From Mariel to Minnesota: Broken Sponsorships and Queer Cuban Exile in the Upper Midwest

In 1980, about 125,000 Cubans took part in what became known as the Mariel boatlift, the mass exodus of Cubans from Havana’s Mariel Harbor to the United States. Voluntary agencies, many of which were religious-oriented, were charged with placing the refugees, or “Marielitos,” with family or volunteer sponsors. While 40 percent were resettled through these channels, those who were deemed less attractive for sponsorship—single men, queer people, and dark-skinned Cubans—were sent to detention camps. One camp was Fort McCoy in western Wisconsin, which detained over 15,000 Marielitos.

Complicating resettlement of Fort McCoy detainees were news reports about flagrant homosexuality. Public perception of sexual deviance among the Marielitos was so great that the Cuban-Haitian Task Force admitted such “widespread publicity” increased the difficulty of finding sponsors. To move queer Cuban refugees out of the media spotlight and avoid a public relations fiasco, the federal government needed Americans willing to sponsor them.

One salve was the establishment of the Positively Gay Cuban Refugee Task Force by Minneapolis-based gay liberationists, which sought to help about a hundred queer Cuban refugees find new homes in Minnesota. Task force members recruited sponsors at gay bars, coffee houses, and even the local bathhouse. Although the task force had noble intentions, problems arose. The refugees experienced culture shock. Most could not speak English. Some were expected to do housework for their sponsors and, in some cases, even serve as lovers.

Through archival research of government reports, organizational files, and oral histories, I detail cases of “broken sponsorship” between white gay Minnesotans and queer Cuban refugees, focusing on how and why white gay men were recruited to fulfill the state’s imperative of dispersing (disappearing) queer Cuban refugees, and how these refugees pushed back against white liberal narratives that cast them as victims in need of rescue.