The independent Cuban journalist Yosmany Mayeta Labrada does not hesitate in his response when asked if the thought of being deported crosses his mind: he asserts that he would be taken directly to prison upon arrival at the airport.
«If I am deported, I'm sure the first thing that would happen is that they would be waiting for me at Antonio Maceo Airport in Santiago de Cuba, or in the capital where I entered, and they would take me to prison,» Mayeta stated in an interview with CiberCuba, where he discussed his critical immigration situation in the United States.
Mayeta, a member of UNPACU since 2011, explains that the regime would not forgive her activism.
"It is very difficult, because I have been a voice for the Cubans on the Island, conveying their reality daily, and also a whip, though I apologize for the lack of modesty, in being so against the secretary of the Party in Santiago de Cuba, Beatriz Johnson Urrutia," he said.
The reporter is emphatic about the consequences of his return: "Those who are still in power, though they have little time left, do not forgive him."
What Mayeta fears the most is not just prison, but what would happen to her inside it.
"It would be like the recent political prisoners, who seem to have come out of concentration camps... they are skeletons, they are skulls," he warns, adding that he suffers from a preexisting health condition that would worsen in confinement.
In his own words, the destiny that awaits him in Cuba would be only one: "To completely silence my voice within a prison, so that it no longer serves as a whip against the regime."
In the interview, Mayeta also reviews the management of the successive secretaries of the Communist Party in Santiago de Cuba and argues that her criticism is not personal against Beatriz Johnson Urrutia, but rather aimed at an entire chain of leaders who have plunged the city into misery.
About Misael Enamorado, his predecessor in office, Mayeta recalls that he lived in the United States trying to obtain residency and was publicly exposed by journalists and congress members before returning to Cuba in April 2025.
From Lázaro Expósito, who preceded him, it is said that "he pretended to improve things: he allowed you to open a restaurant but would close other places, he would sell you a bit more ice cream... yet, Santiago de Cuba remained in misery."
Mayeta arrived in the United States in 2019 with a J-1 visa obtained through a scholarship for her journalistic work, but that visa is incompatible with the Cuban Adjustment Act without a pardon from the Department of State, which she has not yet received.
His application for permanent residency was denied, and he has a decisive immigration court hearing in July, where deportation would mean a certain conviction in Cuba.
After the visibility of her case, lawyers Liudmila Marcelo and Willy Allen offered to review her immigration status for free, a sign that there is still room to explore legal options before the court issues its ruling.
Filed under: