HAVANA (AP) — Ernest Hemingway has returned to Cuba... in a way.
Eighteen white-bearded men who resemble the late U.S. author arrived in Havana to visit some of his favorite places when he lived on the island decades ago.
The members of the Hemingway Look-alike Society on Saturday visited the author’s favorite bar in Havana, “El Floridita,” where the music immediately picked up, and tourists and locals gathered around to take photos.
Earlier, they went to the San Francisco de Paula municipality and Finca Vigia, a former home to Hemingway that is now a museum. There, they played baseball with children.
“That is the reason for our visit: the kids and their families,” said Joe Maxey, from Tennessee, who is one of the bearded men honoring the author of “The Old Man and the Sea.”
The visit comes as Cuba and the United States are in the midst of tense relations. Washington maintains sanctions on the islands, and things are unlikely to change as Donald Trump prepares to assume the presidency in January.
After former President Barack Obama lifted some restrictions in 2017, Trump largely shut down U.S. cooperation with Cuba and hit the country with new sanctions.
The U.S. generally prohibits Americans from traveling to Cuba for tourism, although it gives some permits.
The look-alikes arrived in Havana on Friday when they took part in a ceremony at the Hemingway marina in honor of Diana Nyad, the first swimmer to cross the Gulf of Mexico from Cuba to Florida, and they will leave the island on Sunday.
Hemingway lived in Cuba from 1939 to 1960.
A man who pretends to look like the late American writer Ernest Hemingway poses for a photo recalling passages from the life and work of 1954 Nobel Prize-winning writer Ernest Hemingway at La Floridita bar in Havana, Cuba, Saturday, Dec, 6, 2024. (AP Photo/ Ariel Ley)
Bat Masterson, center, winner of the 2024 "Papa" Hemingway Look-Alike Contest at Sloppy Joe's Bar in Key West, participates in a baseball game at Finca Vigia, recalling passages from the life and work of 1954 Nobel Prize-winning writer Ernest Hemingway, in Havana, Cuba, Saturday, Dec, 6, 2024. (AP Photo/ Ariel Ley)
Charlie Boice, center, winner of the 2015 "Papa" Hemingway Look-Alike Contest at Sloppy Joe's Bar in Key West, prepares a Daiquiri at La Floridita bar recalling passages from the life and work of 1954 Nobel Prize-winning writer Ernest Hemingway, in Havana, Cuba, Saturday, Dec, 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Ariel Ley)
WASHINGTON (AP) — It's the largest prosecution in Justice Department history — with reams of evidence, harrowing videos and hundreds of convictions of the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Now Donald Trump's return to power has thrown into question the future of the more than 1,500 federal cases brought over the last four years.
Jan. 6 trials, guilty pleas and sentencings have continued chugging along in Washington's federal court despite Trump's promise to pardon rioters, whom he has called “political prisoners" and “hostages” he contends were treated too harshly.
In a statement Monday, Attorney General Merrick Garland said Justice Department prosecutors “have sought to hold accountable those criminally responsible for the January 6 attack on our democracy with unrelenting integrity.”
“They have conducted themselves in a manner that adheres to the rule of law and honors our obligation to protect the civil rights and civil liberties of everyone in this country,” Garland said.
Here's a look at where the prosecutions stand on the fourth anniversary of the Capitol riot and what could happen next:
More than 1,500 people across the U.S. have been charged with federal crimes related to the deadly riot. Hundreds of people who did not engage in destruction or violence were charged only with misdemeanor offenses for entering the Capitol illegally. Others were charged with felony offenses, including assault for beating police officers. Leaders of the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys extremist groups were convicted of seditious conspiracy for what prosecutors described as plots to use violence to stop the peaceful transfer of power from Trump, a Republican, to Joe Biden, a Democrat.
About 250 people have been convicted of crimes by a judge or a jury after a trial. Only two people were acquitted of all charges by judges after bench trials. No jury has fully acquitted a Capitol riot defendant. At least 1,020 others had pleaded guilty as of Jan. 1.
More than 1,000 rioters have already been sentenced, with over 700 receiving at least some time behind bars. The rest were given some combination of probation, community service, home detention or fines.
The longest sentence, 22 years, went to former Proud Boys national chairman Enrique Tarrio, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy along with three lieutenants. A California man with a history of political violence got 20 years in prison for repeatedly attacking police with flagpoles and other makeshift weapons during the riot. And Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes is serving an 18-year prison sentence for seditious conspiracy and other offenses.
More than 100 Jan. 6 defendants are scheduled to stand trial in 2025, while at least 168 riot defendants are set to be sentenced this year.
Authorities have continued making new arrests since Trump's election victory. That includes people accused of assaulting police officers who were defending the Capitol.
Citing Trump's promise of pardons, several defendants have sought to have their cases delayed — with little success.
In denying one such request, U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, who was nominated to the bench by President Ronald Reagan, a Republican, wrote: "This Court recently had the occasion to discuss what effect the speculative possibility of a presidential pardon has on the timetable for a pending criminal matter. In short: little to none."
One defendant who convinced a judge to postpone his trial, William Pope, told the court that the “American people gave President Trump a mandate to carry out the agenda he campaigned on, which includes ending the January 6 prosecutions and pardoning those who exercised First Amendment rights at the Capitol.” Pope has now asked the judge to allow him to travel to Washington to attend Trump's inauguration on Jan. 20.
Trump embraced the Jan. 6 rioters on the campaign trail, downplaying the violence that was broadcast on live TV and has been documented extensively through video, testimony and other evidence in the federal cases.
Trump has vowed to begin issuing pardons of Jan. 6 rioters on his first day in office. He has said he will look at individuals on a case-by-case basis, but he has not explained how he will decide who receives such relief.
He has said there may be “some exceptions" — if “somebody was radical, crazy." But he has not ruled out pardons for people convicted of serious crimes, like assaulting police officers. When confronted in a recent NBC News interview about the dozens of people who have pleaded guilty to assaulting law enforcement, Trump responded: “Because they had no choice."
Many judges in Washington's federal court have condemned the depiction of the rioters as “political prisoners," and some have raised alarm about the potential pardons.
"No matter what ultimately becomes of the Capital Riots cases already concluded and still pending, the true story of what happened on January 6, 2021 will never change," Judge Lamberth recently said in a statement when handing down a sentence.
U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, who was nominated to the bench by Trump, has said it would be “beyond frustrating and disappointing” if Trump hands out mass pardons to rioters.
In another case, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta alluded to the prospect of a pardon for Rhodes, the Oath Keepers founder convicted of seditious conspiracy.
“The notion that Stewart Rhodes could be absolved of his actions is frightening and ought to be frightening to anyone who cares about democracy in this country,” said Mehta, who was nominated by President Barack Obama, a Democrat.
Follow the AP's coverage of the Jan. 6 insurrection at https://apnews.com/hub/capitol-siege.
FILE - Violent protesters loyal to President Donald Trump, including Kevin Seefried, center, holding a Confederate battle flag, are confronted by U.S. Capitol Police officers outside the Senate Chamber inside the Capitol, Jan. 6, 2021 in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)
FILE - Supporters of President Donald Trump climb the west wall of the the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
FILE - A flag hangs between broken windows after then-President Donald Trump supporters tried to break through police barriers outside the U.S. Capitol, Jan 6, 2021. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)
FILE - Insurrectionists loyal to President Donald Trump try to break through a police barrier, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, at the Capitol in Washington. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez, File)
