US President Donald Trump said his administration will turn its attention to Cuba once military operations in Iran conclude, calling it “just a question of time.”
“What’s happening with Cuba is amazing,” Trump said yesterday during an event at the White House, appearing to refer to changes he envisions for the Caribbean island. “It will be just a question of time before you and a lot of unbelievable people are going to be going back to Cuba.”
On Friday morning Trump told CNN that Cuba “is going to fall pretty soon.”
“Cuba is gonna fall pretty soon, by the way, unrelated, but Cuba is gonna fall too. They want to make a deal so badly,” he told CNN’s Dana Bash in a phone interview when touting US military success in his second term. What exactly is meant by ‘going to fall’ is anybody’s guess.
His remarks come amid Cuba’s deepening fuel crisis, intensified after the US cut off Venezuelan oil shipments and upheld sanctions and a trade blockade that restrict fuel imports from other countries. On 04MAR, a widespread blackout left millions without power across Havana and western Cuba. State media reported that restoring operations at one major power plant would take up to 72 hours, underscoring the fragility of the country’s aging electrical grid.
For decades, Cuba has held a distinctive place in Canadian travel.
While the US maintains a long-standing economic embargo, Canadians have become Cuba’s dominant source of visitors, typically accounting for 40% of foreign arrivals.
Despite suspended Canadian flights to the island and Ottawa’s Level-3 travel advisory, Cuban tourism officials continue to promote the destination to Canadians, including through social media, Open Jaw reported yesterday. For many Canadians, Cuba has long served as a reliable winter escape—affordable, close to home, without competition from US tourists not to mention incredibly welcoming.
The relationship has been described as reciprocal.
“The Cuban people love Canadians,” Debbie Sutherland, a Canadian who vacationed in Cuba last month, told the New York Times. She noticed signs of strain on her trip including cancelled excursions and closed shops in a nearby mall. “They would say, ‘You know, we would die without Canada.’”
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been reported to lead discussions with Cuban officials about a potential “friendly” arrangement, though specifics remain unclear.
But a shift toward a greater US role could reshape Cuba’s tourism economy, forever altering marketing strategies, air routes and the island’s longstanding reliance on the Canadian market. Winter travel patterns that for decades made Cuba a staple getaway for Canadians could end up changed forever.
