And in some cases, that was not reported on accurately. John, if you would, share with us just a little bit. of your own story, why this issue is so important to you and the work that you do at the Center for Free Cuba? Well, I'm a Cuban American. My family came from Cuba, family in Cuba. So growing up, we would get the calls from the island and hear about the shortages, hear about the fears of not being able to speak freely because your phone call would be cut off. And my family also, you know, had visited the island. And again, you get the sense it's a garrison state and

also living growing up in Miami, Florida. I also had the opportunity to meet a number of former political prisoners, people who spent 28, 30 years in prison in college. It was part of a group called the Free Cuba Foundation, and we were trying to share this information with a wider American audience. One of the things that got me involved, I grew up in Miami, so I assumed everybody understood what was going on in Cuba. And then in the 1990s, through the Leadership Institute, I went out and worked on some campaigns in the Midwest, first in Nebraska and then in Iowa. And in both cases,

I had a friend contact me and say, hey, you might want to come out. They're going to be talking about Cuba. And the people that were talking about Cuba, in one case was a lady by name of Sandra Levinson, who operated with a group out of New York that was taking young Americans to Cuba, basically to brainwash them,

and say that Cuba was this wonderful place and that they wanted to repeat that model here in America, which obviously horrified me. And then later on in Iowa, there were Cuban diplomats that were also making the rounds in the Midwest to promote agricultural sales with the island, but also to promote their model of government. And when I saw that, that was something that inspired me to get involved in the Cuban pro-democracy cause for two reasons. One, obviously, to help the people in Cuba, but also to very much let Americans know that this is not a model you want to bring to the United States. States. It's disastrous. It has enslaved generations of Cubans that never wanted it in the first place. If we go back to how Fidel Castro came into power, he knew that if he had announced in

1959 that he was a communist, he would have never made it into power. So he was talking about restoring democracy from a dictator who had come to power in 1952. And while he was talking about free speech, democracy, human rights, and fooling many people in America and in Cuba, he was setting up a police state with the help of the KGB and the Communist Party and mass executions. And they consolidated and they've been there for 62 years in counting. What is your message then to Americans? Because, you know, as, as you know, we have seen this new fascination across America with socialism. And still today, we see people, you know, refer to Cuba or try to glamorize it. What would you say to those Americans today. There's nothing glamorous about the regime in Cuba. It is a regime where you have a very small

group of military hierarchy run by the Castro family that live like millionaires while 90% of the population lives in absolute misery. And worse yet, not only is there absolute poverty, but you don't even have the right to complain because if you complain, you're punished. There was a Cuban author, Ronaldo Arenas, who came out of Cuba in the early 80s. And what he said to it was that the difference between capitalism and communism is that when in capitalism someone kicks you, you can scream. In communism, you have to say, thank you, may I have another. And smile.

So then, I mean, are you optimistic? Are you optimistic that there can be real change in Cuba, that we can see things move forward in a positive way? one day we'll be able to celebrate Cuba's freedom? I'm optimistic because what I saw over those days in July, there's a profound desire by Cubans for change. What we need is international solidarity, not just from the United States, but from the democratic world more broadly. The consequences of not backing democracy in Cuba has been dire. We see it the way the Cubans have been able to extend their influence into places like Venezuela, Nicaragua,

and the humanitarian disasters that are occurring there. And you have a presence of Cuban troops, Cuban intelligence officers. They're torturing Venezuelans and Nicaraguanians today. And that's because of the failures in the 1990s when there was an opportunity for a democratic change in Cuba. I mean, in August 5th of 1994, there was a mass uprising in Havana called the Malikonassal. The problem then was that the Clinton administration at that point decided that they feared more a mass exodus of Cuban rafters because of a change of system, and they thought that the Castro regime would be able to control the frontiers better than what the consequences would be for that communist regime to continue. And we saw it a few years later with the rise of Hugo Chavez and now Nicholas Maduro in Venezuela, the return of Daniel Ortega, who had been placed there by the Cubans in the 1970s,

and backed by the Cubans now as his grip on power has tightened in Nicaragua. We see him rounding up opposition parties after claiming to have reformed his ways. He's returned to his old ways. What are the steps then that the Biden administration needs to be taking today right now, to be promoting freedom in Cuba? And is there anything that people like me can be doing to move that forward? Is there anything that the American people can be doing to promote freedom and democracy in Cuba? Sure.

