Sandro Castro, grandson of the dictator Fidel Castro, stated in a social media live session that relations between Cuba and the United States would not have reached their current state of deterioration if his grandfather were still alive, in remarks that implicitly call into question the current regime's leadership capacity to handle the pressure from Washington.
The video, recorded on Sunday alongside the content creator known as 'El Guajiro de Tiktok', shows Sandro using Cuban slang to refer to Fidel as “the stone” and “the tank”, terms of admiration in popular jargon.
"My brother, that was the tank, that was the tank!" Sandro said, raising his fist in a gesture of respect towards his grandfather. "The carvings wouldn't have gone so far back," he said, a phrase that means things wouldn’t have deteriorated as much with the United States.
Sandro's words come at a time of unprecedented pressure on the regime. Last Thursday, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned the Ministry of Revolutionary Armed Forces and added Miguel Díaz-Canel, his wife Lis Cuesta Peraza, Manuel Anido Cuesta, Alejandro Castro Espín and Raúl Alejandro Castro Calis to its list.
Since January 2026, the Trump administration has accumulated more than 240 sanctions against Cuba, including an executive order signed on May 1 that expanded the asset freeze and extended the measures to adult family members of designated officials.
In addition, the United States prepared a federal indictment against Raúl Castro for the downing of the aircraft of Brothers to the Rescue in 1996, with charges that would include conspiracy to commit murder of U.S. nationals.
Sandro's statements add to his remarks from previous months when he openly criticized the Díaz-Canel government. In a March interview with CNN, he said that "the president is not doing a good job" and that "the majority of Cubans want capitalism, not communism." In April, in an interview with NBC, he called for deep changes in Cuba: "free market," "less bureaucracy," and "a little more democracy."
Now, in recalling Fidel as the leader who would have known how to contain Washington's influence, Sandro suggests that the issue is not the system his grandfather built, but rather those who are managing it today.
On the other hand, this Monday it was also reported that his nightclub Bar EFE in Havana has been closed for two weeks due to the energy crisis and the impact of U.S. sanctions, placing his statements in a personal context of direct losses.
In the same live stream, Sandro tried to conclude with a message of optimism: "There is always a way out, and when something bad happens, good things follow." A phrase that, amid the greatest international pressure the regime has faced in decades,sounds more like a wish than a certainty.
Filed under: