Dangerous Marielitos: Wisconsin Newspapers and the Proliferation of a Negative Representation

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/intejcubastud.10.1.0030
• Pages: 30-52
• Published date: 01 April 2018
• Date: 01 April 2018
• Author: Jillian Marie Jacklin
• Subject Matter: Cuban,Refugee,Marielito,criminal,Fort McCoy

InternatIonal Journal of Cuban StudIeS 10.1 SprIng 2018

ACADEMIC ARTICLE

DANGEROUS MARIELITOS: WISCONSIN

NEWSPAPERS AND THE PROLIFERATION

OF A NEGATIVE REPRESENTATION

Jillian Marie Jacklin

The University of Wisconsin, Madison

Abstract

This article analyses the local roots of the criminalised characterisation of Cuban

refugees who resided in a Wisconsin detention centre during and after the so-called

Mariel Exodus or Boatlift in 1980. Acknowledging the role of national media in espousing

a violent and chaotic image of the Mariel Boatlift and its participants, who became

known as ‘Marielitos’; it examines how local Wisconsin newspapers gravitated towards

this representation, compounding its negative influence. The article then explains how

the economic recession and rising concerns about deviant sexuality morphed media

accounts of Cuban refugee struggles and uncovers narratives not captured by Marielito

criminality. By doing so, the article complicates the understandings of refugee identities

and experiences.

Keywords: Cuban, Refugee, Marielito, criminal, Fort McCoy

Introduction

Due to improved relations between the Cuban government and the United States,

and a historical policy that painted the United States as a safe haven for Cuban

refugees, on 17 March 1980, President Jimmy Carter signed the Refugee Act

into law. Soon after, he announced that the United States would receive asylum-

seeking Cubans with ‘open arms’ (Skop 2001). In response, displaced Cubans

boarded boats at Mariel Harbor, about 80km west of Havana to travel to

Miami. Approximately 40 per cent of the refugees joined family and friends

already living in the United States. Those who did not have immediate

DANGEROUS MARIELITOS 31

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connections, however, faced a more difficult transition to life as undocumented

migrants in the United States. The Carter administration placed the remaining

60 per cent of these Cubans, who became known as ‘Marielitos’, in four deten-

tion camps around the country.1 Between April and December 1980, the US

government detained over 15,000 Marielitos at Fort McCoy, also known as

Camp McCoy, a military installation located between the small communities of

Tomah and Sparta, approximately 35 miles east of La Crosse, in west-central

Wisconsin (Fort McCoy n.d.).

US media shaped popular perceptions of this particular group of refugees

even before they reached Fort McCoy. Not long after the first Cuban exiles

arrived on US shores, national reports of suspected criminality and homosexual-

ity among Marielitos hurt the refugees’ image among local Wisconsin residents

(Peña 2007: 485). News reports about Fidel Castro allegedly emptying prisons

and mental institutions and instances of crime at other US detention centres,

such as Fort Chaffee in Arkansas, appeared in newspapers from communities

surrounding the Wisconsin military installation.(Army Joint Public Affairs

Office 1980) In late May, 1980, editorials and articles reported that Cuban refu-

gees would soon arrive in Wisconsin and that workers and volunteers were pre-

paring Fort McCoy to serve as a detention centre for Marielitos. Unfortunately

for the new arrivals, they entered a particularly contentious social, economic and

political climate when they arrived at the fort, which did not contribute to public

acceptance of the refugees. The upcoming 1980 presidential election, a nation-

wide economic recession, and rising conservative backlash against the Carter

administration and its social welfare policies dominated local news. These

reports appeared in newspapers alongside stories about Marielito criminality,

and as a result, influenced local perspectives of the newcomers.2

From May through November 1980, local newspapers from the fort and sur-

rounding communities discussed the daily realities of Cuban refugees and public

attitudes towards their presence in the area. Using a local focus, this study

addresses an important gap in the historiography of the 1980 Mariel boatlift.

Although a number of studies have mentioned the role of US national media in

producing the criminalised refugee representation, none have focused specifi-

cally on how local media sources from communities surrounding Marielito

detention centres compounded this negative image. As such, this analysis pro-

vides a local context for understanding the influence of the boatlift on the United

States by looking at media produced by Fort McCoy and the surrounding west-

central Wisconsin communities. By doing so, this investigation contributes a

more nuanced and contextualised account of events that transpired at Fort

McCoy during the 1980 detention of Cuban asylum seekers. The examination of

stories from local media sources provides information that complicates a