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Trump and Rubio allies are vying for control of Cuba’s assets if regime falls (www.theguardian.com)
submitted 12 hours ago by to c/world@lemmy.world
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Washington and Florida insiders are exploring lucrative deals for a post-communist Cuba crushed by ever-increasing US sanctions

Spanish hotel chains. A Canadian mining firm. European shipping giants. Visa and Mastercard. Scores of foreign companies have been driven out of Cuba this summer over fear of being hit with potent, new secondary sanctions. Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, told Axios last month there are “no escape valves” from his unprecedented pressure campaign against the island.

But not everybody is losing out. A growing cast of Washington and Florida insiders – from billionaire Trump cronies and Rubio-linked lobbyists to Cuban exiles – are jockeying for control of the communist-ruled island-nation’s key assets, charging top dollar to help clients navigate the ever-expanding web of sanctions, and positioning themselves for lucrative business opportunities in the case of regime collapse.

Since an executive order signed by Donald Trump on 1 May drove Canada’s Sherritt International from its nickel and cobalt mining joint venture with the Cuban state, two rival US bids to buy out its stake have been presented to US authorities.

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[–] 12 points 11 hours ago (8 children)

They are generally the ones that benefited from the fascist Batista regime, such as plantation owning slavers. They fled from the Cuban revolution, especially once the Cuban government implemented land reform and gave land to the peasantry.

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  • [–] -3 points 3 hours ago (7 children)

    What kind of fantasy bullshit are you talking about? You think every Cuban that floated to miami on some piece of garbage was some wealthy slave owner?

    Fucking sapingo over here.

    Fidel imprisoned and punished and persecuted all kinds of people, and the American sanctions made life hard. The dry foot policy made it an easy decision for many people looking for a better life.

    The main driver for their support for Trump isn’t some fear of “the revolution”, it’s that Cubans are socially conservative, so they will latch onto the Republican Party.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 hours ago (6 children)

    I said "generally," not "every single Cuban in Miami is a slaver." There are people that left because of economic hardship, not necessarily because they oppose socialism, but the reason so many Miami Cubans are far-right is because a great many of them did have ties to those slavers, gangsters, and plantation owners.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 hours ago (5 children)

    Generally doesn’t mean “every”, it means “most”. I grew up in a Cuban community and they were mostly, “generally”, economic refugees.

    It would be physically impossible for the people I interacted with to be “generally” slavers and plantation owners. Like there aren’t enough slaves and plantations for that to be true. There aren’t enough acres in Cuba for that to be true.

    Either you don’t understand the Cuban diaspora, or you hung out with a bunch of Cuban slavers and that warped your perception.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 hours ago (4 children)

    Or I understand that Cubans are not genetically far-right, and that the wealthy Cubans that fled socialism have a dominating presence within the Cuban diaspora. Cubans in Cuba have a word for these people: gusanos.

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  • [–] -3 points 2 hours ago (3 children)

    Gusanos is probably the only Spanish you know. Stop making up bullshit narratives.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 hours ago (2 children)

    No? I took several years of Spanish. I'm by no means fluent, but the idea that I'm inventing the concept of Cuban exiles requires no Spanish, just simple googling.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 hours ago (1 child)

    Yeah you might want to read your own Wikipedia article before you generalize Cuban refugees as slave owning “gusanos”.

    That article actually lines up with my lived experience as a Hispanic person growing up with Cubans.

    They were many waves of people fleeing for different reasons, but mostly poor people wanting a better life, and as that article points out, minorities being persecuted by socially conservative Cubans.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 hour ago

    Cuban exiles would come from various economic backgrounds, usually reflecting the emigration wave they were a part of. Many of the Cubans who would emigrate early were from the middle and upper class, but often brought very little with them when leaving Cuba.

    Right there. I never denied that various groups also left Cuba, but we have to understand, the driving factor for why so many Cubans are far-right is that the major force that left Cuba were the exiles that fled socialism.

    Or, are you saying that Cubans are genetically far-right, and that class has no impact? Why would Cuba itself remain socialist with popular support for the government then?

    Why are Miami Cubans generally far-right, in your own terms?

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