The State Department’s (DOS) July 20 report “Cuba: The Capital of 21st Century Communism” (the Report) will not achieve momentum on its own. Secretary of State Marco Rubio accurately calls Cuba “an espionage superpower” with agents burrowed into “the highest levels of the US government.” However, the Report’s critics have landed serious blows to its credibility that are hampering its practical impact.
While the Report focuses on high-level convicted spies Victor Rocha, Ana Montes, and others, it also mentions the recruitment of “ideologically sympathetic” university students. More research should have been conducted into clarifying how these recruits go on to “occupy positions of importance in the private sector and in the government.” These enemies within constitute a formidable, almost undetectable force of low-level agents who influence policy to favor Cuba’s interests at US expense.
The Report focuses heavily on the connection between Cuban intelligence and US domestic activist groups. Critics say that ideological and historical convergence do not prove that the US groups operate under the direction or control of Cuba’s Intelligence Directorate (DI).
Such critics and even the Report’s supporters are diverting attention from what matters. The most important element should have been that the totalitarian regime cannot survive if the United States remains free and strong.
With so many Hispanics, including Cuban refugees, as part of our culture, the Cuban regime penetrated our government and institutions to protect itself from hostile US actions. Cuba also subverted Latin American countries to undermine the United States and conceal their socialist failure.
The Western Hemisphere is uniquely important to the United States for security and trade. Successful countries are good trading partners and do not produce mass migration that can undermine us. We need to keep competing powers out of the Americas.
The Cuban kleptocracy endeavors to prevent the emergence of liberty and limited government that would create successful trading partners and US allies and contrast with the Cuban model. Uncoincidentally, DOS, for at least the last 35 years, has been helping our hemispheric adversaries and undermining our allies.
Fidel Castro mostly failed to export violent revolutions. He and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil hosted the Sao Paulo Forum in 1990 to switch from armed to internal subversion. In addition to spies like Rocha and Montes, the DI’s network of low-level agents were likely instrumental in this objective.
DOS has long recruited disproportionately from elite universities ideologically aligned with its culture of globalism and multilateralism. DOS’s culture makes the department amenable to manipulation by low-level Cuban agents. They subtly influence DOS to favor Cuba and its allies and undermine its adversaries.
These agents for Cuba are able to shape policy discussions and influence academic and NGO networks and information flows. This clique knows how to discredit opponents and promote friends, including influencing the placement of officials in key posts for their agenda.
Such agents work in the executive, Congress, NGOs, and media—often moving from one to another. They can monitor events in which Cuba has an interest and use undetectable spin to derail or promote them.
Cuban agents who work with Democrats and their aligned media and NGOs do not stand out. Working with Republicans for them is more challenging. Those agents take strong Republican stands on all things not related to Cuban interests to fool and influence their colleagues. They can then pass undetected and beyond suspicion for their entire careers.
The effects of Cuban agents combined with the globalist, elitist DOS culture produce results that undermine Donald Trump’s Western Hemisphere counterterrorism strategy. Rubio should carefully examine his department to limit the very penetration he has denounced.
The Report should prompt the Trump administration to initiate measures to detect agents and limit their damage. Even so, the lower-tier Cuban allies will be more difficult to detect than the Rocha-Montes types.
Trump’s practical solution for his Western Hemisphere agenda is to be suspicious of DOS and the intelligence community. He should place vetted people he can trust in key positions and situations. They should report to his White House team to limit DOS and intelligence agencies undermining his agenda.
Guatemala is a case in point. Two Joe Biden holdovers undermined Trump during 2025 until he removed them in February. New chargé John Barrett began to reverse the Biden holdovers’ damage, but he was suddenly removed after only three months. After Barrett left, President Bernardo Arévalo had free rein for his anti-US criminal activities.
DOS personnel and Democrats subtly derailed Trump’s ambassador nominee. They are also likely advising Arévalo how to pretend to cooperate with SOUTHCOM while continuing to undermine Trump.
Trump needs Guatemala to become an active participant in his counterterrorism agenda. For this, Trump should appoint a new, loyal, well-vetted chargé and bring Guatemala into the fight.
Regional partners that are already aligned will notice and become more motivated, and Trump will have circumvented DOS internal betrayal. Later, Trump can execute a strategy to reverse the effects of Cuban penetration in our government to restore constitutional governance.
This article first appeared in the BizPac Review.
