A book street vendor passes the time on her smart phone as she waits for
customers in Havana, Cuba. The administrator of the U.S. Agency for
International Development on Tuesday begins a series of appearances
Tuesday, April 8, 2014, before lawmakers asking questions about his
agency’s secret “Cuban Twitter,” a social media network built to stir
unrest in the communist island. First up in the questioning of
administrator Rajiv Shah is Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., who publicly
called the social media program “dumb, dumb, dumb.”
WASHINGTON (ASSOCIATED PRESS) — Draft messages produced for a
Twitter-like social media network that the U.S. government secretly
built in Cuba were overtly political and some taunted the Castro family.
The Associated Press obtained the messages in
internal documents from the program. The new disclosures came as the
head of the U.S. Agency for International Development told Congress on
Tuesday that the program was never intended to stir unrest within Cuba's
government.
At a hearing, Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont told USAID
Administrator Rajiv Shah that the social media program was "cockamamie."
An AP investigation last week found the program evaded Cuba's Internet
restrictions by creating a text-messaging service that could be used to
organize political demonstrations. It drew tens of thousands of
subscribers who were unaware it was backed by the Obama administration.
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