I went to a Cuban regime change rally last week in Hialeah, Florida. Trump has recently started yapping about his plans to “take Cuba,” and there’s every reason to think he’ll follow through on this in the near future, given his manifest uber-focus on foreign policy in the second term — and in particular, his globe-spanning regime change conquest mission.
I happened to be in Miami anyway last week, so when I heard about this rally, I figured I certainly must go.
One thing that was interesting: the rally was conducted almost entirely in Spanish. And mind you, this was an almost uniformly Republican constituency. Ardently pro-Trump, in fact. Which you’d think might provoke some cognitive dissonance in certain quarters, but as usual with US politics, everyone just kind of barrels blithely ahead, glossing over any pesky contradictions.
Another interesting feature of the rally: it was organized and funded by the municipal government of Hialeah, Florida. So this wasn’t a matter of some enterprising local citizens deciding to hold a Cuban regime change rally. It was a matter of actual government agencies deciding it was time for taxpayers to subsidize such a rally. Which of course was wildly popular in Hialeah, home to one of the largest (perhaps the largest) population of Cuban Americans anywhere in the country. Still, it’s always interesting when a contested political controversy garners such a universal consensus that it takes on the transcendent character of “apolitical” civic culture. It almost reminded me of the George Floyd rallies I covered/attended in 2020, when overnight, local governments decided to convene “Black Lives Matter” events, as though they were as run-of-the-mill as a Fourth of July Parade or Christmas Tree lighting. (As I mentioned to Matt Taibbi during one of our recent chats, a rally in my otherwise sleepy hometown of Caldwell / West Caldwell, New Jersey featured a cop singing the National Anthem.)
Obviously, the desire to topple the Cuban Government wasn’t something that came about through a sudden explosion of societal mania, akin to the Floyd uproar of 2020. I actually covered a similar rally/march in Hudson County, NJ, home to a smaller yet sizable enclave of Cuban Americans, for this very Substack in 2021. These events tend to correlate with political developments in Cuba, and with Trump now declaring that he’s set his next regime-change sights on the island, it’s no surprise that this virulently Trump-loving constituency would want to summon public displays of support.
Nonetheless, it’s illuminating what kind of political messaging gets subsidized by taxpayer dollars. The majority of people I spoke to were calling for outright US military intervention — even annexation! — and hoping that Trump would do something to Cuba on the order of what he’s doing right now to Iran.
I also couldn’t resist the opportunity to shoehorn in some random questions about Jeffrey Epstein.
So, enjoy the video. Or don’t.
