Category Archives: Gangs and Crimes

Garland Shooters, Fast and Furious, the FBI

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Still there is this operation known as Fast and Furious concocted by the ATF that lives for real….TODAY.

No one at the FBI, the ATF and DHS is really talking but some investigative reporters and a Senator are asking the right questions.

Assailant in Garland, Texas, attack bought gun in 2010 under Fast and Furious operation

by Richard Serranno

Five years before he was shot to death in the failed terrorist attack in Garland, Texas, Nadir Soofi walked into a suburban Phoenix gun shop to buy a 9-millimeter pistol.

At the time, Lone Wolf Trading Co. was known among gun smugglers for selling illegal firearms. And with Soofi’s history of misdemeanor drug and assault charges, there was a chance his purchase might raise red flags in the federal screening process.

Inside the store, he fudged some facts on the form required of would-be gun buyers.

What Soofi could not have known was that Lone Wolf was at the center of a federal sting operation known as Fast and Furious, targeting Mexican drug lords and traffickers. The idea of the secret program was to allow Lone Wolf to sell illegal weapons to criminals and straw purchasers, and track the guns back to large smuggling networks and drug cartels.

Instead, federal agents lost track of the weapons and the operation became a fiasco, particularly after several of the missing guns were linked to shootings in Mexico and the 2010 killing of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry in Arizona.

Soofi’s attempt to buy a gun caught the attention of authorities, who slapped a seven-day hold on the transaction, according to his Feb. 24, 2010, firearms transaction record, which was reviewed by the Los Angeles Times. Then, for reasons that remain unclear, the hold was lifted after 24 hours, and Soofi got the 9-millimeter.

As the owner of a small pizzeria, the Dallas-born Soofi, son of a Pakistani American engineer and American nurse, would not have been the primary focus of federal authorities, who back then were looking for smugglers and drug lords.

He is now.

In May, Soofi and his roommate, Elton Simpson, burst upon the site of a Garland cartoon convention that was offering a prize for the best depiction of the prophet Muhammad, something offensive to many Muslims. Dressed in body armor and armed with three pistols, three rifles and 1,500 rounds of ammunition, the pair wounded a security officer before they were killed by local police.

A day after the attack, the Department of Justice sent an “urgent firearms disposition request” to Lone Wolf, seeking more information about Soofi and the pistol he bought in 2010, according to a June 1 letter from Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, to U.S. Atty. Gen. Loretta Lynch.

Though the request did not specify whether the gun was used in the Garland attack, Justice Department officials said the information was needed “to assist in a criminal investigation,” according to Johnson’s letter, also reviewed by The Times.

The FBI so far has refused to release any details, including serial numbers, about the weapons used in Garland by Soofi and Simpson. Senate investigators are now pressing law enforcement agencies for answers, raising the chilling possibility that a gun sold during the botched Fast and Furious operation ended up being used in a terrorist attack against Americans.

Among other things, Johnson is demanding to know whether federal authorities have recovered the gun Soofi bought in 2010, where it was recovered and whether it had been discharged, according to the letter. He also demanded an explanation about why the initial seven-day hold was placed on the 2010 pistol purchase and why it was lifted after 24 hours.

Asked recently for an update on the Garland shooting, FBI Director James B. Comey earlier this month declined to comment. “We’re still sorting that out,” he said.

Officials at the Justice Department and the FBI declined to answer questions about whether the 9-millimeter pistol was one of the guns used in the Garland attack or seized at Soofi’s apartment.

It remains unclear whether Soofi’s 2010 visit to Lone Wolf is a bizarre coincidence or a missed opportunity for federal agents to put Soofi on their radar years before his contacts with Islamic extremists brought him to their attention.

Though Islamic State militants have claimed to have helped organize the Garland attack, U.S. officials are still investigating whether Soofi and Simpson received direct support from the group or were merely inspired by its calls for violence against the West.

Comey suggested that the attack fits the pattern of foreign terrorist groups indoctrinating American citizens through the Internet. He referred to it as the “crowdsourcing of terrorism.”

In a handwritten letter apparently mailed hours before the attack, Soofi said he was inspired by the writings of Islamic cleric Anwar Awlaki, an American citizen killed in a 2011 U.S. drone strike in Yemen.

