But the refugees keep coming
The twisting line looked endless. Women fainted, even screamed in hysteria, as the hot sun and high humidity baked the seedy, aging airbase at Opa-Locka, on the outskirts of Miami. Nevertheless, the line kept growing. Finally, it stretched to contain some 10,000 people, all waiting to get a simple but cherished piece of paper. They called it a planilla (little plan), a Government form on which they could list the relatives in Cuba with whom they hoped to be reunited.
The push for the slips of paper was so frantic that Army paratroopers had difficulty maintaining order. Yet the sense of urgency was well founded. Jimmy Carter had just taken strong steps to end the chaotic flow of refugees across the Florida Straits in dangerously crowded boats, but he had emphasized that his celebrated "open arms" policy of the previous week would still apply to close relatives of Cuban Americans already in the U.S. They could come to America, Carter said, if Fidel Castro would agree to let U.S. officials screen the would-be exiles and allow them to board American passenger vessels and chartered airliners for safer passage across the straits. First, the U.S. had to know just which of the estimated 250,000 Cubans who have applied for exit visas actually have close kin in America. The crush at Opa-Locka was to place names on that vital list.
Beyond the near panic in Florida's large Cuban-American community, Carter's sudden crackdown on the flotilla chugging between Key West and Castro's designated embarkation port of Mariel produced other uncertainties. By seizing 113 boats by week's end and threatening boatowners with fines of up to $50,000 and prison terms of up to ten years, the Administration had effectively stopped the sailing of boats out of Key West. Yet some 1,500 American craft still lay in Mariel, capable of carrying an average of 45 refugees each—a potential capacity of 67,500, which is even more than the roughly 50,000 refugees already being processed at such centers at Opa-Locka, Florida's Eglin Air Force Base and Fort Chaffee in Arkansas.
Under Carter's order, relayed via radio to the boat skippers in Mariel, the American boats were supposed to return to Key West without bringing any passengers. But returning pilots told harrowing tales of being forced by Cuban soldiers to take on refugees selected by Castro's government—often leaving behind relatives of the Cuban Americans who had paid for the trip. The captains were in a quandary. Some said that the people who had chartered their boats threatened their lives if they tried to leave empty. At the same time, the Cuban government threatened to levy $20,000 fines if the captains refused to pick up refugees. Then, when the ships returned to Key West with a load of refugees, the U.S. handed "intent to fine" citations to the skippers and posted Government seizure notices on the vessels. Protested one mate on a shrimp boat: "This man Carter tells us we can go over there and then tells us we can't. I wish to hell he'd make up his mind."