'McCarthyite' Rubio Report Ripped as Attempt to Justify Trump Invasion of Cuba

While some Republicans in Congress cheered the US Department of State's Monday report titled "Cuba: The Capital of 21st Century Communism," American and Cuban critics blasted it as part of both President Donald Trump's push to invade the island and his authoritarian crackdown on domestic dissent.

"For nearly seven decades, the Cuban regime has waged a sustained campaign of subversion against the United States," the report begins, "that has infiltrated the highest reaches of the US government, recruited and cultivated generations of American activists, backed an unprecedented wave of left-wing terrorism on American soil, and carried out one of the most durable and damaging foreign intelligence penetrations in American history."

Sharing the document on social media, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio—the son of Cuban immigrants and a longtime advocate of regime change on the island—similarly claimed that Cuba's government "has been the leading sponsor of radical leftism and Third Worldism in the United States. The State Department is exposing the full history of Cuban espionage and subversion in our country. The American people deserve to know."

Some of the critics responded directly to Rubio, calling the report "justification for the military invasion of Cuba and the new COINTELPRO," a reference to the Federal Bureau of Investigation program targeting US organizers over half a century ago.

Defense Priorities fellow and Chicago Tribune foreign affairs columnist Daniel DePetris wrote: "This report actually states, in all seriousness, that Cuba's main goal is to conquer the United States. It's about as dumb as dumb gets. Don't be fooled: This is the State Department trying to build the foundational case for US military action, should Trump decide to do it."

Andreas Krieg, a senior lecturer at King's College London and fellow at the Institute of Middle Eastern Studies, urged Rubio, "Before building another casus belli for Cuba, try to solve the strategic disaster that is the Iran War you started but cannot win."

Trump in recent months has ramped up the United States' decadeslong and deadly economic assault on Cuba and suggested that he may try to take over the island. However, he's also signaled such action may come only after an end to his illegal war on Iran, which has been revived in recent days following a failed ceasefire.

In an apparent show of support for Trump taking military action against the island nation, Congressman Carlos Gimenez (R-Fla.) declared on social media Monday, "Cuba is next!"

Meanwhile, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla said in Spanish that "the latest fallacy from the US Department of State against Cuba forms part of the construction, by the secretary of state, of a pretext for sustaining its cruel and criminal economic war that punishes every Cuban family, and its aspiration to militarily aggress Cuba, for which it desperately seeks the support of US citizens. It is further evidence of the macabre plan designed by that US politician from South Florida, who only satisfies the interests of those who have always paid him."

US Congresswoman Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.), who recently traveled to Cuba to hear firsthand accounts of the humanitarian crisis, said that "Secretary Rubio's deranged 'analysis' leaves out the fact that for more than six decades, the United States' policies have destabilized our neighbors in Latin America—including Cuba—through sanctions, embargoes, military coups, land control, and colonization."

"Today, the Trump Department of State, led by Rubio, continues that imperialist tradition while doing what authoritarians do by criminalizing dissent," she continued. "US foreign policy is responsible for death, destruction, and destabilization. We can change that. We CAN become good neighbors."

About halfway through the State Department report, it complains about a "constant stream of Western left-wing activists, influencers, and organizers" participating in "solidarity delegations" as well as events such as the March 2026 "Nuestra América Convoy," which delivered humanitarian aid to everyday Cubans suffering due to the Trump administration's intensified blockade.

"Participants included a suite of influential progressives from the United States and across the world, including Hasan Piker; Amazon Labor Union founder Christian Smalls; a delegation from the Democratic Socialists of America; former UK Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn; former Spanish Deputy Prime Minister Pablo Iglesias; several other current and former members of European Parliament; and Isra Hirsi, campus activist and daughter of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.)," the report states. Elsewhere, it takes aim at groups including the peace organization CodePink, Communist Party USA, the National Lawyers Guild, and others.

Some targeted individuals and groups responded to what CodePink called a "conspiracy theory that masquerades as a report on Cuba," full of "baseless smears and imaginary, contrived links to Russia, China, and Iran."

"The report attempts to paint the tiny island as a threat but says nothing about the US blockade that starves and punishes 10 million people," CodePink said. "This latest attempt by the State Department is just one of many politically motivated witch hunts designed to silence anti-war voices who dare to challenge US militarism. It's about justifying even more aggression against Cuba while turning advocates for peace into suspects. We've seen this playbook before. It's McCarthyism, plain and simple."

"CodePink is currently under investigation by the Treasury Department simply for bringing medical supplies to serve children's hospitals in Cuba. We live in a world where, sadly, the people delivering medicine—not those who are enforcing the policies that deprive Cubans of medicine, food, fuel, and electricity—are under investigation," the group noted.

The organization also nodded to the dozens of United Nations General Assembly votes against the decades of American sanctions, saying that "we stand proudly with the global majority, including 187 UN member nations, who oppose the inhumane US blockade of Cuba. We will not be intimidated for delivering humanitarian aid and advocating for diplomacy over war."

"End the blockade. End the sanctions. End the economic warfare. End the threats of military intervention," CodePink declared. "Let Cubans determine their own future. Hands off Cuba."

Although not mentioned in the administration's new document, Defending Rights & Dissent joined the organizations publicly lambasting it, with policy director Chip Gibbons saying that his group "objects to the State Department's McCarthyite report on Cuba, which makes unfounded claims seeking to tar domestic movements for social change as agents of a foreign government."

Throughout its 100 pages, the publication "goes so far as to cite reports from the long-discredited House Un-American Activities Committee, in order to revive absurd Cold War conspiracy theories and update them for the present," noted Gibbons the author of The Imperial Bureau: The FBI, Political Surveillance, and the Rise of the US National Security State.

"The report smears activists, organizations, and even elected officials using guilt-by-association techniques. It appears designed to justify both domestic political repression and regime change in Cuba," he added. "Congress must not only condemn the report but hold hearings examining its authorship and to determine if the claims behind it have been used to facilitate the surveillance of American activists."

This article has been updated with comment from Congresswoman Delia Ramirez.