Well, first, what can the Biden administration do? One, President Biden did come out with some very strong statements early on, backing the Cubans and declaring the Cuban dictatorship a failed state. Those were very positive statements. He's extended sanctions. He's maintained Cuba on the list of state sponsors of terrorism that was returned to that list by President Trump after being removed during the Obama administration. But those are more, they're not the active steps that we need. So on the active front, State Department did push to get a statement by a number of states.

I think 2021, recognition. recognizing what was going on inside of Cuba, but I think more needs to be done on that front, on the international front, at the UN, at the OAS. They tried to get something like the OAS, but it was able to be tabled by the Caribbean countries, but there needs to be more of a diplomatic effort on that side. That's one. Two, I think they need to highlight, and I understand it's been difficult because of what's the new cycle and with what's been taking place in Afghanistan. But the issue is that the Biden administration back in July authorized humanitarian flights to Cuba. And one of the things we've been calling for is a humanitarian corridor where the regime

doesn't get its hands on aid going into the island. The regime's response was silence. They did not respond to the cargo plane carriers and would be bringing the aid in, and we're already in September. So I think highlighting the fact that they're not really interested in getting aid that would go directly to Cubans, two Cubans. They're doing it through, you know, Russia, China, and Mexico with Lopez Obrador, that are allies, and that's something that can be controlled by the Cuban military.

The other issue are remittances. Currently, there are remittances going into Cuba, but the Cuban military is the one who benefits most. The Cubans, when they send aid to their family, anywhere from 35 to 45 percent, stays with the agencies, which are connected with the government. but then once it gets over there, the military basically has everything in the banking institutions. Dollars immediately go to pesos, and there's a devaluation there. So I think highlighting the exploitive practices of the military, pushing on the international front,

placing a light on what's going on inside the island with the prisoners, the State Department does have a, on their Twitter feed, jailed for what, which is focusing on different specific cases of political prisoners, and that's currently, you can find that on your Twitter channel. I'd recommend Americans to retweet that. But in terms of what you can do concretely, as an American citizen, write your congressman, write your senator, write the White House about your concerns with what's going on in Cuba. I invite you to check out to join our mailing list, Cuba Brief. Our website is cuba center.org, and we would also direct you to other groups that are doing fine work there.

And I think also if we want to look at the subject of communism, I would also recommend visiting the website of the victims of communism, Memorial Foundation, that offers a lot of information more holistically. They also touch on Cuba, and there's some great videos there of victims of repression. There's a video about Rosa Maria Paya, daughter of the activist Osvaldo Paya, who was killed in 2012. There's a case of Surley Avila Leone, who was a local government representative who thought she could do something, and she tried to reopen a school for children, so it wouldn't have to walk several miles back and forth.

They declared her basically a leader, which in Cuba is not a good thing, and she ended up the victim of a machete attack and lost a hand and the use of her knees and was not provided proper health care because of her dissident activities. and ended up having to come to the United States to be able to even walk minimally again. When she arrived in the airport, her legs were literally hyper-extended, and the one hand that she had remaining, they had unnecessarily bound up, so she lost the use of that hand through atrophy.

So the doctors here were able to, with physical therapy, get her to gain use of her remaining hand and be able to bend her knees again and be able to walk in a limited fashion. But that was something that happened in 2015 during the detente with the United States. So this is a brutal regime. It's a regime that is killing its own people,

silencing its own people to remain in power. And Americans can do something about that concretely by doing some homework, some research, and contacting their elected representatives and saying that they care about this. It's 90 miles away from U.S. shores, and it's been 62 years. It's enough.

That's enough. Well, we thank you, John, for the work that you're doing at a Center for Free Cuba to bring us these stories to inform us what's actually really going on. We so appreciate the work that you're doing. We will put those links in our show notes for your website and the other resources that you mentioned. But thank you so much for your time today. Thank you, Virginia. Conservative women. Conservative feminist. It's true. We do exist. I'm Virginia Allen and every Thursday morning on problematic women, Lauren Evans and I sort through the news to bring you stories and interviews that are of particular

interest to conservative leaning or problematic women. That is women whose views and opinions are often excluded or mocked by those on the so-called feminist left. We talk about everything from pop culture to policy and politics. Search for problematic women wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for sending us your letters to the editor each Monday. We feature our favorites on this show. Who's up first? Well, we received a five-star review from one of our listeners on Apple Podcasts who wrote, Refreshing and Needed, Straightforward News and an Admirable Pursuit of Truth. And in response to Victor Davis Hansen's commentary piece, Biden can't escape blame for Afghanistan fiasco.

