An elderly woman is rummaging through a bag full of prescription glasses. She tries a pair on and puts them back. Pair after pair, until she finally stops with one. She blinks, smiles and says:
“I can see now.”
The glasses — and much more — were brought to Cuba by a delegation that traveled last month to the impoverished island to bring humanitarian aid and to make a political statement about the U.S.’s relationship to the nation. The activists and community organizers, which included Cuban Americans from the Miami area and elsewhere in Florida, were a part of the international “Nuestra America Convoy.”
“Cubans are the most friendliest, warmest, most welcoming people on earth,” Justine Medina, a Cuban American and member of the delegation who was raised in Tampa, said after returning to the U.S. “But I also felt really sad and heartbreaking this time because the energy crisis’s effects are just astronomical.”
She delivered medical aid to Havana’s Beth Shalom Synagogue (El Patronato), established more than 100 years ago and the largest in Cuba. It includes many elderly among its congregants.
“The first night, when I went to Shabbat services after services, we were all eating together, and I was talking with one of the Cubans on the table with me, and he just was like, ‘I don’t like this country anymore. My dreams have died. I have no dreams here’,” Medina said. “That stuck with me hard.”
Medina, 36, had made previous visits to the island when President Obama was in the White House. When arriving in Havana on her latest trip, she recounted that on the outskirts of the city, you “notice how green and lush the country is.”
She was among more than 600 delegates from 33 countries and 120 organizations, led by the Progressive International, who made the journey from March 20-23. Groups taking part included CODE Pink, People’s Health Movement, and MediCuba, among many others.
The organization’s mission comes at a particularly fraught time in Cuba and America’s more than 60 years of hostile relations since Fidel Castro came to power and the U.S. embargo was put in place. The island is plagued by daily and widespread power outages, including at its hospitals, since the U.S. cut off oil from Venezuela, constant breakdowns of public transportation, and shortages of gasoline and food.
Still processing their first-hand impressions of everyday life, the Americans who spoke to Caplin News about the trip said they experienced an emotional weekend visiting soup kitchens, markets, health care facilities and community gatherings. They saw both the hardship endured by Cubans and their life-affirming spirit.
“These are people that have dealt with 70 years of an embargo. And you can feel it. Like when you’re there, it’s inescapable,” said Brian Gonzalez, a delegate of Cuban Americans for Cuba. “So, honestly, I’m feeling just angry and just disappointed.”
Gonzalez, a 28-year-old Miami Cuban American, is one of the few members of the delegation who was born on the island. He came to the U.S. as a child and the mission was his first time back since 2020.
“People are doing their best to survive,” said Gonzalez, who recalled walking through John Lennon Park in the Vedado district of Havana, where there was a farmer’s market selling vegetables and other items. “But you do also have a lot of people that are trying to keep the mood up or dancing or trying to enjoy life. There was a bunch of music playing in that park. It’s just something they do all the time.”
During the trip, events organized by La Red Afro-Cubana de Personas Trans and six other LGBTQ+ groups, a network providing resources to the LGBTQ+ community, included drag performances where activists came to show their “solidarity and international support,” said Medina.
“LGBTQIA people who are able to come over to the street, hang out, have some time, have a moment, because life isn’t always about suffering,” said Luna VB, a Cuban American and member of the Miami Democratic Socialists of America, who asked not to be identified. “And even though it may be bad, you still gotta make the most out of a bad situation and be able to improve your happiness.”
Luna, 31, said she wanted to join the mission to be part of a movement supporting Cuba. She has family on the island and also wanted to bring aid to her aunt living there.
Luna described walking in the garbage-filled streets of Havana where kids were coming up and asking members of the group for money. Luna said her aunt told her: “There’s everything here, but there is no money.”
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canal expressed his appreciation to the convoy in a post on X.
“The courage of these friends of all ages moves us, as they are willing to share our same fate at a difficult and challenging time for the country,” Díaz-Canal wrote. “We also admire their generous selflessness, in taking on the costs of passage and stay, in addition to the valuable donations they bring as luggage.”
The trips sparked some backlash in South Florida. Republican Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar of Miami, the daughter of Cuban exiles whose 27th congressional district holds a sizable Cuban population, criticized the delegation’s visit and said it had accomplished nothing except contributing to a tragedy.
“They (CODE Pink) attended…this concert by an Irish group but the light show sucked all the energy and all the electricity in that neighborhood then there was a hospital nearby where seven Cubans died because they were on ventilators,” Salazar said on Fox News. However, a fact check by Politifact found no evidence supporting her claim.
In Washington, President Trump has repeatedly made threats against the island, saying recently he would like “the honor of taking Cuba.”
“I mean, whether I free it, take it — I think I could do anything I want with it, if you want to know the truth,” Trump told reporters recently. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is of Cuban heritage, also has been engaged in talks with Cuban leaders to push for new leadership in Havana.
A YouGov survey in mid-March found 40% of Americans disapprove of the U.S. embargo on Cuba, compared to 32% who support it and 28% who are unsure. In addition, a majority of Americans — 61% — want the establishment of diplomatic relations with the country. However, in a 2024 poll conducted by Florida International University Professor Guillermo Grenier showed that 55% of Cubans in South Florida continue to back the embargo, although majorities support some engagement, such as the selling of food and medicine to the island. Backing for the continuation of the embargo drops to 43% among Cuban Americans not born on the island.
After the U.S. government permitted a Russian tanker to arrive late last month in Cuba with desperately needed oil to ease the electricity crisis and with reports that a second tanker is on the way, the American activists said that is only a temporary fix and more needs to happen.
“Hopefully, we find a future where we can finally normalize relations,” Gonzalez said, “and those of us with connections to the island can kind of go back and forth as we please to a beautiful island that isn’t being strangled by our tax dollars.”
