As Trump Tightens US Chokehold on Cuba’s Economy, Rubio Says Fix Requires ‘New People in Charge’
“Maybe—and stick with me here, Marco—the fact that the United States has had a near-total embargo on Cuba since before the Beatles’ first album might have something to do with its struggling economy?” said one critic.
A woman holds a flashlight while walking with a man on a street during a blackout in Havana on March 16, 2026.
(Photo by Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images)
Brett Wilkins
Mar 17, 2026
COMMON DREAMS
As Cuba works to restore electricity to millions of people plunged into darkness across the fuel-starved island, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday blamed Cuba’s socialist government for the nation’s economic crisis—a crisis largely caused by 65 years of US economic embargo and exacerbated by President Donald Trump’s tightened fuel blockade.
“Suffice it to say that the embargo is tied to political change on the island,” Rubio told reporters at the White House. “The law is codified, but the bottom line is, their economy doesn’t work. It’s a nonfunctional economy.”
“That revolution—it’s not even a revolution, that thing they have—has survived on subsidies,” he added. “They don’t get subsidies anymore, so they’re in a lot of trouble, and the people in charge, they don’t know how to fix it, so they have to get new people in charge.”
Rubio—whose parents fled the island during the rule of pro-US dictator Fulgencio Batista—dismissed Cuba’s proposed economic reforms, including opening the country to investment from Cubans living abroad.
“Cuba has an economy that doesn’t work in a political and governmental system that can’t fix it. So they have to change dramatically,” he said. “What they announced yesterday is not dramatic enough. It’s not going to fix it. So they’ve got some big decisions to make over there.”
Rubio added that although the Trump administration is currently focused on its war of choice in Iran—one of 10 countries attacked during the two terms of the self-proclaimed “president of peace”—the US would “be doing something with Cuba very soon.”
The US has been doing something with Cuba since the 19th century, when it invaded and seized the island from Spain. In the 20th century, it supported successive dictatorships and, after the Fidel Castro-led revolution ousted Batista, imposed an economic embargo on the island that has been perennially condemned by an overwhelming majority of United Nations member states for 33 years.
In addition to the embargo—which Cuba’s government says has cost the nation’s economy more than $200 billion in inflation-adjusted losses—the US tried to assassinate Castro many times and supported the militant Cuban exiles who launched the ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. Other Cuban exiles carried out numerous terror attacks targeting Cuba’s economy—and sometimes innocent civilians.
In language reminiscent of the US imperialists who conquered the island in 1898, Trump told reporters Monday, “I do believe... I’ll be having the honor of taking Cuba.”
“Maybe—and stick with me here, Marco—the fact that the United States has had a near-total embargo on Cuba since before the Beatles’ first album might have something to do with its struggling economy?” said one critic.
A woman holds a flashlight while walking with a man on a street during a blackout in Havana on March 16, 2026.
(Photo by Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images)
Brett Wilkins
Mar 17, 2026
COMMON DREAMS
As Cuba works to restore electricity to millions of people plunged into darkness across the fuel-starved island, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday blamed Cuba’s socialist government for the nation’s economic crisis—a crisis largely caused by 65 years of US economic embargo and exacerbated by President Donald Trump’s tightened fuel blockade.
“Suffice it to say that the embargo is tied to political change on the island,” Rubio told reporters at the White House. “The law is codified, but the bottom line is, their economy doesn’t work. It’s a nonfunctional economy.”
“That revolution—it’s not even a revolution, that thing they have—has survived on subsidies,” he added. “They don’t get subsidies anymore, so they’re in a lot of trouble, and the people in charge, they don’t know how to fix it, so they have to get new people in charge.”
Rubio—whose parents fled the island during the rule of pro-US dictator Fulgencio Batista—dismissed Cuba’s proposed economic reforms, including opening the country to investment from Cubans living abroad.
“Cuba has an economy that doesn’t work in a political and governmental system that can’t fix it. So they have to change dramatically,” he said. “What they announced yesterday is not dramatic enough. It’s not going to fix it. So they’ve got some big decisions to make over there.”
Rubio added that although the Trump administration is currently focused on its war of choice in Iran—one of 10 countries attacked during the two terms of the self-proclaimed “president of peace”—the US would “be doing something with Cuba very soon.”
The US has been doing something with Cuba since the 19th century, when it invaded and seized the island from Spain. In the 20th century, it supported successive dictatorships and, after the Fidel Castro-led revolution ousted Batista, imposed an economic embargo on the island that has been perennially condemned by an overwhelming majority of United Nations member states for 33 years.
In addition to the embargo—which Cuba’s government says has cost the nation’s economy more than $200 billion in inflation-adjusted losses—the US tried to assassinate Castro many times and supported the militant Cuban exiles who launched the ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. Other Cuban exiles carried out numerous terror attacks targeting Cuba’s economy—and sometimes innocent civilians.
In language reminiscent of the US imperialists who conquered the island in 1898, Trump told reporters Monday, “I do believe... I’ll be having the honor of taking Cuba.”
President Donald Trump's talk of "taking Cuba" harkens back to the most aggressively imperialist period in US history.
This, after Trump said last month ahead of talks with Cuban officials that he might launch what he called a “friendly takeover” of the island. The president has also boasted about the tremendous economic suffering caused by his illegal embargo and fuel blockade, which is widely unpopular and has been called a form of “economic warfare.”
