The Cuban government announced last Friday that it would free 2010 prisoners to coincide with Easter celebrations. 

According to a statement by the Cuban Embassy in the United States, those released will include young people, women, adults over 60, those due for early release, foreign citizens and Cubans who reside abroad.

Although the embassy described the decision as a “humanitarian and sovereign gesture”, some speculate that the release is a response to increasing U.S. pressure on the Cuban government.  

Since his re-election, U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly expressed his desire for regime change on the island. Though Cuba and the U.S. are currently engaged in diplomatic negotiations to de-escalate the recent significant increase in tensions between the two nations, Trump has not ruled out the prospect of an “unfriendly takeover” of Cuba. 

The Trump administration’s operation to forcibly remove Cuban ally Nicolás Maduro from power in Venezuela – Cuba’s former primary oil supplier – and his three-month blockade of non-private fuel imports to the island in early 2026 indicate an aggressive American posture. 

The Cuban government, however, has stated that its political system is not up for negotiation. 

The regime has expressed its willingness to accept certain economic reforms which could improve its commercial relationship with the United States and liberalize its largely centrally planned economy. 

Specifically, authorities have announced that Cuban Americans will be allowed to invest in businesses on the island and that remittances sent from abroad can be withdrawn in cash as U.S. dollars in Cuban currency exchange offices. 

Lianys Torres Rivera, Cuba’s Chargé d’Affaires at the Cuban embassy in Washington, even revealed that Cuba was willing to allow the U.S. to participate in the island’s “economic transformation”. 

Meanwhile, Trump recently declared that he had “no problem” with a Russian oil tanker loaded with an estimated 730,000 barrels of crude oil docking in Cuba. 

These potential diplomatic overtures may represent the softening of the previously adversarial negotiating positions of both nations, which could indicate that a negotiated solution is on the horizon. 

Was the prisoner release a concession? 

The Cuban government has consistently rejected claims that its decisions are influenced by Washington. In March, the Cuban government released 51 prisoners after talks with the Vatican, but explicitly denied at the time that the release was in any way a result of U.S. coercion. 

Nevertheless, Havana has used the tactic of releasing prisoners to improve bilateral relations with Washington before; in 2025 the Cuban government released over 500 prisoners early because of a deal that was made between Joe Biden’s administration and the Cuban government. 

In exchange, Biden removed Cuba from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism shortly before his term ended, a decision that was quickly reversed when Donald Trump came to power. But the Cuban government still upheld its end of the deal and freed the prisoners. 

Some believe the latest prisoner release announcement comes in response to Washington easing the oil blockade on the island.

“Trump announced that he would allow the entry of a Russian oil tanker into Cuba and that he will assess case by case from now on the entrance of oil ships in Cuba. That is a concession, he is opening a crack in the oil blockade,” Jorge Alfonso, an independent Cuban journalist based in Mexico City, told Latin America Reports. The prisoner release is “probably the way that Cuba is responding to that”, continued the journalist.

However, Alfonso warned that this potential concession should not be misinterpreted as a sign that Cuba is willing to fundamentally change its internal, authoritarian political system: “They haven’t released political prisoners, they have only released people processed for other felonies … It is also important to note that this release is also a way for the Cuban government to alleviate pressure on the [strained] jail system regardless of U.S. pressure.” 

Indeed, as of March 2026, Cuba has the second highest number of prisoners per 100,000 in the world, after El Salvador. Cuba’s poor prison conditions have begun to provoke dissent, with a protest recently breaking out in the La Canaleta jail in Ciego de Ávila because of dwindling food supplies and poor sanitary conditions. 

The prisoner release may therefore be a pragmatic move rather than a sign of the regime loosening its grip; President Miguel Díaz-Canel reiterated in a recent interview on NBC (set to air on Sunday) that he has no intention of resigning. 

More negotiation or confrontation? 

Progress in negotiations does not automatically rule out the possibility that the United States might launch some kind of military operation to force political changes. Just two days before the Trump administration decided to attack Iran, the U.S. and Iran had been engaged in talks which reportedly produced a bilateral agreement on sanctions relief for Iran.

