What Does Cuba Mean For 2016? Ctd

Last week, Rand Paul voiced his support for normalizing relations with Cuba. Harry Enten expects Paul to pay a price for doing so:

In [Florida International University]’s 2008 survey — which had similar overall results to their 2014 poll — John McCain supporters favored the embargo 73 percent to 27 percent. Obama voters were almost exactly the opposite: 70 percent against and 30 percent for. The embargo’s biggest supporters are older Cuban-Americans, who are quite Republican-leaning, compared to younger Cuban-Americans, who are quite Democratic-leaning.

These Cuban-American Republicans could easily swing a relatively close Florida Republican primary. Cuban-Americans make up a sizable 8 percent of the primary vote in Florida, which is greater than the 6 percent Cuban-Americans make up in the general election. More importantly, though, Cuban-Americans have voted in a bloc in the past two presidential primaries.

Allahpundit agrees that Rand is in dangerous territory:

It’s not even Cuba per se that’s risky for Paul; it’s the perception that he’s so much different from other Republican candidates on foreign policy that he’s more inclined to agree with — gasp — Barack Obama than he is with Marco Rubio and the rest of his own party’s candidates. Opposing the Cuba embargo might please libertarians but it probably won’t him many extra conservative votes, especially in the primaries. Being seen as simpatico with Obama’s approach to international relations could hurt him, though, with exactly the sort of righties he’s targeting for votes.

Larison differs:

Paul’s position may not help him with that many voters in the Florida Republican primary electorate, but it’s the obvious position that he would have been expected to take. It’s also the obvious move for anyone who identifies as a conservative realist as Paul does. Had he not come out in favor of normalization, it would have given would-be supporters a new reason to doubt him, and he would have missed an easy opportunity to distinguish himself from the rest of the party’s likely 2016 field on an important new foreign policy issue. And Paul is far from being the only Republican inclined to support normalization. Not only are there other members of Congress that take the same view, including Jeff Flake and Justin Amash, but according to at least one survey taken this year more Republicans nationally support this position than oppose it. Republicans are far from monolithic on this question, and most don’t share Rubio’s hard-line views.