Cuban-Americans celebrate the death of Fidel Castro, Saturday, Nov. 26, 2016, in the Little Havana area in Miami. | AP Photo/Alan Diaz Cubans spill into streets of Miami to celebrate death of Fidel Castro Cuban lawmakers, others tweeted to express their joy over demise of dictator

MIAMI — In the city of Cuban exiles, they shouted in Spanish: “Libertad! Libertad!, Libertad!” (Freedom!, Freedom! Freedom!)

As news spread of the death of Cuba's longtime dictator Fidel Castro, hundreds of Cubans, young and old, flooded the streets of Miami late Friday night and early Saturday morning to mark the demise of the man they viewed as a tyrant who took their homeland.


“Words really can’t express how I feel,” one Cuban man told Miami’s NBC-6. “My parents died waiting for this day. And I’m here I’m here to celebrate for them.”

He was surrounded by a throng of fellow Cubans who were rejoicing over the announcement in Havana that Castro, at age 90, had finally died.

Waving the Cuban flag, banging pots and pans and honking car horns, the crowd of Cubans — generations young and old — were ecstatic. Miami is home to more than 1 million of Cuban descent.

U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Miami Republican and longtime Castro regime critic, tweeted in English and Spanish about her joy and relief at hearing Castro was finally gone.

“After so many decades of oppression the tyrant #Castro is dead and a new beginning can finally dawn on #Cuba and its people,” the Cuban-American lawmaker wrote.

"We must seize the moment and help write a new chapter in the history of Cuba," she later said in a statement. "That of a Cuba that is free, democratic, and prosperous."

“The passing of the dictator marks the end of a long, horrifying chapter in #Cuba's history,” tweeted U.S. Rep. Carlos Curbelo, also a Miami Republican and Cuban-American. “The #Cuban people need our solidarity #Castro.”

GOP U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, who is also Cuban-American, wrote on his Facebook account that he's hopeful that "the Cuban people finally will be free."

"Today, a tyrant is dead," he wrote early Saturday. "Now we must work even harder toward achieving liberty, basic rights, and free, multi-party elections for the Cuban people."

In his statement, Diaz-Balart slammed President Barack Obama for establishing normal trade and diplomatic relations with Cuba. Last March, Obama became the first sitting president to visit Cuba since Calvin Coolidge. The U.S. reopened its embassy in Havana in July 2015.

"Shamefully, President Obama has spent the past eight years attempting to cede important leverage to the ailing Castro regime," said Diaz-Balart said. "Despite President Obama's collaboration and betrayal of America's longstanding mission to promote freedom, the American people continue their strong solidarity with the Cuban people in their struggle for free elections, human rights, and liberty."

Democratic U.S Rep. Gwen Graham, who grew up in Miami and represents a district in North Florida, said she saw “firsthand how Fidel Castro's control of Cuba tore apart families and destroyed lives in both our countries.”

“He will forever be remembered as a failed tyrant who neglected human rights and brought more than 50 years of poverty to Cuba. Fidel and his followers are relics of the previous century, and I pray that with his passing, we double our nation's resolve to see Cuba libre, a free nation and free people at last," she said in a statement. She also took to Twitter with her comments.

Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, a Cuban exile brought to the U.S. at age 6, told NBC-6 in an interview that he was happy to see Fidel Castro had died, but didn't expect major changes in Cuba.

"One Castro is gone," said the 62-year-old Gimenez. "We need all Castros to be gone."

"Because Fidel [is dead], that’s not going to change anything in the short-term," said Gimenez, who said Fidel's brother, Raúl, remains "entrenched" in power.

It was 85-year-old Raúl Castro who announced his brother’s death on state television at 10:29 p.m. Friday.

UPDATED with comments from U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart made on Facebook and Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez.