Cuba: Key facts about the country and why Trump is interested in it

Havana, Cuba

Content:

• Where is Cuba located?
• Cuba as a state
• Economy of Cuba
• Why Cuba is important to the United States
• Donald Trump's Interest in Cuba
• US sanctions against Cuba
• Protests in Cuba
• Changes in Cuban society

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Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean between North and South America. Situated on the island of the same name, it controls an archipelago of more than 1,600 small islands and cays within the Greater Antilles. The official language is Spanish, and the currency is the Cuban peso. Cuba is a unitary state, administratively divided since 2011 into 15 provinces and 168 municipalities (including the Isla de la Juventud, a special status municipality). Its form of government is a mixed republic with a single-party system. The capital and largest city is Havana. The current constitution was adopted by referendum in 2019. According to official data, the population is 9.7 million, of whom 64% are descendants of white immigrants from Spain, and 36% are of African or mixed descent.

Cuba as a state

The foundations of the modern state were formed after the 1959 revolution. Since 1977, the leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, has held power , serving as Chairman of the Council of State and the Council of Ministers until 2006. His brother, Raúl, then ruled the country until 2018. In 2018, he was succeeded by Miguel Díaz-Canel, who was elected First Secretary of the Communist Party in 2021.

In 2019, a new Constitution reformed the state structure, created the office of president, which Díaz-Canel filled, and distributed executive power between the HEAD of state, the president of the national assembly, and the prime minister.

The highest organ of state power is the National Assembly of People's Power (Asamblea Nacional del Poder Popular - ANPP), a unicameral body of 470 deputies with legislative and constituent powers. It is elected for five years and elects the president, vice president, and secretary, as well as appoints the prime minister (upon nomination by the president). The permanent body of the assembly is the Council of State, composed of 21 deputies, which functions between sessions (they meet twice a year) and also has legislative powers. The Council of State is chaired by the President of Parliament. The Council of Ministers, headed by the prime minister, performs the administrative functions of the government and is authorized to issue decrees and resolutions.

The president is the head of state and is elected by the Assembly for a five-year term, renewable once. The prime minister, according to the Constitution, may also exercise executive and administrative functions "in exceptional cases."

Viñales (Photo: Jürgen Schwenkenbecher / picture alliance / Global Look Press)

At the local level, municipal assemblies of people's power operate, elected for five-year terms, while at the city and town level, people's councils operate. Executive power at the provincial level is exercised by governors and vice-governors, who oversee the work of the provincial councils. Elections are held using a majoritarian system; a candidate must receive more than 50% of the vote to win. All citizens aged 16 and over are eligible to vote.

Since 1992, political parties have been formally permitted in Cuba; however, their activities remain de facto prohibited, and multi-party politics is not provided for in Cuba. The Constitution (Article 5) enshrines the ruling Communist Party of Cuba (CPC) as the "supreme guiding political force in the state and society." The CPC functions as a typical Stalinist organization, with its highest body being the Congress (held every five years). During its recesses, it operates a Central Committee (CC) consisting of 97 members (meeting twice a year), as well as an elected Politburo, consisting of the First and Second Secretaries of the CPC and 12 members (convened as needed). The Secretariat of the Central Committee and the Executive Commission of the Politburo serve as permanent bodies. The party has approximately 800,000 members.

The CCP manages a network of youth, student, women's, workers', and farmers' associations, as well as grassroots committees for the defense of the revolution. Some of these structures, particularly the Small Farmers' Association (ANAP), are able to lobby their interests within the CCP.

Economy of Cuba

The country's economy has undergone significant changes since 1968, when all private enterprises were nationalized. Since the 1990s, the authorities have pursued a policy of "updating" the economic model to reflect new realities. It continues to be built on the activities of socialist enterprises with a limited role for the private sector—self-employed individuals, small and medium-sized enterprises, and urban and rural cooperatives. It is characterized by the monopoly and oligopoly dominance of state-owned companies in all strategic sectors (hotels , oil and nickel production ), state control over export-import operations, and directive price regulation.

A hairdresser waits for clients in Havana (Photo: Ramon Espinosa / AP / TASS )

Limited market reforms were implemented from the mid-1990s and especially in the late 2000s, following Fidel Castro's departure from politics. The most significant changes began after 2010, when the authorities liberalized the housing and automobile markets, legalized "self-employment" (trabajo por cuenta propia - TCP, commonly known as cuentapropistas) in 180 types of activities, and reformed the tax regimes for this sector. While in 1970, there were only 30,000 such individuals (1.2%), by 2019, the private sector employed 1.5 million, or about a third of the workforce, and accounted for up to 55% of retail trade. At the constitutional level, the private sector was separated from the TCP into a separate category only in 2019. The following year, private enterprises were allowed to engage in foreign trade only with mandatory mediation by state agencies. In 2021, a law on small and medium-sized enterprises (micro, pequeñas y medianas empresas, commonly known as mipymes) was passed, with an employment ceiling of 100 employees. As of 2024, there were already 8,066 such companies in Cuba. In addition, the country has a vast informal sector.