Peter Pinnar of South Africa writes, Very Thought-provoking article by Victor Davis Hansen. I live in South Africa and find your president, Joe Biden, somewhat amusing and not trustworthy. based on how he chops and changes his narrative. What I also find peculiar in listening to various broadcasts about the situation in Afghanistan are Biden's constant references to the planned evacuation of U.S. citizens who are still trapped. At the same time, I hear him constantly refer to COVID-19 in the U.S. and use a somewhat threatening tone towards any would-be transgressors of imposed rules and regulations.

But I have not once heard Biden make any reference to the possibility of a widespread escalation of COVID among the thousands of Afghans trapped at the Kabul airport. Strange to say the least. Your letter could be featured on next week's show, so send us an email at Letters at DailySignal.com. If you're tired of high taxes, fewer health care choices, and bigger and bigger government, it's time to partner with the most impactful conservative organization in America.

We're the Heritage Foundation, and we're committed to solving the issues America faces. Together, we'll fight back against the right, rising tide of homegrown socialism and we'll fight four conservative solutions that are making families more free and more prosperous. But we can't do it without you. Please join us at heritage. org. Virginia, you have a good news story to kick off our week. Over to you. Thanks so much, Doug. Many of you are familiar with the name Janine Stang. Janine is a motivational speaker, nationally known patriotic singer and leader of the Medal of Honor Mail Call.

Janine organizes regular letter writing campaigns to thank veterans for their service and to celebrate veterans on special occasions. She's joined us on this show many times. And Janine is once again inviting Americans to participate in two special missions this month to thank veterans for their service. The first mission is for a Vietnam veteran named Michael. When Michael returned home from serving in Vietnam, he was met with hostility from some Americans who opposed. the war. Michael's son recently sent Janine a letter and asked if she could help organize a redo, welcome home all these years later. I recently spoke with Janine about Michael. She read a bit of the letter she received from Michael's son asking for help honoring his father's service.

The part that really gets you is where he says, I'm sure you've heard the phrase, though I have left Vietnam, Vietnam has not left me. These past 50 years have had their share of challenges, struggles, many surgeries. He's a non-Hodgkins lymphoma survivor. I don't know how he's done it, but if I turn out to be an eighth of the man he is, I'll be doing good. Now, Michael is a Vietnam veteran. He served from 70 to 71, and he was discharged on September 27th. So 50 years, in 1971, so it'll be 50 years that he's been home.

And I'm sure many people who are listening right now know that Vietnam veterans did not get the welcome home that many of our soldiers do now. So we want him to know how much we appreciate him and that he's worthy of a huge welcome home. And in that case, in this case, it's the form of a bunch of letters in his mailbox. So his son reached out asking, and we are so happy to do this. Michael has no idea that these letters are coming, and Janine is hoping to surprise him with hundreds of welcome home cards to commemorate the 50th anniversary of his return to America from Vietnam. Janine is also leading a birthday mission for World War II veteran Lawrence Decker, who is turning 100 on September 30th. I recently spoke with Janine, and she told me a little bit about Mr. Decker and why she decided to help his family celebrate him in this. special way.

Lawrence Decker, who's about to celebrate his 100th birthday, we have a lot of them so far, a lot of 100 centennials, I think is what the right name is. Lawrence is from New Mexico, and he was drafted into the Army in 1942. He served in the infantry in North Africa, France, Italy, and Germany. And then after the war, like so many of these World War II veterans, he just wanted to return home to his normal life. and he lived on a farm in New Mexico, and now he is happily retired. Mr. Decker's family is throwing him a big birthday party at his senior center later this month

to celebrate his life and his service to our nation. And Janine is hoping to have tons of letters to give him to say thank you and happy birthday. So if you want to send either Michael a thank you card, a welcome home card, or Mr. Decker, a birthday card. you can text USA to 3377 and you will get all the information on how to participate. You just have to be sure to have your card in the mail by this Thursday, September 23rd. So again, that's texting 3377 for all of the information. You know, our veterans, they have given so much in service to you and I to this country.

And what a unique opportunity it is for us to be able to write them a letter and personally say thank you. Completely agree, Virginia. Please definitely give a big round of applause and a letter to these veterans who served their country with honor and distinction. Virginia, thank you so much again for sharing that story. We are going to leave it there for today,

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