“Officials in the US must be feeling very happy by the harm caused to every Cuban family,” Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío said Monday.
In Havana, residents hardened by decades of privation carried on the best they could without power. Some struggled in the dark.
“The power outages are driving me crazy,” 48-year-old Dalba Obiedo told The Associated Press. “Last night I fell down a 27-step staircase. Now I have to have surgery on my jaw. I fell because the lights went out.”
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel last week acknowledged that high-level talks with US representatives were underway. Recent reporting by Drop Site News cited an unnamed White House official who accused Rubio—a longtime advocate for regime change in Cuba—of trying to sabotage the talks.
Some observers believe that Trump wants Díaz-Canel to face a similar fate as Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro—who was kidnapped in January during a US invasion and is now jailed in the United States—while others warn that the United States cannot be trusted in talks, pointing to recent accusations by Oman’s foreign minister, who said American negotiators duplicitously scuppered an Iran peace deal that “was within our reach.”
However, instead of regime change, Trump may be seeking what some observers are calling regime compliance, which is likely why he did not move to oust Maduro’s subordinates. Unlike Venezuela, Cuba has no oil, but it was once was a magnet for US investment—both legal and otherwise.
Last week, a trio of Democratic US senators introduced a war powers resolution to stop Trump from attacking Cuba without the legally required authorization from Congress. Numerous war powers resolutions concerning Iran, Venezuela, and the dozens of boats Trump claims—without providing evidence—were transporting drugs from South America have all failed to pass the Republican-controlled Congress.
This, after Trump said last month ahead of talks with Cuban officials that he might launch what he called a “friendly takeover” of the island. The president has also boasted about the tremendous economic suffering caused by his illegal embargo and fuel blockade, which is widely unpopular and has been called a form of “economic warfare.”
“Officials in the US must be feeling very happy by the harm caused to every Cuban family,” Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío said Monday.
In Havana, residents hardened by decades of privation carried on the best they could without power. Some struggled in the dark.
“The power outages are driving me crazy,” 48-year-old Dalba Obiedo told The Associated Press. “Last night I fell down a 27-step staircase. Now I have to have surgery on my jaw. I fell because the lights went out.”
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel last week acknowledged that high-level talks with US representatives were underway. Recent reporting by Drop Site News cited an unnamed White House official who accused Rubio—a longtime advocate for regime change in Cuba—of trying to sabotage the talks.
Some observers believe that Trump wants Díaz-Canel to face a similar fate as Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro—who was kidnapped in January during a US invasion and is now jailed in the United States—while others warn that the United States cannot be trusted in talks, pointing to recent accusations by Oman’s foreign minister, who said American negotiators duplicitously scuppered an Iran peace deal that “was within our reach.”
However, instead of regime change, Trump may be seeking what some observers are calling regime compliance, which is likely why he did not move to oust Maduro’s subordinates. Unlike Venezuela, Cuba has no oil, but it was once was a magnet for US investment—both legal and otherwise.
Last week, a trio of Democratic US senators introduced a war powers resolution to stop Trump from attacking Cuba without the legally required authorization from Congress. Numerous war powers resolutions concerning Iran, Venezuela, and the dozens of boats Trump claims—without providing evidence—were transporting drugs from South America have all failed to pass the Republican-controlled Congress.
U.S. President Donald Trump gestures as he attends the annual Friends of Ireland Luncheon at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S., March 17, 2026. REUTERS/Evan Vucci
March 17, 2026
ALTERNET
President Donald Trump is “crazy” and “enamored with war,” warned a former Republican strategist for President George W. Bush in a Monday Substack post.
“Do you think that Donald Trump is together enough to realize that he's being manipulated by Lindsey Graham?” Schmidt said, referring to the Republican South Carolina senator widely viewed as influencing Trump’s hawkish foreign policies. “This is crazy. But before you watch it, keep your eye not on Lindsey Graham.”
Schmidt went on to predict Trump will soon target Cuba, based both on the president’s rhetoric and on the strong influence of Trump’s equally hawkish Secretary of State, Marco Rubio. From there, he pointed out that America is already stuck in a quagmire in Iran despite Trump’s assurances that the war would end quickly.
“We are but 19 days into the quagmire in Iran,” Schmidt wrote. “The Marines are on the way. There is no plan to end the war — only strategies that will escalate it. The world's flow of oil remains shut down through the Strait of Hormuz. And all of this is because Donald Trump is incapable of listening. All he does is talk. Donald knows he can never be told no. And so now oil is careening ever higher.”
Schmidt also warned about the ominous precedent set by Trump threatening media outlets that do not favorably cover his war against Iran.
“Trump demanding the media comply — not with reality, not with what's actually going on, but with his version of the truth; it's madness, all of it, really,” Schmidt wrote. “Here's Donald, supreme warlord of America in our 250th year. On to Cuba next. And who knows where after that?”
He concluded, “War everywhere — the president of peace, winner of the FIFA Peace Prize, Donald Trump. He's just getting started. It's time to put a check on him. Let's vote all of these people out.”
Schmidt has previously said that Trump’s inability to win the Iran war is “unpardonable” in the context of American politics, and added that it is ironic that Trump once demanded the Nobel Peace Prize.
“He wanted the Peace Prize, and when he couldn’t get it, Trump lost his mind,” Schmidt said. He then quoted a February letter Trump wrote to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre in which he raged about not receiving the prize.
“Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America,” Trump told Støre.
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