Cuba next? Trump admin eying possible regime change after Maduro arrest: Report
Photo by Horacio Villalobos#Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images
One U.S. official told the Journal that in recent meetings with Cuban exiles and civic groups, Trump administration officials have brainstormed possible individuals within the current Cuban regime who have an appetite for change and might want to make a deal.
The sense is that the time is ripe for a shakeup in the Stalinist island nation in light of its economic instability and loss of a key ally in Caracas.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, said earlier this month, “I think Cuba is going to be something we’ll end up talking about, because Cuba is a failing nation right now, a very badly failing nation, and we want to help the people.”
“If I lived in Havana, and I was in the government, I’d be concerned,” added Rubio.
Cuba — which has suffered rolling blackouts in recent months and years — has long relied on Venezuela for subsidized oil, which has made up around 70% of its total oil imports.
In the wake of Maduro’s removal, Pavel Vidal, a former Cuban central bank economist who teaches at Javeriana University, told NBC News, “If oil supply were to cease entirely, the Cuban economy would grind to a halt.”
Senior U.S. officials told the Journal that the U.S. plans to further undermine the Cuban regime by restricting its access to Venezuelan oil.
“Cuba lived, for many years, on large amounts of OIL and MONEY from Venezuela,” Trump noted in a Truth Social post on Jan. 11. “THERE WILL BE NO MORE OIL OR MONEY GOING TO CUBA — ZERO! I strongly suggest they make a deal, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE.”
The State Department said in a statement that it is in America’s national security interests for Cuba “to be competently run by a democratic government and to refuse to host our adversaries’ military and intelligence services.”
Rubio made a point of noting last week that the Cuban regime was “illegitimate.”
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