Cuba passes new Family Code, including marriage equality

In a national referendum on September 25, Cuba adopted a new Family Code that completely redefines family relations. Among other things, the new law legalizes same-sex marriages and allows same-sex married couples to adopt children.

According to Cuban authorities, two-thirds of the population voted to approve the new legal code. The law had the enthusiastic support of Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and the Communist Party but faced significant opposition from religious groups and social conservatives.

Speaking as he voted on Sunday, Díaz-Canel, said that the new code reflected Cuba's diversity of people, families, and beliefs, and he expected most of the voters to approve the law.

By September 26, preliminary vote counts indicated an "irreversible trend" toward passage of the new code, with 66% voting in favor of the reform, according to Electoral Council President Alina Balseiro.

Cuba's new Family Code will do the following:

guarantee the right of all people to form a family without discrimination, legalizing same-sex marriage and allowing same-sex couples to adopt children

allow for parental rights to be shared among extended and nontraditional family structures, which could include grandparents, step-parents, and surrogate mothers

add novelties such as prenuptial agreements and assisted reproduction

boost women's rights, promoting equal sharing of domestic responsibilities and extending labor rights to those who care full-time for children, the elderly, or people with disabilities

establish the right to a family life free from violence, that "values love, affection, solidarity, and responsibility"

codify domestic violence penalties, and outlaw corporal punishment of children

state that parents will have "responsibility" instead of "custody" of children and are required to be "respectful of the dignity and physical and mental integrity of children and adolescents"

assert that parents should grant maturing offspring more say over their lives

The reforms were the culmination of efforts by LGBTQ rights activists in Cuba, supported by Mariela Castro, daughter of retired Cuban President Raul Castro, and niece of Fidel.

In the early days of the Cuban revolution, the new government associated the LGBTQ community with the Mafia-run sex clubs that flourished in prerevolutionary Havana. LGBTQ Cubans were often sent to "reeducation camps" similar to "reparative therapy" centers in the US.

Official hostility to Cuba's LGBTQ communities began to lighten up in the 1980s, and 1989 the government founded the National Center for Sex Education led by Mariela Castro. In a historic 2010 interview, Fidel Castro told the Mexican newspaper Jornada that he'd been wrong to allow the detention of LGBTQ people.

In spite of official support for the new Family Code and LGBTQ equality, many Cubans opposed the reform, including evangelical churches and nonreligious social conservatives.

The conservative opposition forced the Cuban government to remove an article explicitly guaranteeing marriage equality from the new Cuban constitution, approved in 2019. Instead, the government inserted gender-neutral language that would allow same-sex marriages, and postponed explicit legalization until the referendum on the projected new Family Code, set for 2022.