Nevertheless, the state sector remains overwhelmingly dominant in the economy, with many of these enterprises in crisis due to high levels of equipment depreciation and operating at reduced capacity. A significant role is played by the Grupo de Administración Empresarial SA (GAESA), a holding company linked to the armed forces, which operates in dollarized sectors of the economy and dominates the hotel and tourism sector. Specifically, it controlled the money transfer operator FINCIMEX and the tourism company Gaviota. Azcuba, a SUGAR monopoly, is also linked to the military.

The economy experienced a severe crisis in the 1990s (the so-called special period of 1991–1995) amid the collapse of the global socialist system, the end of Soviet subsidies estimated at $3 billion annually, and the tightening of the US trade embargo (since 1992). This led to a sharp decline in incomes, living standards, and the quality of social services. To overcome this, the country's leadership legalized the US DOLLAR (in 1993), expanded opportunities for self-employment (in 1994), and focused on attracting foreign tourists, remittances from abroad, and the development of biotechnology and medical services (their share in services exports reached 50%). This allowed the economy to stabilize in the first half of the 2000s and achieve relatively high growth rates from 2000 to 2006 (an average of 6.2% per year in 1997 prices). An additional factor was the supply of subsidized Venezuelan oil, reaching 90,000 tons per year and covering 50% of the island's fuel needs. A new package of limited market reforms was adopted in October 2010 and aimed at reducing the inefficient public sector, but the authorities refused to reform the system along the lines of the Chinese or Vietnamese models. Meanwhile, the trade deficit steadily widened, reaching 187% by 2019 (in value terms, exports were 62% lower in 2019 than in 1989, while imports increased by 22%). The decline of industry and agriculture, which had shrunk by half compared to 1989, elevated the service sector to the leading sector of the economy.

People wait outside a store to make purchases in Havana, August 8, 2020. (Photo: Yander Zamora / EPA / TASS)

In 2020, the country entered a new crisis, the most severe since the collapse of the USSR, exacerbated by the effects of CORONAVIRUS restrictions, tightened sanctions, a decline in tourism, and a severe economic crisis in Venezuela. This crisis was accompanied by high inflation, a decline in the purchasing power of the peso (which lost 88% of its value), shortages of essential goods, a growing black market, and brief protests in July 2021. According to official data, the economy contracted by 11% in 2020.

In January 2021, the government devalued the peso against the dollar (from 1:1 to 24:1) and abolished the convertible peso, thereby unifying the national currency. However, despite a simultaneous fivefold increase in pensions and wages, the currency reform failed to halt inflation (official estimates that year put it at 77%, unofficial estimates put it at 300%, and the following year, government and independent estimates put it at 31% and 200%, respectively). Moreover, it effectively wiped out citizens' peso-denominated savings and undermined confidence in the national currency (by 2022, the US dollar was already worth 120 pesos in government exchange offices and 175 on the black market). In 2022, a series of accidents at key thermal power plants due to outdated infrastructure and chronic fuel shortages knocked out 40% of their installed capacity and caused extended power outages: in 2025 alone, the country experienced four major blackouts. The country currently generates 25% less electricity than in 2019.

The economy is currently in crisis, suffering from energy shortages, water supply disruptions, and rising prices. The situation in the energy sector has cascaded down production in agriculture, industry, and construction, paralyzing the public transportation system. In 2024, sugar production—160,000 tons—was 2.7% of the 1989 level, accounting for less than 30% of domestic demand, while labor productivity, according to estimates by the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ELAC), fell below Haiti's level. According to Cuban economist Ricardo Torres Pérez, the country's GDP in 2024 will be 10% lower than in 2018.

Power outage in Havana, February 15, 2025 (Photo: Joaquin Hernandez / XinHua / Global Look Press)

Why Cuba is important to the United States

Cuba is the largest island in the Caribbean, located approximately 90–110 km off the coast of Florida, usa. Since 1903, a leased American military base has been located in Guantanamo Bay, near the city of the same name. In early 2002, a secret prison was established there to hold high-risk prisoners arrested on suspicion of terrorism. It is separated from Cuban territory by the so-called Cactus Curtain—a demarcation line where the Cuban military planted prickly pear cacti to prevent Cuban citizens from fleeing.

