President Trump signed an executive order to squeeze Cuba’s oil supplies in response to the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro by U.S. forces.
Published January 30, 2026
US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order imposing new tariffs on any country that supplies oil to Cuba. This is the latest move in Washington’s pressure campaign on Havana.
The order, signed by President Trump on Thursday, describes the Cuban government as an “extraordinary and extraordinary threat” to U.S. national security.
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“The regime coordinates with and provides support to numerous adversaries, transnational terrorist groups, and malign forces hostile to the United States, including Russia, China, Iran, Hamas, and President Trump’s command state Hezbollah.”
“Under this regime, additional ad valorem taxes may be levied on the import of foreign products that directly or indirectly sell or provide oil to Cuba,” it added.
President Trump said earlier this month that Cuba’s leadership “must strike a deal before it’s too late,” without specifying the nature or consequences of such a deal, but he has made a number of statements hostile to Cuba.
The US president’s threat to Cuba comes after US forces abducted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife in a bloody military night raid on the capital, Caracas, earlier this month. Since then, the United States has taken effective control of Venezuela’s oil sector, and President Trump has vowed to halt oil shipments previously sent to Cuba.
Just this week, President Trump pointed to the lack of Venezuelan oil and revenue arriving in Havana and said, “Cuba will soon go bankrupt.”
Cuba’s Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez quickly condemned President Trump’s order, calling it a “brutal act of aggression” backed by “a long list of lies intended to portray Cuba as a threat to the United States.”
“We condemn before the world this brutal act of aggression against Cuba and its people. For more than 65 years, Cuba has been under the longest and cruelest economic blockade ever imposed on an entire nation,” the minister said on social media.
“New evidence emerges every day that the only threat, and the only negative influence, to peace, security and stability in the region comes from the United States,” he said.
President Trump’s executive order Thursday also comes as the United States continues to pressure Mexico to distance itself from Cuba.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said this week that her government had at least temporarily halted oil shipments to Cuba, calling it a “sovereign decision” and not made under pressure from the U.S. government.
Mexico, along with Venezuela, provides most of Cuba’s oil supplies, but since the United States kidnapped former President Maduro on January 3, supplies of Venezuelan crude oil have been suspended.
Mexico supplies about 44% of Cuba’s oil imports, and Venezuela provided 33% until last month, according to the Financial Times. About 10% also comes from Russia, and to a lesser extent Algeria, according to the Financial Times.