Despite Trump’s recent precedent of opting for military force over diplomacy, analysts believe this is unlikely in Cuba’s case.

“I do not expect a military intervention by the U.S. … I expect that there will continue to be talks between the two governments, and it is conceivable that Washington will reduce its pressure on the island in response to initiatives by Havana to open opportunities for U.S.-based businesses,”  Eric Hershberg, Professor of Government at American University and expert, told Latin America Reports.

The White House’s repeated threats of regime change against Cuba could be part of a strategy that the U.S. President has used before. Hershberg explained that Trump often acts aggressively towards foes and then de-escalates before claiming an ultimate diplomatic victory. 

“Cuba may turn out to be another instance of Trump-era American menacing that doesn’t achieve its purported objectives, in this instance overthrowing the Cuban political system,” concluded the academic. 

Washington’s decision to strike an alliance with current Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez, the former vice-President under Maduro, instead of installing opposition leader María Corina Machado could suggest that Trump has little interest in changing foreign adversaries’ internal power structure. 

Instead, the Venezuela case would suggest that Trump prefers obliging adversaries to align more closely with the U.S. diplomatically, rather than pushing for comprehensive regime change. 

However, this preference is not necessarily shared by all of the Trump base or his high-ranking cabinet members, especially with regards to Cuba. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, for example, has a long history of calling for the current Cuban Government’s removal from power. Rubio told reporters as recently as mid-March that, for the Cuban domestic situation to improve, “they have to get new people in charge”. 

The historically powerful Florida-based Cuban-American lobby is also likely to oppose any negotiation that allows the Cuban Communist Party to continue its one-party rule of the island. 

Various Cuban opposition groups signed the so-called “Freedom Accord” in early March, a document which outlined the opposition’s plan for a democratic transition on the island and intention to “dismantl[e] the criminal enterprise that is the Communist Party of Cuba”. 

Cuban American voters have historically supported Trump, and will likely lobby him to push for systematic internal changes in Cuba in negotiations. 

Featured Image: Boniato Prison, near Santiago de Cuba. The facility, which remains in use today, was the site of Fidel Castro’s imprisonment after the failed attack on the Moncada barracks in 1953

Image Credit: Greg0611 via Wikimedia Commons

License: Creative Commons Licenses

The post Could latest Cuba prisoner release mark an advance in Havana-Washington talks? appeared first on Latin America Reports.

U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters on Monday that he believes that “Cuba sees the end” and, as such, he will have “the honor of taking Cuba”. 

The American leader was likely referring to an “end” of Cuba’s current communist system, which has historically been at odds with the U.S. 

“I mean, whether I free it, take it. Think I can do anything I want with it. You want to know the truth”, the president added. 

Trump’s comments coincided with a total collapse of the Cuban electrical grid on Monday which left millions without power. The U.S. blockade of foreign oil supplies — which has meant that no oil shipment has reached Cuba in three months — to the island has left Cubans facing chronic electricity shortages and frequent power outages. 

The Cuban national energy provider — La Unión Eléctrica de Cuba — posted on X that it had restored power to several “micro systems” in the provinces and that power was gradually being restored municipality by municipality. 

Read More: Crippling blackouts leave millions in darkness in crisis-ridden Cuba

Responding to Trump’s predictions of Cuba’s imminent collapse, the Cuban Consul General in Italy José Luis Darias Suarez told Latin America Reports that he was unaware of Trump’s latest comments, but that “in 67 years of revolution, a United States president has never been able to do what [he] wants with Cuba.” 

“On the contrary, they have implemented different measures, especially measures of economic pressure, to topple the Cuban Revolution, a revolution that remains in power because of [the] popular support … of the people who stand with the revolution, of which there are indisputably many”.

However, the current economic crisis has contributed to a growth in political opposition to the Cuban government. Protests, once a rarity in Cuba, have gradually increased in intensity and scope. 

