WASHINGTON — Attorney General Janet Reno is laying plans to use force if necessary to return Elian Gonzalez to his father but is still open to negotiations with his Miami relatives, a spokeswoman said today.
"If necessary the attorney general is prepared to use law enforcement" to pick up Elian over the objections of relatives who have temporarily cared for him since Thanksgiving, Justice Department spokeswoman Carole Florman said. "If and when there's a law enforcement action, we are not going to be previewing it."
Florman portrayed Reno as virtually out of options other than law enforcement.
"There have always been three trains moving simultaneously down the track — negotiations for a transfer, litigation and law enforcement," Florman said. "We are no longer in the engineer's seat on the negotiation train. We're just passengers.
"She is looking to our law enforcement officials to determine the best timing and methods" for removing Elian from the house where hundreds of Cuban exiles have gathered, promising to form a human chain to prevent the boy's removal, Florman said.
Nevertheless, Florman said, "The doors are always going to be open to the family for a negotiated settlement. She said last night she is willing to consider any specific suggestions for how to achieve a cooperative resolution."
Planning for law enforcement operations has been under way for the past 10 days, Florman said. This has included assessment of any patterns in the activities of the crowd in the street, consultation with local police and positioning of key federal agents nearby, other officials said.
"There is a plan. There's probably more than one," Florman said today.
On Thursday, President Clinton said a court ruling has stripped Elian's Miami relatives of all arguments against transferring temporary custody to his father. "That is the law," Clinton said.
Clinton commented after a three-judge panel of the federal appeals court in Atlanta said Elian must remain in the United States until the court decides whether he should get an asylum hearing. A hearing was set for May 11.
The ruling was viewed by the Miami relatives and their allies as a victory, but Clinton said it reinforced the administration's case for Elian to be reunited with his father.
The Washington Post on Friday quoted unidentified government officials as saying they expected a law enforcement move to retrieve Elian by the middle of next week. USA Today quoted officials as saying the action would come next week.
Asked about the timing, Florman said, "For obvious reasons, we've always said we wouldn't discuss a law enforcement action in advance."
A lawyer for the Miami relatives indicated today that the great-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez, who has control of Elian, and other family members will not assist federal agents' attempt to take the boy.
"So he's not going to cooperate?" attorney Jose Garcia-Pedrosa was asked on CBS' "The Early Show."
"Without a psychological evaluation that says that that is in the best interest of the boy in the opinion of a professional, not a lawyer or an immigration official, that's correct," Garcia-Pedrosa replied.
Clinton, making his strongest statement to date on the case, said he knew of "no conceivable argument" against the custody transfer.
"I think he (the father) should be reunited with his son," he said. "That is the law. And the main argument of the family in Miami for not doing so has now been removed."
Less than two hours before Clinton spoke, Elian's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, asked Americans to write to Clinton and Reno, urging them to act decisively to end the five-month father-son separation.
"Don't let them continue to abuse my son," the elder Gonzalez said, referring to the Miami relatives.
"I was promised that I was going to be reunited with my son," he said, speaking in Spanish near his temporary home in suburban Maryland. "Two weeks have gone by, and it hasn't happened. I have always understood, I have always thought, that the United States is a country which abided by its laws."
Thursday evening, Elian spoke on a cordless telephone in the yard outside his Miami relatives' home and blew kisses into the phone. Family spokesman Armando Gutierrez said the boy was talking to his father.