Photo: Bay of Pigs invaders under arrest. Photo: historyguild.org

This article reaffirms and expands upon the Green Party of Florida's May 27, 2026 press release, "Green Party of Florida Condemns U.S. Policy Towards Cuba." For the original statement, please visit: GPFL Press Release (May 27, 2026).

The responsibility of the Green Party of Florida, as an affiliate of the Green Party of the United States, is to recommend policies that advance the interests of people, planet and peace, in accord with our democratically established platform, under the governance of our own U.S. national, state and local political entities, and to hold our administrations accountable for their actions. This is the responsibility of every citizen in a democracy. 

Criticizing the actions of our own government is not to be misconstrued as defending the actions of foreign nations, organizations or individuals. We stand against brutality and repression wherever found.

In addition to sanctions and blockade, U.S. aggression has also involved the direct overthrow of governments, and training and supplying of military regimes that protect U.S. corporate interests engaged in the plunder of a country’s natural resources and exploitation of their labor, including in Cuba. Under Fulgencio Batista, a military dictatorship characterized by intense political repression, systemic corruption and the suspension of the constitution, there was extreme economic inequality. The U.S. relied heavily on Batista's government and military forces to maintain social order and suppress labor unrest to secure the steady flow of Cuban sugar to the U.S. 

During the Cold War, CIA incursions into Cuba ranged from the major military invasion at the Bay of Pigs to sabotage and espionage campaigns. President John F. Kennedy authorized Operation Mongoose (1961-1965), an extensive CIA-led campaign featuring covert sea and air incursions, sabotage of Cuban infrastructure (like refineries, factories, and plantations), and multiple plots to assassinate Fidel Castro. The CIA also carried out a series of bombings targeting popular Cuban tourist hotels. As mentioned in our press release, a 1976 anti Cuban U.S. trained terrorists operation downed civilian flight 355 killing the entire Cuban Olympic fencing team! 

During this same period, the notorious School of Americas (SOA), a U.S. military academy at Fort Benning Georgia (renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation), trained tens of thousands of Latin American soldiers. Human rights groups have documented that several infamous graduates went on to lead or organize right-wing death squads and massacres under President Ronald Reagan, who with the help of the CIA made Central America a killing field, resulting in murderous repression of left-wing movements. (Many so-called left wing movements may have begun non-ideologically just to resist U.S. militarized domination.) 

Additionally, the U.S. currently occupies Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, maintaining a secret torture gulag there. Gitmo was intentionally established outside the U.S. mainland to bypass domestic criminal law and fundamental U.S. constitutional rights, such as habeas corpus and due process. By holding foreign detainees in this extraterritorial "legal black hole," the U.S. also circumvents obligations under the Geneva Conventions and international human rights treaties.

Read the memoirs of Marine Corp Major General Smedley Butler “War Is A Racket” for his role in enforcing U.S. incursions in earlier periods. Read John Perkins’ “Confessions of an Economic Hitman”for his role in U.S. financial warfare and exploitation of nature and labor abroad, often via corporate proxies. U.S. military and U.S. corporations have engaged in the murder of numerous indigenoustribal peoples who were defending Mother Earth and their way of life, beginning in the U.S. itself. 

The environmental depredations of the U.S., often accompanied by political, military and economic coercion, are orders of magnitude greater than other nations’, both internally and externally, and demand massive resource exploitation by client states, or states like Cuba who need foreign exchange for survival. It doesn’t excuse even minor players, but it is important to recognize and call to account the principal driver. That is the responsibility of U.S. citizens, loyal opposing political organizations and defenders of Mother Earth.   

It should come as a surprise to no one that the Green Party has long opposed U.S. foreign policy towards Cuba and proclaimed solidarity with the Cuban people, and other peoples, who have been the target of U.S. aggression. Notably, such aggression has taken the form of collective punishment to instigate political unrest to achieve regime change, which is a war crime under the international Nuremberg code. Such actions entail violations of national sovereignty, human rights and rights of nature, as per domestic and international law. 

From the GPUS platform, Article I.D.3.l.:

We reject the U.S. government's economic blockade of Cuba. We ask the U.S. Congress to lift the embargo and restore normal diplomatic relations and respect for national sovereignty, and demand that the U.S. government end its veto of U.N. resolutions pertaining to Cuba.

The Search section on gp.org website reveals numerous citations on Cuba.

The comprehensive body of statutory and regulatory law going back more than sixty years establishing the legal framework for what is referred to as the U.S. blockade of Cuba is factually indisputable, and flies in the face of persistent transparent propaganda denying the existence of the blockade. Efforts to obscure and deny the reality of the blockade are reinforced by U.S. government messaging and echoed throughout corporate media, shaping perceptions among both the American public and the Cuban people. Just for the record, these documents shaping the blockade are easily searched and found on U.S. government sites.

• The Platt Amendment of 1903

• Trading With the Enemy Act of 1917

• The Mallory Memorandum 1960

• The Cuban Democracy Act of 1992

• Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of 1996 (Helms-Burton Act, Three Parts)

• Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000

• Cuban Assets Control Regulation

• President Trump's first term "maximum pressure" campaign against Cuba

• President Trump's Executive Order 14404, May 1, 2026, significantly expanding U.S. sanctions

• President Trump's Executive Order 14380 Establishing the Oil Embargo.

The extent of the current U.S. oil embargo against Cuba, apparent to the whole world, is a siege of the Cuban population, intentionally making life untenable for them, intending to motivate them to rise up against their government. The Mallory Memorandum of 1960 outlined this strategy. It states that because the Cuban people supported Castro, and there was no effective political opposition in Cuba, and militant opposition from within would only strengthen Castro's hand, it concluded: "...while as adroit and inconspicuous as possible, make(s) the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation, and overthrow of government."

This body of official documents makes it explicit the U.S. does not value the well being of the Cuban people. To the contrary. The Cuban people have been ruthlessly manipulated as pawns for the U.S. political agenda. The U.S. has expanded this program of deprivation to this day, which has not achieved its intended goal. The Cuban people have staunchly withstood the blockade for six decades, which suggests the original internal conditions the Memorandum identified and responded to are stronger than anticipated.

Post cold war, a formalized policy of ideological promotion was developed under the banner of “pro-democracy.” NGO’s such as the Congressionally funded National Endowment for Democracy (NED) operate abroad, including in Cuba. By contrast, promoting actual functional democracy in the U.S. has never been a priority, and has in fact been continually thwarted. Hyping "democracy" in the U.S. serves as cosmetic cover for a corrupt legalized bribery system under a corporate two party lock-down run for the benefit of the billionaire class entirely for profit at the expense of people, planet and peace. As well-intentioned as the NED would appear to be, one wonders at the full implications of Allen Weinstein's remarks, a co-founder of the NED: "A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA."   

The Green Party of Florida wholeheartedly reiterates our statement on U.S. foreign policy towards Cuba. 

Let Cuba Be Cuba! Hands Off Cuba! No War on Cuba!

The GPFL Board and Coordinating Council.