“I love you,” Soofi wrote to his mother, Sharon Soofi, “and hope to see you in eternity.” In a telephone interview, Sharon Soofi described the letter and said her son had been shot twice in the head and once in the chest, according to autopsy findings she received.

At the time of the 2010 gun purchase, Soofi ran a Phoenix pizza parlor. His mother said that was about the same time he met Simpson, who worked for Soofi at the restaurant. They later shared an apartment, a short drive from the Lone Wolf store.

Reached by telephone, Andre Howard, owner of Lone Wolf, denied that his store sold the gun to Soofi. “Not here,” Howard said before hanging up.

Sharon Soofi said her son had told her he wanted the pistol for protection because his restaurant was in a “rough area.” She said he also acquired an AK-47 assault rifle at the end of last year or early this year, when authorities believe he and Simpson were plotting an attack on the Super Bowl in Arizona.

“I tried to convince him that, what in the world do you need an AK-47 for?” she said in a telephone interview. Soofi told her they practiced target shooting in the desert. Her younger son, Ali Soofi, was living with his brother and Simpson at the time, she said, but left after becoming frightened by the weapons, ammunition and militant Islamist literature.

She blamed Simpson for radicalizing her son, who she said had no history of religious extremism. A month before Soofi bought the pistol, Simpson was indicted on charges of lying to the FBI about his plans to travel to Somalia and engage in “violent jihad,” according to federal court documents.

Simpson was jailed until March 2011 and convicted of making false statements. But the judge ruled there was insufficient evidence to prove the false statements were connected to international terrorism. Simpson was released and placed on probation.

After the Garland attack, the FBI arrested a third man, Abdul Malik Abdul Kareem, and charged him with planning the Garland attack. At a detention hearing on June 16, prosecutors and an FBI agent provided details about the plot, but avoided discussing the history of the firearms.

Sharon Soofi said she found her son’s letter in her post office box. It was dated the Saturday before the attack, and postmarked in Dallas on Monday, the day after the assault, suggesting he dropped it in the mailbox before he and Simpson arrived in Garland. “In the name of Allah,” the letter began, “I am sorry for the grief I have caused.”

He referred to “those Muslims who are being killed, slandered, imprisoned, etc. for their religion,” and concluded, “I truly love you, Mom, but this life is nothing but shade under the tree and a journey. The reality is the eternal existence in the hereafter.”

 

Putin’s Kill List and a Victim

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Putin ‘personally ordered Litvinenko’s murder’: QC at inquest into Russian spy’s death says ‘direct and solid evidence’ ties ‘morally deranged’ President to the killing

By Steph Cockroft for MailOnline

Vladimir Putin ‘personally ordered’ the killing of Alexander Litvinenko and should be held responsible for his death, the inquiry into the former spy’s death has heard.

The lawyer for Mr Litvinenko’s family said there is ‘direct and solid evidence’ which ties the Russian state to the 43-year-old spy’s ‘assassination’.

Making his closing remarks at the end of the six-month inquiry into 2006 poisoning, Ben Emmerson QC added that it would be ‘impossible’ for the killing to have taken place without the approval of the ‘morally deranged’ Russian president.

He added that Mr Putin – whom he described as an ‘increasingly isolated tinpot despot’ – targeted Mr Litvinenko because he was ‘bent on exposing him and his cronies’.

He told the inquiry: ‘Vladimir Putin stands accused of this murder on solid and direct evidence – the best evidence that is ever likely to be available in relation to secret and corrupt criminal enterprise in the Kremlin.’ The Kremlin has always denied the claims.

Mr Litvinenko died nearly three weeks after drinking tea laced with polonium-210 in London in November 2006. Police concluded that the fatal dose was probably consumed during a meeting with Dmitri Kovtun and Andrei Lugovoi at a hotel in central London.

British authorities later decided that the pair – who deny involvement – should be prosecuted for murder. But the inquiry heard how the trial is now unlikely to take place.

Speaking outside the Royal Courts of Justice, Mr Litvinenko’s widow Marina claimed that her husband’s killers had finally been ‘unmasked’

She added that her husband had ‘vowed to expose corruption’ in the Russian Federal Security but that he had ‘paid the ultimate price’.

Paying tribute to the ‘loving father and husband’ who she says was killed by ‘nuclear terrorsim’, she said: ‘It was very difficult but very important to do this.

