Opinion | Trump Wants to ‘Take Cuba.’ These Cubans Have Thoughts.

Things in Cuba have gotten really, really bad. I do believe I’ll be having the honor of taking Cuba. The United States has imposed a punishing full trade embargo on Cuba since — — and now the Trump administration is doubling down by putting another embargo on top of that embargo. For months now, the U.S. has blocked fuel imports. Whole Cuba is in a blackout. That has pushed this island of 11 million people to the brink of societal collapse. And it’s on purpose. Jeff. Nice to meet you. That’s me, Jeff Seal, a video journalist and comedian. And when I landed in Cuba few weeks ago, it was as if the United States had turned the lights off of the whole island. I saw grocery stores with empty shelves, pharmacies were running out of medicines, and the President of the United States has only let in one single Russian oil tanker in four months of a fuel embargo. He’s still trying to figure out what to do next. Whether I free it, take it — I think I could do anything I want with it. Yeah you can’t just — that’s not how — — Anyway, I was there with the Nuestra América convoy, bringing 50 tons of medical and school supplies, food, solar panels and battery packs. My dad came in 1970 with the Venceremos Brigade. During the 1970s, hundreds of young Americans circumvented U.S. travel regulations to go to Cuba to harvest sugar cane and experience the Cuban revolution firsthand. Yep, that’s pretty how he explained it, although hopefully I won’t also get an F.B.I. file. Anyway, while in Cuba, I tried to meet as many people as I could to understand what they think about the U.S.-Cuba relationship. I wanted to know: Is Trump actually going to be the one to win over Cuba, or is the embargo still just a total failure? What would your message to Donald Trump be? What would you say? Easing of restrictions does not help the Cuban people. In fact, the project to overthrow the Cuban government started when Donald Trump was still in short pants and Fidel Castro came to power. And you can go to see the memorandum on Lester Mallory. Wait. Who’s Lester Mallory? Well, he’s this stuffed shirt right here. He wrote a classified 1960 memorandum that laid out the policy rationale for the U.S. embargo on Cuba. It said that because Fidel Castro’s Communist government was so popular, the only way to undercut his support was “to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.” It does seem that the Trump administration is finally bringing this nearly 70-year-old memo to fruition. He wants to be the one to finally achieve what no other president has been able to do — “All my life, I’ve been hearing about the United States and Cuba” — overthrow the Cuban government. I do believe I’ll be having the honor of taking Cuba. Well, some of the Cubans I talked to didn’t think so. It’s my personal opinion: You cannot change the economic trajectory of Cuba, as long as the people who are in charge of it now are in charge of it. It’s a broken, nonfunctional economy. Since Fidel Castro and Che Guevara took power in 1959, the United States government has tried to overthrow a lot of countries, and it doesn’t always work out to our advantage or for the people who live there — you know, like Vietnam, for instance, or when we toppled the Iranian government in 1953 or this time in Iran, when we — I don’t — I don’t know what’s happening there. Did we win? But now the U.S. Department of Justice has indicted Raúl Castro, just like they did to Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela before they kidnapped him — er, I mean, before they arrested him. Good night. Happy New Year. For over 60 years, no matter how much suffering it’s inflicted on the Cuban people, the United States hasn’t been able to overthrow the government of this small island just 90 miles off its coast. And people like Roberto are very proud of that. There’s four things that the Cuban government has been defending all the time: health for free, education for free, access to free culture, access to sports. Still, I did meet people who wouldn’t mind a closer relationship. I love American people, with a few caveats. What about the American government? No like. No like. No, no, no, no. The relationship between the Cuban people and the United States people has been always good. The problem is there is a small sector of Florida. Ah, Florida, the land of no personal state income tax, most of the Cuban diaspora and my boy, Marco Rubio. There’s no oil blockade on Cuba per se. Here’s what’s happening with Cuba, OK? Venezuelans have decided: We’re not giving you free oil anymore. But many people told me they don’t blame the U.S. embargo for their problems. Cuba block everything here. OK, from who? From U.S.A.? — Yeah. — It’s not beginning now. — It is — — — Yeah, but it’s worse now, no? No, it’s bad, but it’s the blockade inside Cuba. Instead, they blame their own government, currently led by President Miguel Díaz-Canel. To be fair, people here have been mad at the Cuban government for very real reasons for a very long time. There’s political repression, economic mismanagement and mass migration off the island. But either way, if the goal of the 1960 memo was disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship, and the current Trump- Rubio Cuba policy is to create unlivable conditions on the island, that appears to be working. But Americans should feel ashamed that our government is punishing a whole population to force regime change. It’s yet another example of the indifferent cruelty of the Trump administration. That doesn’t mean he’s going to have an easy time taking Cuba. Taking Cuba. We’re not going to bend our knees. We’re going to hold on. I’m going to fight for our principles and for our country till the end.