Historically, Cuba has had close ties to the United States since its independence, with its troops assisting local nationalists in their rebellion against Spain and occupying the island from 1899–1902, 1906–1909, 1912, and 1917–1922. In 1901, the US Congress passed the Pratt Amendment, which provided for the possibility of intervention in Cuba if American interests were threatened, and insisted on including this provision in the island's new Constitution (it was only repealed in 1934).

Until 1959, the United States accounted for 56% of Cuban exports, including 80% of Cuban sugar exports, and 76% of Cuban imports. American companies owned sugar mills, plantations, and most of the island's banks, controlled 90% of the island's telephone and electricity sectors, 50% of railroad transportation, 40% of sugar production, 23% of other industrial sectors, and a significant portion of the tourism industry. Import quotas for Cuban sugar were an important instrument of control. All of these assets were nationalized without compensation beginning in May 1960.

Since 1961, Havana's foreign policy has been characterized by a sharply anti-American stance and a socialist orientation, keeping Cuba at the center of US attention. The island became the focus of global attention after American reconnaissance aircraft discovered the deployment of Soviet nuclear-armed missiles there in October 1962. This triggered a serious crisis in US-USSR relations, bringing the countries to the brink of nuclear war, which was resolved diplomatically.

For decades, Washington has pursued a policy of diplomatic and economic isolation of the island, known in Havana as the "blockade" (el bloqueo). It centers on a trade embargo, restrictions on travel to Cuba by US citizens and Cuban citizens to the US, and controls on remittances to the island. Cuban authorities, for their part, traditionally hold the US primarily responsible for the protracted economic crisis.

Political organizations of the Cuban diaspora living in the United States, typically right-wing and far-right, exert a certain influence on the position of the American authorities. In particular, the large Cuban diaspora in Florida supported George W. Bush's candidacy in 2000 and played a role in his victory. After being elected president, he tightened sanctions against Cuba.

A 1950s car passes a dilapidated house in central Havana (Photo: Lisette Poole / dpa / Global Look Press)

During the 2016 election campaign, Donald Trump also counted on the votes of American-Cuban voters and tightened sanctions against Cuba in 2017, then significantly expanded the trade embargo again in 2019–2020 in preparation for the next election campaign. In 2025, Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants and a vocal opponent of the Havana government, became Secretary of State and National Security Advisor.

Donald Trump's Interest in Cuba

Donald Trump continued the Republican line of pressure on the republic and in July 2025 ordered the tightening of sanctions against the island, specifically banning American citizens from traveling to Cuba. He again raised the issue of Cuba immediately after the US operation in Venezuela in January 2026, during which President Nicolás Maduro  , Havana's closest ally, was detained and extradited from the country.

More than 30 Cubans responsible for the head of state's personal security were killed during a raid on his residence in Caracas. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio then declared the Cuban government "in serious trouble" and hinted at possible action against the Cuban authorities.

A few days later, Trump again stated that Cuba was "hanging by a thread" and that the country would be left without money from Venezuelan oil.

US sanctions against Cuba

After Fidel Castro's revolutionary government came to power in January 1959, the United States recognized the island's new government , and the Cuban leader made an unofficial visit to the United States. However, the nationalization of American property, increased taxes on American imports, and rapprochement with the USSR led to retaliatory measures and ultimately a severance of relations in January 1961.

Tanks parade during the second anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, Plaza Marti, Havana, January 9, 1961. (Photo: Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

The first sanctions against the new government were imposed by President Dwight David Eisenhower in 1960, who reduced the Cuban sugar import quota by 22%. In response, the Castro government negotiated sugar purchases with the USSR. In April of the following year, the CIA attempted a counterrevolutionary coup, organizing a landing of 1,400 Cuban exiles in the Bay of Pigs under cover of American military aircraft. However, the operation ended in failure. Over the following decades, American intelligence agencies, with the participation of the Pentagon, carried out a series of sabotage and terrorist attacks on industrial facilities and planned several coup scenarios, including an assassination attempt on Castro. However, overall, after 1961, the US prioritized the economic isolation of Cuba.

Following the failure of the attempt to overthrow the Castro regime by force on February 2, 1962, President John F. Kennedy imposed a trade embargo on the country through Executive Order 3347, prohibiting trade and financial transactions with Havana. Its legal framework was formed by the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917, and the EXPORT Control Act of 1949, which was replaced by the Export Administration Act of 1969. The implementation of these measures was entrusted to the US Department of Commerce and the Treasury (the latter is responsible for the Cuban asset control regulations—a set of federal regulations). The Lyndon Johnson administration expanded the food embargo in 1964 and sought to extend the sanctions regime extraterritorially, exerting pressure on the Organization of American States to this end.

