What Trump Wants From Cuba
Our take
The recent actions of the Trump administration toward Cuba, as outlined in the article "What Trump Wants From Cuba," reveal a complex interplay of geopolitical maneuvering and humanitarian consequences. Since January, the administration has enacted a blockade on oil shipments to Cuba, which has led to dire conditions on the island. Electricity outages, food spoilage, and a failing medical system are just a few of the acute crises facing Cubans, raising ethical questions about the extent to which economic pressure can be justified by political goals. This strategy seems to be aimed at destabilizing Cuba's leadership and compelling the government into negotiations with the U.S., a tactic not unfamiliar in foreign policy discourse. For further context on Trump's administration and its methods, consider reading Critics Have a New Way to Describe the Trump Administration and What the Markets Tell Trump.
At its core, the blockade reflects Trump’s desire to reshape the political landscape in Cuba to favor U.S. commercial interests. As noted by Vivian Salama in the article, the administration is less concerned with ideological opposition to communism and more focused on installing a leadership that aligns with American economic ambitions. This underscores a broader trend in U.S. foreign policy, where economic leverage is wielded in the name of strategic gains. However, the human cost of such policy must not be overlooked. Reports of increased mortality rates due to the blockade and a deteriorating public health crisis call into question the morality of employing such extreme measures to achieve political ends.
Moreover, the timing of this blockade raises important considerations. As Trump seeks to solidify his legacy as he approaches the end of his presidency, the aggressive stance towards Cuba can be interpreted as a bid to achieve something that his predecessors only spoke about. The alignment of his administration with hardline figures like Marco Rubio suggests that this approach is not just about Cuba; it is part of a broader agenda that intertwines immigration, drug policy, and U.S. dominance in the Western Hemisphere. The question remains: is this an effective strategy, or will it backfire and lead to greater instability in the region?
As we look ahead, the implications of the blockade extend beyond Cuba. The involvement of Russia, which has continued to support Cuba despite U.S. sanctions, adds another layer of complexity. The geopolitical landscape is shifting, and the U.S. must navigate its foreign policy with an awareness of how its actions may embolden adversarial nations. The potential for a cholera outbreak or mass exodus from Cuba due to dire living conditions not only presents a humanitarian crisis but could also destabilize the region further.
Ultimately, the situation in Cuba serves as a reminder that foreign policy decisions can have profound, far-reaching consequences on the lives of everyday people. Observers should remain vigilant about how the U.S. navigates this delicate situation moving forward. Will the administration’s approach yield the desired results, or will it merely exacerbate the existing humanitarian crisis? The answer may shape U.S.-Cuba relations for years to come.
Updated at 5:34 p.m. ET on April 3, 2026
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Since January, the Trump administration has effectively blockaded nearly all oil shipments to Cuba, causing conditions on the island to deteriorate dramatically. Electricity is becoming more unreliable, food is spoiling, and a collapsing medical system now risks creating a major health crisis. Some hospitalized Cubans have reportedly already died as a result of the blockade. According to my colleague Vivian Salama, a staff writer who has been reporting on Cuba, it’s all part of the White House’s plan to choke the island, destabilizing Cuba’s top leadership and forcing its government into diplomatic talks with the United States. In today’s Daily, she and I discuss the Trump administration’s possible intentions for the country, and consider who stands to gain from such a sharp escalation.
Will Gottsegen: What is the White House’s plan for Cuba right now?
Vivian Salama: Late last year, the administration started clamping down on Venezuela economically and militarily with the forward-looking objective of doing the same thing to Cuba. For decades, Cuba has been highly dependent on Venezuela for economic purposes, primarily oil. By cutting off Venezuela’s ability to export oil, the administration was also hoping that it would inflict intense pain on and ultimately spur dramatic change in the Cuban government.
What the White House wants to happen remains sort of opaque. It says that Venezuela’s leaders need to go, but it doesn’t explicitly talk about regime change. It’s important to put Venezuela into that context, because even though the administration forcefully removed Nicolás Maduro in January, it did so while still maintaining, for now at least, his regime. Trump is working with Maduro’s vice president in Venezuela, and would potentially do something similar in Cuba. Will we see ground incursions, or a dramatic raid like we saw in Venezuela? That is a big question mark.
Will: The Trump administration has indicated that it’s more interested in changing Cuba’s leadership than it is in toppling the current regime. Why might that be the administration’s goal, as opposed to ending communism on the island?
Vivian: The goal is to pursue commercial and economic interests for the United States. That is really what President Trump is all about. The ideological element is not a primary factor for him, as it is for many Cuban Americans. Trump will have achieved something historic and significant if he is able to put in place a Cuban government, or a Cuban leader, at least, who is more compliant with the U.S. so that the U.S. can go and invest in Cuba. Anything beyond that is sort of in the weeds for him.
Will: Why is Trump choosing this moment to act?
Vivian: Every president, Democrat and Republican, has mused over the idea of regime change in Cuba. It has just been a matter of how they would achieve that.
This has been one of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s primary objectives since he took public office. He has long called for regime change in Cuba. He has long called for a democratic transition in Venezuela, and he was able to convince Trump that this is tied to two things: his immigration and anti-narcotics crackdown and his broader ambitions for the U.S. to reassert its dominance in the Western Hemisphere. Trump is also very much focused on his legacy. He’s a second-term president, and, barring a dramatic change to the Constitution, he will leave office. He wants to do things that other presidents talked about and didn’t do. The Iran war is among those. And so is a dramatic realignment of the Cuban government.
Will: What has the current oil blockade done to Cuba?
Vivian: Garbage is accumulating in the streets because there’s no gas for the trucks to go around and pick it up. People are reportedly dying or in very, very bad conditions because hospital generators are now failing. The city of Havana—and the country in general—has plunged into darkness multiple times because its power grid has completely failed. This is exactly the impact that the Trump administration was looking to achieve in order to bring the Cuban regime to its knees.
Cubans have gone through periods similar to this in the past. They are used to sort of hunkering down and relying on the bare minimum to function. But in this case, it’s been so bad that it seems the government has at least been forced to start negotiating with Washington.
Will: What has Russia’s role been here, as Cuba’s longtime ally? I know the Kremlin has said it’s going to continue sending aid to the island.
Vivian: After the blockade started, a Russian oil tanker set sail for Cuba. That was before the United States eased sanctions on Russian oil last month to help mitigate the Iran war’s effects on the global economy. And the tanker didn’t turn around, even when Trump later amended those sanctions to bar Russia from supplying oil to Cuba specifically. Russia’s move was seen as a sign that its relationship with Cuba remains pretty tight, but this wasn’t a purely humanitarian gesture. It was also an attempt to poke at the United States, and there were questions about whether or not there would be a confrontation.
Then Trump said on Sunday that he would allow the tanker to reach Cuba, effectively breaking his own blockade. The sense among administration officials that I talked with was that they have inflicted enough pain for the Cuban government to want to talk—they do not want the situation to reach a point where it spurs an exodus of Cubans, or leads to a pandemic of some kind on the island. There are worries that there could be an outbreak of cholera because of conditions there.
Russia always looks to benefit when there is geopolitical disarray. With the U.S. so focused on the war in Iran, Russia has stood to benefit both with regard to its own conflict in Ukraine and elsewhere in the world. Cuba is a very small example of that. The fear is that if the U.S. continues to grant permissions to Russia, or turn a blind eye to Russia, the country could rebuild, once again, to be the kind of global menace that we saw in the years leading up to its invasion of Ukraine.
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