The White House was on a collision course with some of the most influential figures in the Republican party after the Senate voted to ease a 40-year ban on Americans travelling to Cuba.

The Senate voted 59-38 on Thursday night to ease the travel ban two weeks after the US president, George Bush, announced he was stepping up pressure on Fidel Castro, Cuba's president, by tightening restrictions on Americans on visiting and spending money on the island.

It was the first time the Senate had acted against the restrictions since John Kennedy imposed them 40 years ago. Nineteen Republicans broke ranks to vote against the White House, including influential figures such as John Warner of Virginia, the chairman of the armed services committee and Pat Roberts, the chairman of the intelligence committee.

The vote was greeted with dismay from the White House which had advocated a harder line against Mr Castro in part with a view to Florida, where anti-Castro Cuban-Americans are crucial to Mr Bush's prospects for re-election.

The White House threatened to veto an entire spending bill in retaliation. But that could embarrass Mr Bush and anger the farming lobby and free trade Republicans.

Opponents of the ban say it has damaged the US far more than it has hurt Mr Castro's government and that the policy benefits only a small special interest group of hardline Cuban-Americans.

The US treasury department estimates that about 160,000 Americans, half of them Cuban-Americans visiting family members, travelled to Cuba legally last year.

But another 25,000 flouted the ban, according to the US-Cuba Trade and Economic Council. Tourism officials believe that as many as 1 million Americans would visit the island within the first year of lifting the embargo.

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2003

###