Stugotz

That is the Mariel Boatlift.

Over the span of, what, about six months, it brought about 125,000 people.

New Cuban exiles to South Florida nearly bankrupted the four southernmost counties of South Florida, Monroe, Dade, Broward and Palm Beach, and really changed kind of the face of South Florida forever.

But what was happening is you can call it bankrupt.

Well, when you get 125,000, an influx of 125,000 new arrivals and people who don't necessarily have resources or they need food, they need education, they need water and clothing and shelter.

And it's a drain on resources, but also, like I said, changed Miami in ways that I think are sort of unforgettable in culture and politics.

And it made quite an impact, I think, nationally.

I always say the Miami of today is the America of today.

But you also were literally pulling people out of the water.

You were boats that were probably overfilled with people because the Castro regime was forcing everybody who brought a boat over to take more people than they probably than was probably their ship was seaworthy for.

So so you literally saved a lot of lives.

The Florida Straits are known as one of the world's largest cemeteries because of the people, not just from Cuba, but from Haiti, from all over the Caribbean or Latin America who have fled.

in some cases on ramshackle vessels for a better life, for freedom, for democracy, for capitalism here in the U.S.

Opportunity.

For opportunity to make a better life for them and their families and to enjoy the rights that many people, that we all have enjoyed, that have given us the opportunities that this country has given us.

And to that end, you have a predominantly, is it a predominantly still Hispanic or Spanish-speaking or Cuban-American district in 2018?

I have to wonder, though, because we started this conversation talking about immigration and the opportunity of America and people fleeing places like Cuba for freedom and democracy and opportunity here economically, politically and otherwise.

But we are living in a different United States now than 1980.

So when you had Ronald Reagan embrace the Cuban-Americans, when you had the president of the United States, I was going to say Gerald Ford.

No, Jimmy Carter.