President Donald Trump is pulling out all the stops to get total control of Venezuela and its natural resources. But fears that a new U.S. blockade against a nearby Caribbean country could collapse its economy is mounting pressure against the administration.
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Cuba has relied on its close economic relationship with Venezuela for the past 25 years. But since Trump organized a military operation to capture the country’s dictator, Nicolás Maduro, at the start of 2026, Cuba’s future has been tossed into the air.
Now, the Trump administration has shut off oil flow in an attempt to put pressure on the communist country to make some significant political changes, Fortune reported. Cuba geographically sits in between the U.S. and Venezuela, being only 90 miles away from the coast of Florida. But because Cuba doesn’t have any other allies willing to pump hundreds of millions worth of fuel for its economy, residents are struggling.
School for many Cuban students has been suspended, according to CNN. And government workers are facing furlough in order to save energy. Flights from Russia and Canada into the island have even been canceled citing low jet fuel for international flights and reported blackouts has literally residents in the dark. While the entire country is struggling, Afro-Cubans are likely bearing the brunt of the economic impact.
Afro-Cubans officially make 11 percent of the population, but that number is much larger thanks to self-identification– or a Cuban resident’s refusal to identify as only Black. When you add Cubans who identify as mixed-race, that number climbs closer to 30 percent.
They are more likely to stay in the country, live in extreme poverty and have lower salaries than other ethnic groups while being subjected to police brutality and deteriorating infrastructure, according to the Washington Post. This makes Afro-Cubans more vulnerable to Trump’s political attacks. But in truth, the shaky relationship between the U.S. and Cuba dates back further than you probably think.
“Among us longtime Cuba watchers, we’ve always resisted people using the word blockade,” said Fulton Armstrong, the former lead Latin America analyst for the CIA, told the New York Times. “But it is indeed a blockade.” He’s been studying Cuba since 1984, but as he explained, we haven’t seen anything economic blockade like this since the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.
But now, the island is facing more than just an economic crisis. Experts warn that the nation of 10 million will soon into a humanitarian crisis that will have severe effects if no one steps in. Cuba’s allegiance to socialism and economic drama has led to a tense political relationship with the U.S. With Venezuela now out of the picture, Trump in theory could unleash his full wrath onto Cuba.
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