Trump threatens to take Cuba ‘almost immediately’ after tightening sanctions on the regime
The new executive order expands the scope of existing sanctions to persons, entities, and companies that support the Cuban regime’s security apparatus
US President Donald Trump said on Friday that his country would take Cuba almost immediately, in remarks made during a private event at the Forum Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, hours after signing an executive order substantially expanding economic sanctions against the Havana regime. The president’s words, though framed in colloquial tone, considerably escalate bilateral tensions and open a new chapter in US policy toward Miguel Díaz-Canel’s government.
On the way back from Iran, we’ll have one of our greats, perhaps the USS Abraham Lincoln, the largest aircraft carrier in the world, stop about 100 yards from their shore, and they will say: thank you very much, we surrender, Trump said before attendees at the dinner. The president conditioned any such hypothetical operation on the conclusion of the war against Iran, still without a peace agreement after two months of fighting. We’ll finish this one first, I like to finish jobs, he added. The White House did not clarify whether the remarks reflect actual operational planning beyond the sanctions already announced.
The new executive order, signed Friday under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), expands the scope of existing sanctions to persons, entities, and companies that support the Cuban regime’s security apparatus, are complicit in government corruption or human rights violations, or act as agents and officials of the government. The measure covers the energy, defense, mining, and financial services sectors, and blocks all assets in US territory of designated persons, as well as those of their adult family members. The order also authorizes secondary sanctions against foreign financial institutions that facilitate transactions with sanctioned entities, which entails potential loss of access to the dollar as an operating currency.
US policy toward Cuba has progressively hardened since the start of Trump’s second term. The island was reinstated on the State Sponsors of Terrorism list on January 20, and on January 29, an energy embargo was decreed, complemented by the threat of secondary tariffs against third countries that sell oil to Havana. According to US official data, the administration has intercepted at least seven oil tankers bound for Cuba, reducing the island’s oil imports by between 80% and 90%. The Economist Intelligence Unit projects a 7.2% contraction of Cuba’s GDP for 2026.
The Cuban response was immediate and firm. President Miguel Díaz-Canel described the new sanctions as coercive and characterized them as collective punishment against the Cuban population. Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez maintained that the government will not be intimidated and invoked the massive pro-government rallies held on May 1, in which former President Raúl Castro, close to turning 95, made a rare public appearance. From Florida, Republican congresspeople of Cuban origin celebrated the measure. Congresswoman María Elvira Salazar said on social media that the era of appeasement policy is over. Meanwhile, former National Security Advisor John Bolton warned in April that the Trump administration could repeat a similar mistake to Venezuela, referring to the military capture of former President Nicolás Maduro on January 3, a precedent the White House presents as a model of the so-called Operation Absolute Resolve.
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