Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth traveled to the U.S. Navy base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, on Wednesday as the Trump administration has been increasing pressure on Cuba’s government to make political and economic changes.
The Pentagon said the purpose of Mr. Hegseth’s visit and a stop later in the day at the headquarters of U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Fla., was “to engage with troops.”
Videos released by the Pentagon showed him lifting weights and doing jumping exercises with Marines near the gate leading to Cuba. He also posed for photos with the troops and called the base “a very important and strategic piece of American terrain.”
Mr. Hegseth posted nothing about the trip as he departed from Andrews air base near Washington early Wednesday. En route, he reposted a remark by President Trump hailing a U.S. blockade against Iran as the most successful “in the history of Naval Warfare.”
During his morning visit, he also warned Cuba against trying to obtain weapons capable of reaching either U.S. soil or the base, in the southeastern portion of the island.
About two weeks ago, Gen. Francis L. Donovan, the commander of U.S. military operations in Latin America and the Caribbean, met with a senior Cuban military official at the fence line separating the U.S.-controlled territory from the rest of the island. It was the first visit between U.S. and Cuban forces at the base in more than a year.
John Ratcliffe, the C.I.A. director, also traveled to Cuba last month.
The U.S. military base, which is behind a Cuban minefield and secured by a unit of Marines, functions like a small American town, entirely independent of the Cuban economy. It is resupplied by ships and aircraft from the United States, which bring liquefied natural gas from Georgia and food for the commissary and restaurants on a twice monthly barge from Florida.
Mr. Hegseth last visited the base in February 2025 and enthusiastically put a focus on the Trump administration’s plan to house tens of thousands of detainees there as part of its crackdown on immigration. At the time, 26 immigration detainees were being held on the base.
The program, run by the Homeland Security Department and the Pentagon, never expanded. Fewer than 900 immigration detainees have been brought to Guantánamo. As of this week, five migrants were detained there.
It is a sleepy time for the base of about 4,500 residents. The school for sailors’ children is in summer recess, and some families have returned to the United States for vacation. Camp Justice, where the Pentagon holds hearings for some of the 15 wartime prisoners held there, is closed until early August.
