The Biden administration this week eased some restrictive policies toward Cuba and Venezuela in a bid to increase relations with isolated nations, a move that has prompted a bipartisan pushback and could further jeopardize Democrats’ chances of winning some Hispanic voters in Florida and elsewhere.

Biden and the Democrats struggled in Florida in the 2020 election as Republicans portrayed their opponents as embracing socialist policies. With Biden taking steps to engage with Cuba and Venezuela, those attacks are likely to return before midterms, potentially further alienating voters who have fled or have family in those countries.

In a sign of the policies’ unpopularity with some voters, Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.), who is running against Florida Republican Marco Rubio for his Senate seat in November, gave a warm welcome to the announcements of the Biden administration.

“Easing sanctions on Venezuela only strengthens Maduro and his cronies,” Val Demings tweeted. “We do not support the Venezuelan people who are fighting for freedom and democracy by appeasing their murderous regime. We need to focus on lowering the cost of gas for Florida families without comforting dictators.

Sen. Bob Menéndez (DN.J.), the powerful chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also criticized the administration for its overtures to both dictatorships — and it wasn’t the first time he’s done so. these last months. .

“From Tehran to Havana to Pyongyang, history shows us that negotiations based on unilateral concessions have failed to produce real changes in the behavior of authoritarian regimes. Giving Maduro a handful of undeserved gifts just to get his regime to promise to sit down at the negotiating table is a doomed strategy,” Menéndez said in a statement on Tuesday.

But the backlash – like the relief from sanctions – has been somewhat limited.

Democrats are not expected to be competitive around Miami, an area where until recently they were perennially vying for two of Florida’s three southernmost congressional districts.

Outside of South Florida, Republican messaging about perceived Democratic leanings toward socialism has been shown to have limited appeal among voters outside the GOP base.

And the Biden administration is taking a holistic view of foreign affairs, with Latin American allies pushing for openness to Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua amid bigger fights on the international stage.

Officials have signaled in substantive appeals about the policy changes in Cuba and Venezuela that they hope the changes will ultimately benefit residents of each nation. And they signaled that the sanctions could be quickly reversed if either regime appears to be acting in bad faith.

“These are measures that … are intended to help alleviate the humanitarian suffering that causes migration from Cuba, and also to advance our interest in supporting the Cuban people,” a senior administration official said, saying Cubans Americans and Americans traveling to Cuba could help. spread democratic values ​​in the island nation.

With much of the world focused on the ongoing war in Ukraine, the White House this week announced reversals of some Trump-era policies toward Venezuela and Cuba. Both nations were hit with economic sanctions by the former administration, which saw them as evidence of the consequences of socialism as Cubans and Venezuelans faced food shortages and collapsing economies.

The Biden administration announced on Monday that it would allow limited flights to Cuban cities other than Havana, restore a family reunification program that had lapsed, and support efforts to boost Cuba’s private sector by supporting better access to American internet services.

On Tuesday, the administration continued plans to lift some sanctions against Venezuela in a bid to foster talks between Nicolas Maduro’s regime and opposition leaders. The administration said it would allow talks between the Maduro government and Chevron, a US oil company that operates in Venezuela.

The limited overtures to Cuba and Venezuela are unlikely to have a big impact on bilateral relations with either country, but could pave the way for other Latin American leaders to attend the Summit of the Americas. hosted by the Biden administration in June in Los Angeles. A number of leaders had previously said they would not attend, including the presidents of Mexico and Honduras.

And any deal with Cuba will necessarily include a migration aspect, helping to reduce the number of Cuban nationals showing up at the southwestern border, addressing a more pressing political responsibility for the Biden administration.

Yet Republicans spent much of the 2020 campaign trying to portray Biden and other Democrats as radicals who wanted to push socialist policies in the United States. The message was aimed particularly at Hispanic voters in Florida, many of whom have roots in socialist countries like Venezuela and Cuba. .

The Biden administration’s policy announcements this week seemed to reopen the doors to these attacks.

“Biden has officially surrendered to Latin American dictators. Yesterday he gave American business to the Cuban regime. Now he is lifting sanctions on Maduro in Venezuela for buying bloodstained oil. We won’t forget this month of November,” tweeted Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Florida), the daughter of Cuban exiles who flipped a Florida district for the GOP in 2020.

The 2020 Republican Convention brought together speakers from Cuba who spoke about the brutal conditions and warned of the dangers of socialism. Then-President Trump visited Florida several times, where warnings against socialism were a constant theme.

The attacks proved at least somewhat effective, as Biden and the Democrats saw Trump make significant gains among the Hispanic population en route to winning Florida by nearly 400,000 votes.

Trump fared nearly 23 percentage points better in 2020 than he did in 2016 in the heavily Hispanic county of Miami-Dade.

Recent polls have shown Biden struggling with Hispanic demographics.

An April Quinnipiac poll showed just 26% of Hispanic voters polled approved of the president’s job performance, the lowest rating of any demographic group, potentially serving as a signal that could portend further aggravation for Biden in places like the Sunshine State.