‘I’m very, very happy for what (the inquiry) will be able to bring to the open air for all people to be able to listen and see and discuss. Even more I’m so glad that people are still interested after more than nine years.’

Asked how certain she was that Mr Putin was behind her husband’s death, she said: ‘After 15 years being in charge, of course he is responsible for this. What I want to say I did exactly by this public inquiry. What I did is my tribute to my husband.

‘Any reasonable who looks at the evidence will see my husband was killed by agents of the Russian state in the first ever act of nucelar terrorsim on the streets of london and this could not have happened without the knowledge of Mr Putin.’

The inquiry, which began at the end of January, has heard from 62 witnesses in a bid to establish how Mr Litvinenko died and, crucially, who was responsible.

Sir Robert was told about forensic evidence linking Kovtun and Lugovoi to the murder, including the discovery of polonium-210 in the pair’s hotel rooms.

The inquiry also heard how Litvinenko’s whistle-blowing about Mr Putin and his alleged links to organised crime made him an ‘enemy of the state’.

Mr Emmerson QC had described the pair as ‘henchman’ who had been ordered to ‘liquidate’ Mr Litvinenko by the Russian state with the backing of Mr Putin.

WHO POISONED SPY LITVINENKO? THE PRIME SUSPECTS 

Dmitri Kovtun and Andrei Lugovoy are suspected of murdering the Alexander Litvinenko.

Litvinenko, 43, died nearly three weeks after consuming tea laced with polonium-210 in London in November 2006.

Mr Litvinenko is thought to have been working for British secret service MI6 whilst in the UK.

Both Kovtun and Lugovoy deny any involvement and remain in Russia.

They both initially refused to take part in the inquiry.

However in March 2015, Kovtun dramatically changed his mind and offered to give evidence before pulling out today. 

He described an honour awarded to Lugovoi for services to the ‘Motherland’ by the president in March as an attempt by Russia to undermine the inquiry.

He said: ‘It was a crass and clumsy gesture from an increasingly isolated tinpot despot – a morally deranged authoritarian who was at that very moment clinging desperately on to political power in the face of international sanctions and a rising chorus of international condemnation,’ he said.

‘Putin’s award to Lugovoi should be seen for what it was – a crude attempt to intimidate an independent judicial inquiry through cowardly political bluster.’

The inquiry had been due to hear from the prime suspect in the case, Mr Kovtun, but he withdrew at the 11th hour, amid claims of interference from Moscow.

Sir Robert said of the last-minute withdrawal: ‘This unhappy sequence of events drives me to the conclusion either that Mr Kovtun never in truth intended to give evidence and that this has been a charade.

‘Alternatively, if he has at some stage been genuine in his expressed intention to give evidence, obstacles have been put in the way of his doing so.’

In a statement given to the Inquiry, Mr Kovtun claimed he had ended up in the bar at the Millennium Hotel with Mr Litvinenko and Mr Lugovoi ‘completely by chance’.

He said Mr Litvinenko had ‘flopped down’ at their table before grabbing a teapot and pouring himself some tea.

‘He gulped down two cups and then had a coughing fit. In the course of the conversation he coughed constantly and wiped his mouth with a napkin.’

Mr Kovtun added that he had the impression that Mr Litvinenko had ‘mental health problems’ and was ‘driven to despair’, adding: ‘He was prepared to do anything to achieve his financial goals.’

The hearing had also heard from Mr Litvinenko’s father Walter, who claimed that his son’s final words on his deathbed were: ‘Daddy, Putin has poisoned me’. He said that his son also claimed the Russian president was ‘perverted’ and ‘very dangerous’, warning him to be ‘careful’ himself.

The Russian Embassy in London said it did not trust the public inquiry, which it claimed it had been ‘politicised’, and disregarded international law.

Both Mr Emmerson and inquiry chairman Sir Robert Owen praised the meticulous detective work of the Metropolitan Police.

Mr Emmerson described the investigation as one of the most extensive murder inquiries ever carried out in the UK and the post mortem on Mr Litvinenko as “the most dangerous” in British history.

Inquiry chairman Sir Robert Owen said he expected to return his conclusion by the end of the year.