In the central city of Morón demonstrators even ransacked a local office of the ruling Cuban Communist Party (PCC) in a sign of growing discontent towards the island’s leadership. 

Trump’s warnings to Cuba contrast the conciliatory tone struck by Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel last Friday, who revealed that the Cuban and American governments were engaged in official negotiations that sought to find “a potential solution to … bilateral differences” between the two traditional adversaries.  

However, those negotiations may require Cuba to make comprehensive political changes in exchange for the United States easing its economic sanctions against the island; the New York Times and The Miami Herald report that the U.S. government sees removing Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel from power as a key element of any future negotiation. 

The New York Times revealed that, if Cuba complied, the U.S. would then likely allow Cubans to choose their next leader, as opposed to having a U.S.-backed figure installed. 

However, Trump’s most recent comments imply that a negotiated solution remains anything but guaranteed. The Trump administration’s actions in Venezuela to capture President Nicolás Maduro and their killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei serve as a reminder that the U.S. is willing to use force to remove heads of state, such as Miguel Díaz-Canel, that it perceives to be hostile. 

Featured Image: Trump with military officers at MacDill Air Force Base in 2017. 

Image Credit: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff via Wikimedia Commons

License: Creative Commons Licenses

The post Trump says he can “do anything” he wants with Cuba following Morón riot and nationwide blackouts appeared first on Latin America Reports.

Pete Hegseth, the highest-ranking official in the United States Department of War, told a congressional hearing on Tuesday that he considered Cuba a national security threat, citing the Caribbean nation’s alleged intelligence sharing with and support for U.S. adversaries, such as Russia. 

His comments came the same day that U.S. President Donald Trump said the White House was still entertaining negotiations with Cuba, although he also said the regime was going “down.”

The mixed signals fuel speculation that Washington may be preparing an operation in Cuba similar to its intervention against Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro in January.

“We’ve long been concerned that a foreign adversary using that kind of location, that close to our shores is highly problematic … we don’t want foreign adversaries attempting to use that environment,” Hegseth told Cuban-American Congressman Mario Díaz-Balart. 

Venezuela’s association with U.S. geopolitical adversaries, namely Russia and China, was a key factor in the U.S. attacking the country and removing its President Nicolás Maduro in a military operation.  

U.S. President Donald Trump also criticized Cuba yesterday, calling it “a failed country and only heading in one direction – down!”. The U.S. leader also, however, wrote that “Cuba is asking for help, and we are going to talk!!!” 

The Cuban government had previously confirmed that it was engaged in talks with the U.S. in order to de-escalate the brewing tensions between the two nations. It is unclear whether Trump is referring to a continuation of these existing talks or is proposing a higher-level meeting between Cuban and U.S. leaders. 

Emerging parallels to Venezuelan operation 

Criticism of Cuba’s alliances is not the only sign that the U.S. is seeking to conduct a Venezuela-style regime change operation there. Before Maduro’s capture, surveillance flights over Venezuela by the U.S. military increased significantly, a pattern which seems to be repeating itself over Cuba. 

According to CNN, the U.S. Navy and Air Force have flown at least 25 intelligence-gathering flights over the Cuban coastline since early February, with the vast majority of them taking place near the major cities of Havana and Santiago de Cuba. Before February, such flights had been very rare. 

These intelligence flights follow a recent intensification of sanctions against Cuba by the Trump administration, months of a near-complete U.S.-enforced oil blockade of the island nation and repeated threats of regime change by Trump’s government. 

The U.S. government had also enforced a blockade of Venezuelan oil tankers and escalated its rhetoric of threatened regime change before striking the nation. These parallels may not be a coincidence; successive U.S. administrations have seen weakening both Cuba and Venezuela simultaneously as key ideological priorities. 

In 2018, then-U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton called the two nations – along with Nicaragua – part of a “troika of tyranny” that threatened U.S. interests in Latin America in 2018. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has also previously mentioned that a positive effect of regime change in Venezuela would be the debilitation of the Cuban government.