Following attempts to normalize relations under Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter in the 1970s, in 1982 the Ronald Reagan administration added Cuba to the list of state sponsors of terrorism for supporting left-wing movements in Africa and Latin America, thereby complicating Cuba's trade with third countries. Subsequently, Presidents Bush Sr. and Bill Clinton signed the Cuba Democracy Act of 1992 and the Cuban Freedom and Solidarity Act (Helms-Burton Act, 1996), respectively. The latter codified previous executive orders, enacted the embargo into law, and effectively eliminated the possibility of lifting sanctions without congressional approval. It also made the restoration of multiparty democracy, a market system, and compensation to US citizens and Cuban-Americans for expropriated property a condition for reopening trade. The US hoped for a swift overthrow of the government in the wake of the economic crisis, but this did not happen.

In 2000, the US lifted its ban on agricultural exports with restrictions, and Cuba began purchasing American food products in 2002. In December 2014, President Barack Obama and Raúl Castro announced the restoration of diplomatic relations. In 2015, Obama removed the country from the list of state sponsors of terrorism, significantly expanded the list of permitted transactions, and in 2016, he made the first official visit to Havana since 1928. Between 2015 and 2017, the countries signed 22 agreements, including on air travel, joint medical research, and more.

The first passenger plane from the United States landed in Cuba in 55 years, August 31, 2016. (Photo: Liu Bin / Zuma / Global Look Press)

However, after Republican Donald Trump came to power in 2017, sanctions were reinstated. In June of that year, Trump issued a memorandum on tightening policy toward Cuba, and in the fall, he cut the embassy staff in Havana by 60% in response to suspicions of the use of ultrasonic weapons, allegedly causing "Havana syndrome." In 2019, Trump activated the previously unused Section 3 of the Helms-Burton Act, which allowed for legal challenges to property nationalized since 1959, threatening investment in the economy. In the final days of Trump's presidency in January 2021, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo relisted Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism, disrupting payments and supplies. Despite promises from the next Democratic president,Joe Biden lifted sanctions, which were left in place even during the height of the Delta virus epidemic after his administration came to power.covid-19 in the summer of 2021. Joe Biden removed Cuba from the blacklist only in January 2025, but on his inauguration day that same month, Donald Trump reinstated Cuba.

The US operation in Venezuela in early 2026 deprived Havana of its closest ally and an important trade and economic partner (since 2016, Venezuelan aid has been declining, but in 2025, Caracas still provided Cuba with a third of its oil needs).

Despite the disproportionately negative impact of sanctions on Cuba, the embargo has periodically strained US relations even with its closest allies, in part due to the humanitarian consequences of such measures for the island's residents, who periodically experience shortages of medicine and essential goods. Specifically, in 1997, the European Union suspended trade negotiations with the US over the Cuban issue, while France, in defiance of Washington, announced a trade agreement with Havana that included investment guarantees and profit repatriation.

Since 1992, the UN General Assembly has annually adopted resolutions demanding an end to the trade embargo against the island. The 33rd resolution was adopted in October 2025. Back then, 165 countries voted in favor, seven voted against (Argentina, Hungary, Israel, Paraguay, North Macedonia, the United States, and Ukraine ), and 12 abstained.

In 2021, the Cuban government estimated the damage from the embargo at $144 billion in current prices; UN experts gave a similar estimate ($130 billion) in 2018.

A pedicab adorned with the Cuban and US flags in Havana (Photo: Yander Zamora / EPA / TASS)

Protests in Cuba

After the suppression of the last pockets of armed resistance in the Escambray Mountains by 1965 and until the 1990s, Cuba experienced no episodes of mass anti-government activity. The first new protests in Cuba erupted in the summer of 1994 during the peak of the economic crisis, but the authorities subsequently managed to quell discontent through reforms, selective repression, and the lifting of restrictions on emigration. The next and largest anti-government protests in modern history erupted only on July 11, 2021, amid a severe financial and economic crisis, but were quickly suppressed by law enforcement. Many detained activists received excessively harsh sentences (up to 30 years), while others were forced to leave the country. Miami-based human rights activists counted 1,196 political prisoners.

There are no independent public opinion polls in the country , and officially sanctioned surveys conducted by the Center for Social, Political Studies and Public Opinion (CESPO) find high levels of support for the party and the current government. However, the spread of skepticism, opposition, and dissident sentiments is fueled by the widespread use of the internet and mobile phones, as well as the deteriorating economic situation.

