On July 31, the U.S. State Department released a statement[1] that said the following:
- “We have made clear to foreign adversaries that we will not tolerate any efforts to interfere in our elections. The inclusion of Cuba in the Intelligence Community Assessment of Foreign Threats to U.S. Elections is the result of the Cuban government targeting candidates in South Florida who wanted to maintain U.S. sanctions against Cuba.”
- “Havana [has] attempted to undermine Florida’s congressional and gubernatorial candidates: It likely wanted to advance its foreign policy goals, including the removal of sanctions, travel restrictions, and the State Sponsor of Terrorism designation.’”
- “The report also pointed out that one of the regime’s objectives was to ‘denigrate certain US candidates in Florida’and revealed that part of the strategy deployed in this regard was to ‘forge relationships’ with the media that tend to criticize Washington’s policy toward Cuba. In addition, it referred to the use of social media profiles ‘probably linked’ to Cuba, from which the negative content of US politicians who harshly criticize the Cuban government was amplified.”
The State Department’s comments were precipitated by Cuban foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez’s comment that accusations of Cuba’s influence in U.S. eleactions were ‘unfounded.’
============================
[1] Bruno Rodriguez accuses the US of interfering in elections around the world and Washington responds, Diario de Cuba (July 31, 2024).
