What a story!
24.02.2026 03:07
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What a story!
Forgot to share here: Last week I appeared on NPR's Code Switch to discuss the past and present of Cuban migration.
Grateful for the invite to reflect on material from my recent Public Books piece.
www.npr.org/2026/02/18/n...
Thanks for reading and sharing, Renata. 👍
Really insightful article on Cuba's political prospects from @mjbusta.bsky.social www.journalofdemocracy.org/online-exclu...
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"The fantasy of effortless regime implosion — complete with glossy visions of a reborn Havana — obscures the far harder reality of postauthoritarian rebuilding. It treats economic pain as a catalyst while ignoring the social foundations necessary for political order."
I also revisit history:
"Regime change imposed externally risks resetting the historical clock...while reproducing a new version of the legitimacy deficit from 1898: a government born not of negotiated national consensus or internal transformation, but of foreign imposition."
For @jodemocracy.bsky.social, I pull back the presumptions of inevitability and ask what, if anything, is really this administration's Cuba strategy, what are its blindspots, and what are its likely costs.
www.journalofdemocracy.org/online-exclu...
We've extended the deadline for the 2026-2027 Goizueta Graduate Fellowships @umchc.bsky.social to Feb 20.
If you're a grad student in the US working on Cuba-focused or Cuba-adjacent topics, apply!
mailchi.mp/miami.edu/li...
oy indeed. Ay, too.
A Cuban migrant held in solitary confinement at an immigration detention facility in Texas died after guards held him down, according to an autopsy report released Wednesday that ruled the death a homicide. n.pr/49xRXVf
"He has repatriated > 1,600 Cubans in 2025. Legal immigration has also been cut. Trump enacted a travel ban, including Cuba, & ended a family reunification program. Officials are rejecting visa applications. The admin paused all Cuban immigration cases: naturalization, residency & asylum."
“When Trump claimed that Biden had misused parole authority many Cubans reassured themselves: Trump isn’t talking about us. He’ll target the criminals and the gangs for deportation. We still have the Cuban Adjustment Act. He owes Cuban Americans our votes.”
Thanks for reading and sharing!
My new essay for @publicbooks.bsky.social on the Cuban-American community's response so far to the current administration's crackdown on historic numbers of recent Cuban migrants with irregular or provisional status.
www.publicbooks.org/will-cuban-a...
Michael J. Bustamante (@mjbusta.bsky.social) explores the past and present of the Cuban Americans who voted overwhelmingly for Trump—and who are now mostly silent as his administration cracks down on all migrants, including Cubans.
My new essay for @publicbooks.bsky.social on the Cuban-American community's response so far to the current administration's crackdown on historic numbers of recent Cuban migrants with irregular or provisional status.
www.publicbooks.org/will-cuban-a...
What does US intervention in Venezuela mean for Latin America and how did we get here?
Authors unpack the history, policy, and implications in this must-watch discussion.
Watch it here👇
youtu.be/VGlfGplYdm4
“Emigrants,” 1894. Oil on canvas by Raffaello Gambogi (1874–1943). Museo Civico Giovanni Fattori, Livorno, Italy.
🗃️ The US attracted more foreign-born people from more places than any other nation in history. We need language to acknowledge that central fact of American history. But we also need language that goes beyond the idea that the United States is, or ever was, simply a “nation of immigrants.” 🧵1/10
Thanks for reading, John!
In Foreign Affiars, a must-read piece from Michael Bustamante @mjbusta.bsky.social on Cuba: “Cuba’s cascading problems are now so severe that even a more dynamic private sector would be insufficient to fix them” www.foreignaffairs.com/cuba/cuba-br...
Excellent article from @mjbusta.bsky.social that summarizes Cuba’s current (not that recent) economic and political crisis.
www.foreignaffairs.com/cuba/cuba-br...
Thanks to Foreign Affairs’ editors for the invitation to contribute.
In my drafts, I titled the essay “Cuba’s Lost Decade.” Editors went with a different framing. But “lost decade” (or more) is an apt descriptor, I think, for the period from the confluence of actualización and Obama normalization to now, which is the arc this essay also traces.
It means creating the conditions for generating a tax base that could continue to fund what the state clearly cannot currently.
It goes without saying such moves would have a better chance of success if Cubans had a real political voice in shaping hard choices ahead.
Others may say that by calling for greater liberalization, I’m simply abiding by a neoliberal playbook. But a more significant economic opening—i.e. dispensing w the rigidity of central planning—does not have to mean completely selling off the public sector for parts.
(I have another piece coming that dives further into the U.S. side of the equation, focused on Cuban-Americans’ reactions to the current administration's crackdown on Cuban migrants, at times as a corollary of sanctions maximalism. I’ll share that when it’s published.)
That’s what I focus on in this essay. As I argue—and few Cubans I know would disagree—if the external shocks/impediments are real, internal fumbles have made them far worse.
But that’s just it: I have so little hope for a decisive or humanitarian turnaround in U.S. policy in the near or mid-term that I think Cuba and Cubans have little choice but to focus on what they can control: urgently needed reform from within, despite external constraints.
For what it's worth, those additional words can be seen in the screenshot below.
Some will fault me for not dedicating more space here to the state of U.S. policy today. In truth, some words on that subject were left on the cutting room floor. (If you’ve ever worked on a piece like this, you know the give and take involved with editors around length.)