President Barack Obama ending the longstanding “wet foot, dry foot” policy that allows Cubans who arrive in the United States without a visa to become permanent residents, the administration announced Thursday.
The move, which wasn’t previously outlined and is likely one of the final foreign policy decisions of Obama’s term, terminates a decades-long policy that many argued amounted to preferential treatment for a single group of migrants. “By taking this step, we are treating Cuban migrants the same way we treat migrants from other countries,” Obama wrote in a statement Thursday.
Cartoon Wet Foot, Dry Foot, by Antonio Rodriguez Garcia, from Mexico City, Mexico
