Is Cuba Trump’s Next Target?
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This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. Since the beginning of this year, President Trump has turned sharply from his promised focus on domestic issues, America first, to a series of foreign military adventures that have shocked many of his own supporters and much of the world. In January, there was the invasion of Venezuela and the seizure of its president, Nicolas Maduro. Then came the threatened invasion of Greenland. And now there's a war with Iran that has engulfed the Middle East, killed many hundreds of people, and threatens the entire global economy. And yet no sooner was the bombing of Iran underway that Trump and some of his allies began teasing a new move.
Taking Cuba. That's a big honor. Taking Cuba. Taking Cuba. In some form, yeah.
What recent actions has Trump taken regarding Cuba?
Taking Cuba. I mean, whether I free it, take it, I think I can do anything I want with it. You want to know the truth? They're very weakened now.
The U.S. has effectively shut off Cuba's oil supply and the electrical grid had a near total blackout last week. New Yorker staff writer John Lee Anderson has been to Cuba countless times in his career and his most recent trip followed the invasion of Venezuela. I spoke with John Lee Anderson this past week. John Lee, the Trump administration has recently said that the president of Cuba, Miguel Diaz-Canel, has to step down. So let's start there. Who is Diaz-Canel? What's his role in the regime? And what would ousting him even accomplish?
Diaz-Canel is the hand-picked successor to Raul Castro. He's a party apparatchik. He was a provincial party chief. And he has served... how shall I put this, creditably as the face of the ongoing regime. And he's not had an easy time of it. There's been, you know, as we know, a huge economic downturn in Cuba, etc. The falling apart of relations in Trump 1 and now Trump 2. Biden did nothing during his four years to alter the things in Cuba, for better or worse. So, DSK now is a kind of Yeah, he's a working stiff, really, and doesn't have a huge amount of respect from the population, but nor is he seen as particularly evil. He's seen as the front man for the regime, which continues to be controlled from behind the curtains by the elderly Raul Castro and his family.
So... Raul Diaz-Canel, you know, he won his reelection three years ago. So he has two to go. He has to leave office in April 2028. He won his reelection to give you an idea of the kind of politics on the island under the slogan of continuidad, continuity, which, you know, doesn't appeal to people under 30 years old. And, you know, he's uninspiring.
But uninspiring. The description you've given me when we've talked on the phone and in your coming piece about Cuba is of a Cuba in desperate straits. People are leaving and leaving and leaving. The streets are filled with garbage. That's right. There's blackouts all the time. The economy is in desperate straits. events in Venezuela and elsewhere could not have been all that encouraging. So continuity seems a kind of a grim way to put it.
Yeah, exactly. But you have to put into context that this is a regime that presents itself as the revolutionary continuation, which includes notions of sacrifice. In a way, there's analogies here to Iran, right? This idea of sacrifice, a common enemy, the Yankee imperialist regime. empire just there over the sea as ever oppressing us. Increasing numbers of Cubans don't believe that anymore, but they have little agency to alter the situation. And Diaz-Canel always succeeds in disappointing. He even defers, almost as if Raul Castro was the supreme leader, as Iranian presidents do. So back to part of your first question, what does it do to remove him? Because he has no real power. But I think for someone like Trump, you know, he's, well, as we know, he's rather simplistic.
So he thinks we got rid of Maduro and now it's mine. Venezuela's mine. If we get Diaz-Canel out of there, it'll look good because he's the top guy.
I have to say, though, John Lee.
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