Venezuela had been a longtime Cuban ally and, as the nation with the world’s largest oil reserves, was Cuba’s primary oil supplier for decades; the Chavista Venezuelan government and the communist Cuban one had been close regional allies. 

However, the removal of Maduro from office and his replacement by Delcy Rodríguez, who has so far acquiesced to U.S. pressure, seems to have severed the Cuban-Venezuelan alliance. 

The political risks of U.S.-backed regime change in Cuba 

Dr Andrew Gawthorpe, a U.S. foreign policy and history lecturer at Leiden University, spoke to Latin America Reports about the similarities between the geopolitical developments in Cuba and Venezuela. 

“Current events [in Cuba] look like those which preceded what happened in Venezuela”, argued Gawthorpe, noting that the “activity could be a prelude to a direct attack … or it could be an attempt to pressure the Cuban government into making concessions to U.S. demands. It’s hard to tell which it is.” 

The professor also noted that Washington is tied up with its war against Iran right now, which may complicate any intervention against Cuba.

“What happens in the Caribbean is connected to what is happening in the Middle East. The Pentagon has moved a large amount of its military capacity to the Middle East for the war with Iran, and it might still need more,” said Gawthorpe. 

He also warned that an attack on the Caribbean nation in the midst of the ongoing U.S.-Iranian conflict could prove politically imprudent: “Although it’s possible that Trump might be tempted by the idea of a quick win in Cuba … it’s politically and militarily risky to take on another military engagement” 

The U.S.-Iran war, which began in February, has grown increasingly unpopular with the U.S. public, with Silver Bulletin reporting that over 55% oppose the conflict as of today.

Gawthorpe believes that the Iran conflict is contributing to a shift in U.S. public opinion towards conflict aversion, a factor that Trump would have to consider before striking Cuba. 

“In America right now there is a tremendous appetite for the administration to focus on domestic problems – especially the cost of living – and to not spend its time starting foreign wars which have little relevance to the average American. This feeling is particularly strong in Trump’s base.” 

However, the operation to remove Maduro, given its success and the lack of U.S. casualties associated with the operation, had lower disapproval ratings. Reuters reported in January that only 34% of Americans disapproved of the raid, while 33% approved. 

“Americans in general – and Trump’s base also – are not going to get too exercised over something that looks exactly like the seizure of Maduro: a quick operation without American casualties that nets someone they see as a bad guy,” explained Gawthorpe.

But, such an operation would not be without its risks: “The big risk for Trump would be that he can’t guarantee that any operation in Cuba is going to go the same way.”

Featured Image: Former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro being escorted off a plane in New York by U.S. DEA agents after his capture by U.S. Special Forces.  

Image Credit: Drug Enforcement Operation via Wikimedia Commons

License: Creative Commons Licenses

The post Spectre of Venezuelan-style regime change grows in Cuba despite Trump promise of U.S.-Cuba talks appeared first on Latin America Reports.

High-ranking members of the Trump administration have intensified their rhetoric towards Cuba in recent days, with President Donald Trump himself joking last week that the U.S. Navy would attack the communist island after it has completed its operations against Iran. 

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio also told reporters at the White House on Tuesday that Cuba was a “failed regime” run by “incompetent communists” while dismissing the significance of a months-long U.S. fuel blockade against the island nation of 10 million. 

The threats, however, are not merely rhetorical. Trump also signed an executive order on Friday introducing further sanctions against the Cuban government. 

These measures target officials deemed to be working in the security, energy, defense, financial services and mining sectors of the Cuban economy. The order also authorized secondary sanctions against anyone accused of facilitating transactions with these officials. 

This weekend’s announcement marks the latest example of a series of punitive measures that the U.S. has introduced against the island since the beginning of the year. 

In addition to restricting the island’s oil supply, the U.S. has declared Cuba an extraordinary threat to U.S. national security and pressured countries in the region to cancel decades-old medical agreements with Cuba. 

Domestic attempts to prevent military action fail 

Some members of the Democratic party, however, have been urging the Trump administration to show restraint towards Cuba. 