Every U.S. Corporation Hacked by China

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From the Former NSA Director McConnell via CNN:

“The Chinese have penetrated every major corporation of any consequence in the United States and taken information,” he said. “We’ve never, ever not found Chinese malware.”
He said the malware lets Chinese spies extract information whenever they want. McConnell, who also led the NSA from 1992 until 1996, continues to investigate hacks as a high-ranking adviser to Booz Allen Hamilton (BAH).
He listed victims he has come across during his investigations: U.S. Congress, Department of Defense, State Department (which is currently dealing with Russian hackers) and major corporations.
The U.S. government has said it has caught Chinese spies stealing blueprints and business plans. Last year, federal prosecutors took the unprecedented step of filing formal criminal charges against five Chinese government spies for breaking into Alcoa (AA), U.S. Steel Corp. (X), Westinghouse and others.

Exclusive: Secret NSA Map Shows China Cyber Attacks on U.S. Targets

A secret NSA map obtained exclusively by NBC News shows the Chinese government‘s massive cyber assault on all sectors of the U.S economy, including major firms like Google and Lockheed Martin, as well as the U.S. government and military.

The map uses red dots to mark more than 600 corporate, private or government “Victims of Chinese Cyber Espionage” that were attacked over a five-year period, with clusters in America’s industrial centers. The entire Northeast Corridor from Washington to Boston is blanketed in red, as is California’s Silicon Valley, with other concentrations in Dallas, Miami, Chicago, Seattle, L.A. and Detroit. The highest number of attacks was in California, which had almost 50.

Each dot represents a successful Chinese attempt to steal corporate and military secrets and data about America’s critical infrastructure, particularly the electrical power and telecommunications and internet backbone. And the prizes that China pilfered during its “intrusions” included everything from specifications for hybrid cars to formulas for pharmaceutical products to details about U.S. military and civilian air traffic control systems, according to intelligence sources.

The map was part of an NSA briefing prepared by the NSA Threat Operations Center (NTOC) in February 2014, an intelligence source told NBC News. The briefing highlighted China’s interest in Google and defense contractors like Lockheed Martin, and in air traffic control systems. It catalogued the documents and data Chinese government hackers have “exfiltrated” — stolen — from U.S. corporate, government and military networks, and also listed the number and origin of China’s “exploitations and attacks.”

The map suggests that NSA has been able to monitor and assess the Chinese cyber espionage operations, and knows which specific companies, government agencies and computer networks are being targeted.

The NSA did not immediately respond to repeated requests for comment.

 

 

Other Terrifying Facts on Affects of Immigration

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Guardian: A group of eight illegal immigrant sex offenders, including at least one pedophile, have been arrested in the Rio Grande Valley, border officers have said.

The men, who come from Mexico, El Salvador, and Honduras had all previously been convicted of crimes including sex abuse, indecent assault and two counts of lewd behaviour with a child.

In a separate incident, four suspected illegal immigrants were discovered being taken across the border inside a black pickup truck and trailer, with two men locked inside a water butt.

A dog unit alerted police to the men’s presence inside the Dodge truck on July 25, and a quick search revealed two men hiding behind the back seats, and another two inside the trailer.

The truck and trailer have now been seized by the border patrol, and the men have been referred to the Rio Grande Valley Sector Prosecutions Office, a police press release said.

On the same day, border agents from the McAllen, Rio Grande City, and Kingsville forces arrested the eight sex offenders.

Four were from Mexico, two from El Salvador and another two were from Hoduras, agents said.

All eight had convictions for sex offences, including lewd and lascivious acts with a child under 14, sexual assault, fondling a child, and sexual abuse in the first degree.

Acting chief patrol agent Raul L. Ortiz said: ‘Thanks to the efforts of our Border Patrol agents, these convicted sex offenders no longer pose a threat to local communities.’

On the same day, another 11 suspected illegal immigrants were also detained, including two men found locked inside a water butt in a trailer (pictured)

On the same day, another 11 suspected illegal immigrants were also detained, including two men found locked inside a water butt in a trailer (pictured)

Later on Saturday officers arrested another seven suspected illegal immigrants at a known stash house along a river near Escobares, Texas.

Officers set out at 6am, following a singposted trail to the house, where the men were discovered hiding inside, a press released said.

The immigrants, six Mexicans and one Salvadoran, were all taken into custody, while the owner of the property was also arrested and was found to be carrying drugs.

