 President Barack Obama talks to media in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016, at the bottom of a meeting, where he announced that former IBM CEO Sam Palmisano, former... (Associated Press) 
 
 President Barack Obama talks to media in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016, at the bottom of a meeting, where he announced that former IBM CEO Sam Palmisano, former National Security Adviser Tom Donilon are being appointed as the Chair and Vice Chair, respectively,... (Associated Press) 
 
 President Barack Obama talks to media in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016, at the bottom of a meeting, where he announced that former IBM CEO Sam Palmisano, former National Security Adviser Tom Donilon are being appointed as the Chair and Vice Chair, respectively,... (Associated Press) President Barack Obama talks to media in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016, at the bottom of a meeting, where he announced that former IBM CEO Sam Palmisano, former... (Associated Press) 
 
 WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama will pay a historic visit to Cuba in the coming weeks, senior Obama administration officials said Wednesday, becoming the first president to set foot on the island in nearly seven decades. Add Interest 
 
 The president officially announced his trip via Twitter on Thursday morning. "Next month, I'll travel to Cuba to advance our progress and efforts that can improve the lives of the Cuban people." The last and only sitting U.S. president to visit the island nation only 90 miles south of the Florida keys was Calvin Coolidge, in 1928, to address the Sixth Annual International Conference of American States in Havana. Hundreds of thousands more Americans are expected to visit Cuba per year under the deal, which cleared the way for the U.S. Department of Transportation to open bidding by American air carriers on as many as 110 flights a day. Obama's stop in Cuba will part of a broader trip to Latin America that the president will take next month, said the officials, who requested anonymity because the trip hasn't been officially announced.
– President Obama next month will become the first sitting US president to visit Cuba since Calvin Coolidge's trip to Havana in 1928. Obama announced the trip on Twitter Thursday, and ABC News reports that he'll be there March 21-22. The visit will mark a watershed moment for relations between the US and Cuba and will be part of a broader trip to Latin America, reports the AP. (President Harry Truman visited US-controlled Guantanamo Bay on the southeast end of the island in 1948, and former Jimmy Carter has paid multiple visits to the island since leaving office.) Word of Obama's travel plans drew immediate resistance from opponents of warmer ties with Cuba—including Republican presidential candidates. Ted Cruz, whose father fled to the US from Cuba in the 1950s, said Obama shouldn't visit while the Castro family remains in power. Marco Rubio, another child of Cuban immigrants, lambasted the president for visiting what he called an "anti-American communist dictatorship." "Today, a year and two months after the opening of Cuba, the Cuban government remains as oppressive as ever," Rubio said on CNN. Told of Obama's intention to visit, he added, "Probably not going to invite me." (An Alabama tractor-maker is the first US firm to set up shop in Cuba since the revolution.)