Secretary of State Marco Rubio designated Cuba's state-owned oil and gas company on Thursday, freezing its U.S. assets and barring all American dealings with the firm, in the latest escalation of the Trump administration's maximum-pressure campaign against Havana.
Rubio designated Unión Cuba-Petróleo, known as CUPET, under President Trump's Executive Order 14404, signed May 1, 2026, according to a State Department press release. The action blocks all CUPET property and interests subject to U.S. jurisdiction and prohibits American companies and individuals from any financial transactions with the firm, which controls Cuba's crude oil extraction, refining, and national distribution network.
"While the Cuban people have suffered fuel shortages and blackouts because of decades of under-investment in critical infrastructure, Cuba's Communist leaders have diverted energy resources to line their own pockets," Rubio said in the State Department statement. He accused Cuban officials of reselling "countless barrels of scarce energy on the secondary market, hoarding energy supplies," while ordinary Cubans go without. Rubio added that CUPET's key assets were "unlawfully expropriated from American owners years ago," making explicit that the designation is not just a geopolitical move but a reckoning with decades of uncompensated seizures of American-held property.
Cuba requires between 100,000 and 110,000 barrels of oil per day to meet its total national demand, covering roughly 40 percent with domestic production, according to energy market data. Venezuela and Mexico have historically supplied the bulk of the rest, but both lifelines have been severed under U.S. pressure. Total imports fell from about 69,400 barrels per day in the first ten months of 2024 to roughly 45,400 in the same period of 2025, according to data reported by CiberCuba. By May 2026, the blockade had choked supply even further: Cuba's energy minister announced the island had depleted its diesel and fuel oil reserves entirely, as CNBC reported. The result is rolling blackouts across the island, near-total fuel rationing at public stations, and an economic crisis with no near-term relief in sight.
CUPET is more than a utility. It is the Cuban government's primary instrument for controlling the energy supply that keeps the regime functioning, and, Rubio said, a vehicle through which officials enrich themselves at the public's expense. By placing the company under U.S. sanctions, Washington is targeting what has historically been one of Havana's chief mechanisms for managing its finances, adding financial isolation on top of a physical fuel shortage already squeezing the government's room to maneuver.
The CUPET designation follows a series of escalating actions by the Trump administration in recent weeks. On June 4, the State Department sanctioned Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel, members of his immediate family, and several regime-linked institutions, as CNN and the Washington Post reported. Raúl Castro's son and grandson were included in that round of designations, along with the Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces and three other organizations tied to the government. The cumulative scope of the sanctions now reaches from Cuba's head of state to the company that pumps and refines the island's fuel.
Rubio has told Congress the United States is open to a negotiated transition to democracy in Cuba, though he has not publicly identified a Cuban leadership figure willing to engage on those terms. Trump has gone further in public statements, floating the idea of a "friendly takeover" if the Cuban government opens its economy to American investment and distances itself from adversaries. China has moved in the opposite direction, deepening Communist Party ties with Havana as U.S. pressure has intensified, according to the South China Morning Post, raising the stakes of the standoff for regional influence as well as bilateral relations.
What Comes Next
The CUPET sanctions create a new compliance problem for any third-country company with U.S. financial exposure that currently does business with the firm. European, Canadian, and Chinese entities active in Cuba's energy sector now face the risk of secondary sanctions for continuing those dealings, a pressure point that could further constrict the regime's ability to find foreign partners willing to help keep the lights on.
For American claimants whose property was seized by the Castro government in the 1960s and since, Thursday's action is a signal that Washington still regards those claims as live policy. Rubio's explicit linkage of the CUPET designation to unlawful expropriation of American-owned assets elevates property rights from a rhetorical grievance to a named justification for U.S. government action.
With CUPET now sanctioned, Díaz-Canel personally designated, Venezuela's oil deliveries severed, and Raúl Castro himself under indictment, the Trump administration has systematically dismantled the main pillars that sustained the Cuban government's finances and energy supply over the past decade. Whether Havana moves toward the negotiating table or accelerates its turn toward Beijing will shape the next phase of a pressure campaign that, by every visible measure, is still intensifying.
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