Indirect signs of discontent include high emigration rates (primarily to the United States, and in recent years to Spain) and rising absenteeism and disregard for the "party line" in elections (this manifests itself in voting for individual candidates rather than for lists as a whole, as the Communist Party insists; in 2023, this figure was about half (49.4%) of voters). In 2022, a referendum adopted a new Family Code, legalizing same-sex marriage and introducing legal protections for spouses cohabiting outside of marriage. However, approximately 25% of voters ignored the vote, and another 5% of ballots were invalidated. And the municipal elections in November of that same year saw a record low turnout in the past 40 years (69%, compared to 89% in 2017).

Historically, a crucial means of reducing social tension was providing opportunities for emigration. Between January 1959 and October 1962 alone, when air travel to Miami was suspended, 248,070 people left Cuba. In 1965, Fidel Castro again permitted anyone to leave the island through the port of Camarioca (2,979 people departed from October 10 to November 15 of that year). The US-supported "Freedom Flights," which operated until 1973, were used by 260,561 people, and in 1980, when the port of Mariel was reopened for emigration, 125,266 people left the country.

Since 2013, the government has lifted most administrative restrictions on citizens leaving the country. Since 2019, Havana has permitted dual citizenship, and annually, approximately 250,000–300,000 ethnic Cubans who are U.S. citizens return to their homeland to visit relatives and friends.

People in a homemade boat with an American flag on board are captured by the Cuban Coast Guard, December 12, 2022. (Photo: Ramon Espinosa / AP / TASS)

The newest and most massive wave of population exodus in modern history began in late 2021 in the wake of the crisis and reached unprecedented proportions in 2022. According to estimates by Cuban demographer Juan Carlos Albizu-Campos, up to 2.75 million people could have left the country since 2020 due to the financial crisis; other estimates indicate that the population decreased by 1.4 million between 2019 and 2024. According to official data from the National Office of Statistics and Information of Cuba (ONEI), the population decreased by 1.55 million between 2020 and 2024 inclusive.

Furthermore, the formation of the San Isidro Movement in 2018, a movement for freedom of expression and against censorship in the cultural sphere, was a significant event. In November 2020, approximately 300 cultural figures demonstrated outside the Ministry of Culture, demonstrating against restrictions on freedom of speech. A delegation of demonstrators was admitted to the Ministry of Culture for talks with the Deputy Minister of Culture and other officials, but the authorities made no significant concessions.

Changes in Cuban society

Thanks to socialist reforms and equalitarian and redistributive policies, Cuba has achieved significant success in universal education, achieving universal literacy, and basic healthcare coverage. Despite the deterioration of the public healthcare system and widespread impoverishment, life expectancy in recent years (78.4 years in 2024) remains in line with developed country standards and above regional averages. In 2020, Cuba developed two coronavirus vaccines and vaccinated over 90% of the population. However, the healthcare system failed to cope with the spread of the delta strain in 2021 due to the failure of an oxygen plant and the resulting increase in excess mortality. Meanwhile, the pharmaceutical industry accounted for only 33.7% of drug production.

Social policy opportunities and standards have been largely undermined by the financial and economic crisis and the declining purchasing power of the peso. The food stamp system fails to cover even basic needs, although it is somewhat mitigated by low utility bills. The impoverishment of the population due to the economic crisis negatively impacts the HEALTH , quality of life, mental well-being, and educational and professional opportunities of Cubans: by 2024, the country had fallen to 97th place in the UN Human Development Index (73rd in 2021).

An old car in front of a dilapidated building in Havana, January 4, 2024. (Photo: Yander Zamora / EPA / TASS)

Serious demographic challenges include low birth rates since the 1970s, rapid population aging, and high emigration rates. In particular, according to ONEI, the proportion of the population aged 60 and over was 25.7%.

Since the 1990s, and especially amid the country's economic difficulties, inequality between Afro-Cubans and whites has deepened, particularly in access to foreign currency (such as remittances from abroad). About a third of Cubans receive remittances from relatives working abroad, and these funds are often used as seed capital to launch small businesses. The overwhelming majority of recipients are white Cubans, who make up 85% of the 1.5 million Cuban-American diaspora. For example, 93% of white Cubans residing on the island have at least one relative in the United States, compared to only 34% of black Cubans. Meanwhile, the poorest Cubans receive wages and pensions in pesos, whose purchasing power has plummeted, and are largely cut off from the private sector and dollar-denominated sectors of the economy. Their ability to travel abroad is severely limited (according to surveys, in 2019, only 3% of Afro-Cubans traveled abroad at least once a year, compared to 31% of whites). Their children's educational opportunities suffer due to a lack of funds to pay for tutors and private lessons.