The arrests come during heightened tensions over the U.S. – Mexico border following inflammatory remarks by Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump.

In a blistering speech launching his campaign, he attacked lax controls along the border, suggesting that Mexico was sending ‘rapists and killers’ into America.

Trump has since caused further controversy by retweeting a message accusing rival Jeb Bush of having a ‘soft spot’ for ‘Mexican illegals’ because of his wife. Bush’s wife Columba is a legal US citizen, but was born in Mexico. 

 

Inquisitor: An illegal immigrant charged with attempted murder in Ohio was set free earlier this month after the U.S. Border Patrol declined to take him into custody.

Authorities indicate that more felony charges against the man may be forthcoming.

Lake County sheriff’s deputies pulled over the suspect, who allegedly admitted to officers that he was in the U.S. illegally, on July 7, but upon being notified, federal immigration agents wouldn’t pick him up.

“The Lake County Sheriff’s deputies could not hold [the suspect] because he was not charged with any crime,” NewsNet5, the ABC News Cleveland affiliate, reported.

The man is now being held in connection with the ongoing investigation into the murder of a local woman and other crimes after being apprehended in a manhunt conducted by Lake County SWAT officers and other neighboring law enforcement agencies.

An irate judge (see footage of the initial court hearing embedded below) set bond at $10 million, and the suspect who entered a plea of not guilty is due back in court on August 3.

Multiple news outlets identify the suspect as Juan Emmanuel Razo, 35. As it emerge in the court hearing, he apparently has no driver’s license, passport, green card, or other documentation that would definitely establish his identity, however.

n illegal immigrant charged with attempted murder in Ohio was set free earlier this month after the U.S. Border Patrol declined to take him into custody.

Authorities indicate that more felony charges against the man may be forthcoming.

Lake County sheriff’s deputies pulled over the suspect, who allegedly admitted to officers that he was in the U.S. illegally, on July 7, but upon being notified, federal immigration agents wouldn’t pick him up.

“The Lake County Sheriff’s deputies could not hold [the suspect] because he was not charged with any crime,” NewsNet5, the ABC News Cleveland affiliate, reported.

The man is now being held in connection with the ongoing investigation into the murder of a local woman and other crimes after being apprehended in a manhunt conducted by Lake County SWAT officers and other neighboring law enforcement agencies.

An irate judge (see footage of the initial court hearing embedded below) set bond at $10 million, and the suspect who entered a plea of not guilty is due back in court on August 3.

Multiple news outlets identify the suspect as Juan Emmanuel Razo, 35. As it emerge in the court hearing, he apparently has no driver’s license, passport, green card, or other documentation that would definitely establish his identity, however.

Illegal Immigrants Outnumber Unemployed Americans

11.3 million illegal immigrants in U.S.
FreeBeacon:The number of illegal immigrants in the United States totaled 11.3 million in 2014, outnumbering the 9.6 million Americans who were unemployed in the same year, according to data from Pew Research Center and the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).“An estimated 11.3 million unauthorized immigrants lived in the U.S. in 2014,” says a Pew report. “The new unauthorized immigrant total includes people who cross the border illegally as well as those who arrive with legal visas and remain in the U.S. after their visas expire.”Of those 11.3 illegal immigrants, 8.1 million are participating in the labor force. “Unauthorized immigrants make up 5.1% of the U.S. labor force,” Pew says. “In the U.S. labor force, there were 8.1 million unauthorized immigrants either working or looking for work in 2012.”

In 2014, there were 1.7 million more illegal immigrants living in the United States than there were unemployed Americans. According to the BLS, the average number of unemployed Americans in 2014 was 9.6 million. The BLS defines an unemployed individual as someone who did not have a job but actively sought one in the past four weeks.

The executive action on immigration President Obama put in place in November of 2014 is set to help more illegal aliens become active in the labor force.

“Last year, President Barack Obama took executive action to expand an existing program and establish a new one that would offer work permits and deportation relief to an estimated 5 million unauthorized immigrants,” according to Pew. “The actions—which are on hold because of a lawsuit by 26 states—would be open to unauthorized immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children, who are parents with a child who is a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident, as long as they meet certain requirements.”

Obama Orders Financial Incentives

President Obama’s new immigrant amnesty provisions will incentivize businesses to hire illegal immigrants over native U.S. citizens – to the tune of $3000 per employee, congressional aides recently confirmed, according to The Washington Times.

