After right-wing media pushed for and then celebrated the Trump administration’s ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and seizure of the country’s oil supplies last month, they quickly pivoted to the administration’s reported efforts to overthrow Cuba’s government, which for now primarily involves starving the island of oil.
Research/Study
Right-wing media rally behind Trump’s efforts to trigger regime change in Cuba
Written by Zachary Pleat
Published
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The Trump administration is working to cut off oil supplies to Cuba, seeking regime change
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- President Donald Trump threatened tariffs on imports from countries that provide oil to Cuba. The Guardian reported that an executive order from Trump, “which ratchets up Trump’s pressure to topple the communist government, declares a national emergency and establishes a process for the US secretaries of state and commerce to assess tariffs against countries that sell or otherwise provide oil to the island nation. The White House has yet to specify tariff rates for violating its new policy of blocking Cuba from buying oil.” [The Guardian, 1/29/26]
- Mexico announced a pause on oil shipments to Cuba amid reported pressure from the Trump administration. According to The Associated Press, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said the decision to pause oil shipments to Cuba “was a ‘sovereign decision’ not made under pressure from the United States,” but it came amid overt Trump administration efforts to isolate the Cuban government and amid threats from Trump to “take military action against Mexican drug cartels.” [The Associated Press, 1/27/26]
- Politico: “Trump administration weighs naval blockade to halt Cuban oil imports.” Politico reported: “The Trump administration is weighing new tactics to drive regime change in Cuba, including imposing a total blockade on oil imports to the Caribbean country, three people familiar with the plan said Thursday.” [Politico, 1/23/26]
- Trump has said Cuba is “ready to fall” and threatened Cuba to “make a deal, before it is too late.” [BBC, 1/11/26]
- Wall Street Journal: “The U.S. Is Actively Seeking Regime Change in Cuba by the End of the Year.” The Wall Street Journal reported: “Emboldened by the U.S. ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the Trump administration is searching for Cuban government insiders who can help cut a deal to push out the Communist regime by the end of the year.” The article continued: “In meetings with Cuban exiles and civic groups in Miami and Washington, administration officials have focused on identifying somebody inside the current government who will see the writing on the wall and want to cut a deal.” [The Wall Street Journal, 1/22/26]
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Right-wing media rally behind the Trump administration’s tactic of starving Cuba of oil and its goal of overthrowing the Cuban government
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- Fox Business host Elizabeth MacDonald on an oil embargo against Cuba: “This is Trump getting communism out of the western hemisphere.” MacDonald asked her guest, Rep. Greg Steube (R-FL), “Do you see ... Cuba collapsing [as] a 2026 event?” [Fox Business, The Evening Edit, 1/26/26]
- Heritage Foundation's Victoria Coates on Fox Business: Cuba is a “proximate threat to the United States. It's been a deadly enemy of the United States for more than 60 years. It would be great to see positive change in Cuba.” Coates continued: “I think we could see that through economic means through this oil embargo. … We have the extraordinary diaspora in the United States starting with the secretary of state, who are prepared to help Cuba in a very positive transition to become a friend of the United States.” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria, 1/28/26]
- America First Policy Institute's Fred Fleitz on Newsmax: “I love Rubio's answer to this. When he was asked, do you favor regime change in Cuba? And he said, yes.” Another guest, former deputy assistant secretary of state Joel Rubin added, “I think the Cuban regime has to go, clearly.” [Newsmax, American Agenda, 1/28/26]
- Fox Business anchor David Asman: “Let’s hope, let’s pray that the communist system” in Cuba “comes to an end as a result of not having oil.” Asman continued: “I say the same prayers about Nicaragua.” [Fox Business, The Big Money Show, 1/30/26]
- America First Policy Institute’s Carla Sands on Fox Business: “What we're doing is by strangling the energy, we're not allowing Mexico to send energy, we've stopped the Venezuelan energy. I think for the first time in my lifetime there will be regime change” in Cuba. Sands continued: “And I'm sure that the United States has someone in their sights within Cuba, or in the Cuban community in the United States, because they will have to seize power, and then they're going to need a lot of investment to — I mean, to bring Cuba into the 21st century, it's still in the mid 20th century, sadly, for these people, because of communism.” [Fox Business, Varney & Co., 1/30/26]
- Coates on Fox Business: Letting the Cuban government survive the collapse of the Soviet Union was “a mistake we can’t afford to make again.” Coates added that blockading oil from the island is necessary “to get to the change that everybody, I think, who’s reasonable, wants to see in Cuba.” [Fox Business, The Bottom Line, 1/30/26]
- Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo to Rep. Maria Salazar (R-FL): “Is the Cuban regime entering its final chapter?” Salazar replied: “Thank God for that.” [Fox Business, Maria Bartiromo’s Wall Street, 1/30/26]
- Newsmax guest Antonio Mora: “Few things would make me happier than the collapse of this malignant cancer that has been the Communist Party-dominated regime in Cuba for the last 67 years.” [Newsmax, Saturday Agenda, 1/31/26]
- Heritage Foundation’s Andrés Martínez-Fernández: It’s a “perfect moment for an opening to be created for a restoration of stability and democracy” in Cuba. [Newsmax, Saturday Agenda, 1/31/26]
- Coates on Newsmax: “Getting Cuba into a better condition is a great strategic gain.” Coates added that Cuba “is a very proximate threat to us.” [Newsmax, Wake Up America, 2/2/26]
- Fox senior strategic analyst Jack Keane on Cuba: “I think the president's team is moving in the right direction here. Pressure this regime, maximum pressure.” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria, 2/3/26]
- Newsmax guest Tony Shaffer on Trump’s actions against Cuba: “Just sit back and get some popcorn and watch the expatriates get their boats ready to go from Key West into Havana.” Shaffer added that Trump should “just continue to allow their own economy to fail” from an oil embargo. [Newsmax, Wake Up America Early, 2/3/26]
- Heritage Foundation’s Brent Sadler: “This is not the time to relent on the economic and certainly the military pressure” on Cuba. Sadler added: “So, pressure, much like Iran, the pressure needs to be sustained. The United States has both these terroristic regimes right in the place that we want them, a very weakened one, to get the most out of negotiations, preferably. But this is also a moment in time where the people in both Cuba and Iran can actually seize their own countries back.” [Newsmax, Wake Up America, 2/3/26]
- Fox Business host Stuart Varney to Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R-FL) on Cuban regime change: “When you say push it over, how do we push it over?” Gimenez replied: “I think right now what the president's doing is the right thing. He is basically taking away all the economic benefits that it gets from free oil from Venezuela. They also get free oil from Mexico. He's making sure that they're not going to get free oil from Colombia. I want some more harsher measures against Cuba.” He continued: “And that regime is a cancer, a cancer to the Cuban people, a cancer to the western hemisphere. We need some harsh medicine to cure the patient, Cuba, so that we can get rid of this cancer which is the communist regime that has basically oppressed its own people for over 65 years, and has exported its revolution to the western hemisphere. So they've been a real thorn in our side for a long time, and I'm very glad that the president is taking decisive action.” [Fox Business, Varney & Co., 2/3/26]