Cubans across the island expressed their elation over the success of their seven-month-long campaign to gain the return of the boy to Cuba.

The Supreme Court issued a brief order rejecting the appeal filed by the Miami relatives and a separate emergency request aimed at postponing the child's departure. The emergency request was filed with Supreme Court judge Anthony Kennedy, who referred it to the full court. The order read in its entirety, "The application for stay presented to Justice Kennedy and by him referred to the court is denied. The petition for a writ of certiorari [the appeal] is denied."

On June 1, a three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta had refused to overturn the Immigration and Naturalization Service's decision that an asylum application filed on behalf of Elián González was invalid, affirming that the executive branch of government has broad authority to interpret and implement policy in immigration matters because they have substantial "international-relations implications."

The full panel of the appeals court subsequently refused a rehearing request filed by the attorneys of Lázaro González, Elián's great-uncle, who then appealed to the Supreme Court.

After the Cuban boy was found November 25 off the Florida coast, the U.S. government placed him in the custody of Lázaro González, and for seven months refused to return the boy to Cuba, in flagrant and arrogant violation of Cuba's sovereignty. On April 22, the government seized him in a raid of Lázaro González's home in Miami by heavily armed INS cops and U.S. marshals, an action the Clinton administration used to assert the extrajudicial powers of the INS and further limit the constitutional rights of working people in the United States.

From the beginning, Cubans mobilized repeatedly in rallies, marches, and other actions to demand the U.S. government return Elián González to his country, winning broad international support for their battle.

As he was departing with his son from the airport in Washington, D.C., Juan Miguel González said, "I am extremely happy to be going back to my homeland." In Havana, close family relatives and dozens of students from Elián's school in the town of Cárdenas were on hand at the José Martí international airport to greet them.

The Cuban government issued an official statement read on national television that said, "Now more than ever, our population must act with the utmost dignity, serenity, and discipline." Emphasizing the broad historical struggle against U.S. imperialist domination in which this victory is but one battle, the statement reiterated, "Our fight has just begun, and a long road before us still remains."  
 
 
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