Under the temporary amnesty, which will last for three years, five million illegal immigrants will be allowed to stay in the country legally for three years without threat of deportation. These immigrants will also be eligible for work permits, but will not be allowed certain public benefits such as access to Obamacare insurance.

This means that businesses who hire the undocumented immigrants will not be penalized for failing to provide health care coverage, reported The Washington Times. On the other hand, if the business hired a native-born worker and chose not to provide health coverage, the business could, by law, be fined a $3,000 penalty.

Businesses with more than 50 employees who refuse to provide insurance coverage to full-time workers are assessed a penalty for every employee who receives subsidies under Obamacare. But the five million undocumented immigrants are not allowed to sign up for Obamacare or receive subsidies, so businesses are not penalized, explains The Washington Times.

The loophole was criticized for seemingly placing illegal immigrants  ahead of American citizens in the job market.

“If it is true that the president’s actions give employers a $3,000 incentive to hire those who came here illegally, he has added insult to injury,” Republican Rep. Lamar Smith said. “The president’s actions would have just moved those who came here illegally to the front of the line, ahead of unemployed and underemployed Americans.”

Obama continues to maintain a positive outlook on his decision, saying Tuesday that “Immigrants are good for the economy.”

“We keep on hearing that they’re bad, but a report by my Council of Econmic Advisers put out last week shows how the actions we’re taking will grow our economy for everybody,” he said.

Secret White House Meetings on Cuba, Shooting From the Hip

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To date, agenda items are in place for normalizing relations with Cuba, while the larger needs list to have business and economic conditions and interactions are far from successful or  advancing mostly due to distrust in the banking industry.

In part from the Miami Herald:

During a White House briefing last week with business people, academics and others who have been supportive of the normalization process, briefers said that a revision and clarification of some banking and travel rules would come out shortly. They also asked business executives to keep the feedback coming on the evolving rules.

Pompano-based Stonegate is the first U.S. bank to engage with Cuba under the regulations that came out in January.

But banks in general are very nervous about Cuba, said Ted Piccone, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “Part of it is the banking culture is very conservative, but the banks also have seen that they can be heavily penalized if they don’t abide by the letter of the law.”

 

Meanwhile, as U.S. business pioneers try to strike deals, they must also contend with a Cuban system that doesn’t necessarily mesh with U.S. business practices, limited Internet service, and a Cuban bureaucracy that often seems more interested in going slow than expediting business.

Beyond the sluggish bureaucracy, the government also is testing the shifting currents with caution.

Carlos Alzugaray, a retired Cuban diplomat, points out there are reasons the government wants to go slow and not risk losing political control by allowing too swift an economic transformation or rapprochement with the United States.

Secretive White House meeting reveals Obama’s plan to visit Cuba in 2016

Washington Examiner: A secretive White House meeting on Cuba last week revealed that President Obama is mulling a visit the island nation next year, and also discussed the controversial idea of the Cuban government opening consular offices in Miami.

After hailing embassy openings in Washington and Havana last week, the White House held an off-schedule, private meeting on Wednesday with U.S. officials involved in the administration’s Cuba policy. Nearly 80 activist members of the Cuban-American community from Florida and across the United States — mostly Democrats — were also there.

Valerie Jarrett, one of Obama’s closest advisers, was on hand, along with White House deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes and Roberta Jacobson, assistant secretary of State for the western hemisphere.

The White House Monday at first declined to talk about the meeting, and referred questions about it to the State Department. A State Department spokesman then referred the same questions to the Cuban embassy, which was already closed for the day.

On Tuesday, a White House official told the Washington Examiner that the briefing took place as part of the administration’s ongoing efforts to reach out and engage the Cuban-American community on the president’s efforts to normalize relations with the island nation.

“The president has been very clear that he supports measures to improve travel and commerce and further increase people-to-people contact, support civil society in Cuba, support the growth of Cuba’s nascent private sector and enhance the free flow of information to, from, and among the Cuban people,” the White House official said. “The president has also called on Congress to begin the work of ending the embargo.”

On Obama’s plans to travel to Cuba, the official said there are no announcements.

But according to sources familiar with the meeting, Rhodes told the group that President Obama is considering visiting the island nation next year, and will make an assessment early next year depending on progress in U.S.-Cuba relations.

