The sea between Cuba and Florida has been more than a geographic dividing line—it’s been a graveyard for untold lives escaping communism.
Read more Mamdani proposes de facto ration cards for New Yorkers to buy his cheap government groceries
On one shore were families who had little more than hope. On the other stood a nation founded 250 years ago on the principle that government derives its just powers from the consent of the people.
That promise endured because the founders understood that declaring liberty was not enough. Liberty had to be protected from those who govern. From that wisdom came the Constitution: divided powers, independent courts, competing branches, lawful elections and rights no temporary majority could take away.
I grew up in Miami and attended school with Cuban children whose families had escaped Castro’s revolution. In the 1960s, Dade County schools saw a huge influx of these students. To make it easier for English-speaking and Spanish-speaking students to talk to one another, there would be about five minutes of Spanish lessons every day over the intercom.
On the playground, the words most of us boys wanted to learn were curse words—we built our language skills up from there. At the time, we saw our new classmates as disadvantaged youth, but in reality, they were often the children of doctors and lawyers who were learning how to rebuild their lives from scratch.
Over the years I watched many of those same children grow into flourishing citizens under America’s democratic government—raising families, building businesses, and contributing to the very freedom their parents had risked everything to reach.
Communism was not classroom theory to them. It had taken their homes, their country and, in some brutal stories, the people they loved.
Some families fled Cuba in small boats and makeshift rafts. Parents rationed water and listened to failing engines, not knowing whether the current carried them toward Florida or deeper into the watery abyss. Some arrived in the U.S. Some were intercepted. Others disappeared forever.
People don’t surrender their children to an unforgiving ocean because freedom has failed them—they do it because freedom has been taken from them.
In the political milieu of today, I’m reminded of a 1970s Motown hit that warned, “Smiling faces, sometimes they don’t tell the truth.” The song cautioned that even a friendly handshake can conceal danger—that we shouldn’t judge promises by how good they sound, but by the power behind them and how it may be misused.
This is why I believe every American should read the Democratic Socialists of America’s (DSA) 2026 Workers Deserve More! program.
Read more Anthony Fauci, Our Own Wizard of Oz
The DSA calls for a new constitution and a “democratic socialist republic.” It proposes abolishing the Senate and replacing the independently elected president and Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary “chosen by and subordinate to Congress.” It seeks public ownership of the largest corporations and essential industries.
These are not rumors or misrepresentations; they are published objectives. Together, they would dismantle the pillars of America’s constitutional and economic order.
The DSA promises multiparty elections, unlike Communist China’s one-party system. That distinction matters. Yet the structures bear a troubling resemblance. China places its National People’s Congress at the summit of state power, with the executive and highest court beneath it. The DSA likewise proposes subordinating the executive and judiciary to Congress.
Its intentions may sound democratic, but its concentration of power is foreign to America’s system of checks and balances. History warns what can happen when one political movement controls lawmaking, executive authority, the courts, and the commanding institutions of the economy.
DSA National Co-Chair Megan Romer recently went viral after her appearance on Fox News Sunday where she affirmed several of the DSA’s long-term goals. I was shocked that she was being so frank and honest about it.
Many Millennials and Zoomers are being seduced by socialist slogans like “Workers deserve more,” “Eat the rich,” and “People over profits.” In the Marxist-Leninist tradition, socialism is the transitional step toward communism. I know this history not from textbooks, but from the stories I heard firsthand—from the kids who escaped it and from the families of those who never made it. Communism is a cruel, punishing system in which people must either conform or face imprisonment or execution.
Opposition becomes resistance to the revolution, and one-party rule prevents citizens from reversing it. Of course, that history does not prove every democratic socialist seeks dictatorship, but it does require us to ask what would restrain a future majority once constitutional restraints were removed.
The Constitution does not require us to trust every leader. Power checks power. Two chambers must agree. Presidents are elected separately. Courts keep other branches in check. Opposition remains lawful. And the people can peacefully remove those who govern them.
This inheritance is neither self-preserving nor replaceable. It survived because earlier generations understood its value and defended its limits. Smiles and promises may reassure us for a season, but only constitutional limits can preserve the liberty entrusted to us 250 years ago—and keep it secure for generations to come.
James Herchek is a former New Hampshire State Representative, Naval Flight Officer, and Construction Analyst for the U.S. Small Business Administration. He now resides in Upstate New York.
Read more Manchin can’t go for a dem socialist
Image generated by ChatGPT.