Last week, the majority-Republican Senate blocked a Democrat-backed resolution which would have prevented Trump from authorizing military action against Cuba without congressional approval. 

The resolution lost by a vote of 51-47, with all Senators voting along party lines with the exception of Republican Senators Rand Paul and Susan Collins, who supported the resolution, and Democrat John Fetterman, who opposed it. 

This is not the first time that Democrats have attempted to limit Trump’s capacity to circumvent congress and approve military action abroad; the U.S. Senate has rejected resolutions seeking to block U.S. military action against Venezuela and further action in Iran. 

Democratic Senator Tim Kaine cited the economic blockade as a key reason for his sponsorship of the resolution, calling the sanctions tantamount to an “act of war”. 

Republican Senator Rick Scott, who has been an outspoken supporter of U.S.-backed political regime change on the island, introduced the point of order which stopped the resolution’s adoption. 

Scott asserted that the resolution was unnecessary as Trump has thus far not deployed any troops to the island and, this notwithstanding, argued that “President Trump is doing everything he can to bring back freedom and democracy all across Latin America, and we should do everything we can to support him”.

Probability of political conflict grows

The Cuban and U.S. governments are currently negotiating a potential solution to the brewing tensions between the two nations, but sources close to the Trump administration’s negotiating team have revealed that the U.S. sees the removal of current Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel as key to any successful deal. 

However, the Cuban government has been emphatic in its opposition to any form of U.S.-enabled political change on the island: Díaz-Canel told NBC that he would not step down as a result of U.S. pressure under any circumstances.

In light of this political impasse, the recent escalation of rhetoric by the Trump administration and the failure of the U.S. Senate to restrict Trump’s capacity to strike the island, a U.S.-instigated attempt at forcing political regime change appears increasingly likely. 

Stephanie Cepero, the co-founder of the Florida-based Cuban dissident organization Cuban Freedom March, spoke to Latin America Reports about the implications of the recent Senate ruling and increasing U.S. sanctions, as well as her hopes for comprehensive political change. 

“When you cut off GAESA [the Cuban military conglomerate that controls a large portion of the Cuban economy], when you sanction Díaz-Canel directly, when you choke the regime’s access to hard currency — you are hitting the people responsible, not the people suffering”, Cepero argued. 

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla disagrees, calling the sanctions “illegal and abusive” and tantamount to “collective punishment against the Cuban people”. 

Cepero also characterized the Senate ruling as “the right outcome”, accusing the proponents of the Democrat-led resolution of attempting to “tie the President’s hands at a moment when U.S. leverage over the regime is arguably stronger than it’s been in decades.”

“The Cuban dictatorship has survived for over 60 years in part because of predictable, toothless U.S. policy. Uncertainty is a tool. Removing it prematurely would have been a gift to Havana, not to the Cuban people,” she continued. 

Large elements of the sizable Florida-based Cuban-American community have long pressured successive U.S. administrations to take more decisive action against the Cuban state, citing its human rights abuses, imprisonment of dissidents and restriction of civil liberties. 

Cepero believes that the change long sought after by the Cuban-American constituency could be imminent given the Trump administration’s current harsh stance towards the Cuban government. 

“A U.S. administration willing to hold firm on pressure without blinking creates real conditions for change … pressure [must be] sustained and intensified until there is meaningful, verifiable political change on the island. Half-measures and relief valves only delay the inevitable. The Cuban people deserve freedom now,” the dissident concluded. 

The Cuban government, however, has promised to resist any attempts to force political change upon the island; Díaz-Canel warned that millions of Cubans, including him, would be willing to sacrifice their lives to resist a U.S. attack on Cuba and its Revolution. 

Featured Image: Pro-Trump Cuban Americans celebrate his first inauguration in 2017. 

Image Credit: VOA via Wikimedia Commons

License: Creative Commons Licenses

The post U.S.-Cuba tensions escalate amidst new sanctions and failed attempts to prevent conflict  appeared first on Latin America Reports.