Francesca Chambers
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
So President Donald Trump has put Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is a Cuban-American and a former Florida senator, in charge of these talks with Havana.
Now, we know that he has spoken to Raulito Castro, who is the grandson of former leader Raul Castro.
And we also know now that Rubio and the Trump administration have also been in talks with the current president, Miguel Diaz-Canel of Cuba.
But what is in this potential agreement?
That is something that we know what's been under discussion.
A few of the things it focuses on economic reforms, and they've talked about an off ramp for Diaz Canal.
They've also talked about the Castro family being able to stay on the island, but we don't know exactly what is on the table at this moment, especially as the president has talked about a
friendly takeover, or as he told me a few weeks ago, it could be an unfriendly takeover of Cuba.
He's talked about both.
Well, right, exactly.
He has talked about taking Cuba.
He's talked about freeing Cuba.
And I think he said that he could do whatever it is that he wants with Cuba in the end.
It's not exactly like Venezuela, though.
People who are close to the administration, as well as experts, have told me because in Venezuela, the United States...
had Delcy Rodriguez, who's currently the acting president, was the number two to Nicolas Maduro.
Here, this is an unclear situation if the United States did want to pursue regime change.
And by the way, Marco Rubio has previously testified in the Senate that it wouldn't necessarily be pursuing that as part of its strategy towards Cuba.
But it's not clear if the U.S.
has identified someone yet who's not related to the Castros, by the way, who would be able to fulfill that role.