The 2020 Florida International University (FIU) Cuba Poll results were released this week and they provide some encouraging data for President Trump in a hotly contested swing state. Now in its 20th year, the FIU Cuba Poll measures the opinions of Cuban-American citizens living (and voting) in Florida, where they are a key demographic. Contrary to much of what you’ll hear from the mainstream media, Floridian Cuban-Americans have maintained a solid level of support for President Trump across a variety of issues and a majority of them still plan to support the President in the upcoming election. (CBS Miami)

A majority of Cuban Americans support President Donald Trump and plan to vote for him in November, according to the latest FIU Cuba Poll.

They gave Trump high marks on his handling of key national issues such as the COVID-19 crisis, immigration, health care, Cuba policy, China policy, and the economy, and mixed but still supportive reviews on his handling of race relations and national protests

The Cuba Poll, which is the longest-running research project measuring Cuban American public opinion, also found increased support for isolationist policies and for the U.S. embargo on Cuba.

The results of the poll seem fairly unambiguous. Trump receives high marks from Cuban-Americans in Florida on all of the measured key national issues. His handling of American policy toward Cuba and the Castro regime are similarly regarded favorably. That’s not a subject that has received much media attention since the transition to the Trump administration and the onset of the pandemic, but it’s still clearly of interest to the Cuban-American community.

This edition of the poll found that 60 percent of Cuban Americans in Florida support Trump’s policies. That’s the highest level of support registered since 2007. The highest levels of opposition were (unsurprisingly) found among the youngest Cuban-Americans and those who are registered Democrats. But those groups were not nearly numerous enough to overcome the total sample in the survey.

Guillermo Grenier was the principal investigator of the survey and his observations should give Democrats reason to pause in their continued support for the Cuban regime. He’s quoted as saying “There is strong support to give antagonism a chance.” In this case, “antagonism” refers to a continued policy of isolation for the Cuban regime as opposed to expanding the economic opportunities offered to them by the Obama administration.

All categories of respondents expressed overwhelming support for regime change in Cuba and American support and diplomatic pressure toward that goal. That comes in stark contrast to the policies of the previous administration, where economic engagement in Cuba was seen as a path toward the “enlightenment” of its government. 2020 is a particularly appropriate year to consider such questions when we look at what’s been going on in China. For a very long time, American policy has been seemingly based on the idea that if we just welcomed China into the fold of international trade and showed them how they would benefit from capitalism, a shift toward democracy would follow. The actions of the CCP in recent years have shown us the folly of that theory.

The same should probably apply to Cuba. No amount of capitalist activity or wealth will shift the old guard away from socialist dominance and the hunger for power demonstrated by the communist party. Will that lesson carry over? It’s hard to say. But the Cuban-American community in Florida remains influential, and they clearly like what’s being served up by the Trump administration better than what Joe Biden and the Democrats are offering.