While that historic visit would likely help Obama cement his legacy as the president who started to open up bilateral relations, it could be marred by or even delayed by Cuba’s arrest of dissidents. Those arrests have continued despite Obama’s gestures to Cuba, and could put Obama at risk of appearing to be too friendly with a country that often arrests members of political or religious groups dozens at a time.

Eduardo Jose Padron, the current president of Miami-Dade College who came to the U.S. as a refugee at the age of 15, used the White House meeting to ask about the state of human rights in Cuba, and State Department officials acknowledged that it is a dangerous time for dissidents on the island, one participant told the Examiner.

Andy Gomez, a retired assistant provost and dean of the University of Miami’s School of International Studies, said that so far, the Castro regime doesn’t appear to be changing its ways. Gomez previously served on the Brookings Institution’s Cuba Task Force from 2008 to 2010, and told the Washington Examiner Cuba needs to demonstrate a stronger commitment to human rights before Obama travels there or the U.S. agrees to allow it to open a consulate in Florida.

“Up until now, the Cuban government hasn’t even brought Cuban coffee to the table … I don’t see any signs of the Cuban government loosening up their control,” he said.

Pope Francis’s visit to Cuba, scheduled for later in September, he said, would be a good time for the Cuban government to release more political prisoners and demonstrate a true commitment to improving relations.

The idea of a consular office of the Cuban government in Florida is one that is already stirring debate among Cuban-Americans. During a question-and-answer session in the White House meeting, one participant asked about the chances for opening a Cuban consulate in Miami, according to a source who was there.

The White House responded that it was up to the Cuban government to decide when and where it would open the consulate.

But that response has only spurred more questions and concerns since the meeting, some of which deal with how it might hurt Hillary Clinton’s White House bid. The opening of an outpost in the heavily anti-Castro area of Miami could further anger Florida’s politically powerful Cuban-American community and create a backlash for Democrats that could hurt Clinton’s Florida presidential campaign operations.

“The consulate in Miami would create a bittersweet taste in the Cuban-American community, including those supporting these [normalization] changes,” said Gomez. “It would also hurt any chances of Hillary Clinton making inroads and gaining support among Miami’s Cuban-Americans.”

“I don’t think President Obama would do that to Hillary Clinton,” he added, noting that he believes a better place for the consulate would be in Tampa or Key West.

Ever since Obama’s December announcement to try to normalize relations with Cuba, South Florida’s major cities have fiercely debated the opening of a consulate, which would provide passport and visas services and emergency aide to visiting Cuban citizens, as well as other resources.

Officials have strongly objected to such an outpost in Miami-Dade County, home to nearly a million Cubans, the largest concentration in the world next to Havana.

But city leadership in Tampa, which has roughly 80,000 Cuban-Americans, is embracing the idea, viewing it as an economic opportunity for the city.

While recent polls have documented a generational shift in Cuban-American feelings about the Obama’s administration’s decision to re-engage with the Castro government, the political leadership in Miami is still heavily anti-Castro, dominated by descendants of those who fled the 1959 communist revolution regime, and some who had their property taken by Castro.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., who vehemently opposes Obama’s decision to restore ties, is strongly against a consulate in Miami. Two other Florida GOP congressmen, Mario Diaz-Balart and Carlos Curbelo, also are opposed, along with Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado.

Ros-Lehtinen said opening a consulate in Miami is another Obama administration effort to “legitimize an illegitimate regime.”

“Placing a Cuban consulate in Miami is nothing but an insult to so many who have been arrested, imprisoned, maimed, and tortured by the Castros and their ruthless thugs,” she told the Examiner. “This administration has done nothing but give dictators concession after concession yet what do we have to show for it? More arrests of pro-democracy activists in Cuba, a continued harboring of fugitives from American justice, and total disrespect for the suffering of victims of autocratic despots.”

Ros-Lehtinen also argues that any Cuban consulate would serve as a headquarters for espionage.

But others argue that South Florida Cuban-Americans are in real need of consular services and don’t view the opening as a serious problem.

“I would hope that it would make things easier for those traveling back home, about 400,000 are traveling back to Cuba a year,” said Jorge Duany, director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University. “Right now, it’s very expensive and cumbersome to apply for a visa and make all kinds of travel arrangements.”