Grant Cardone, real estate magnate and one of the entrepreneurs closest to President Donald Trump, posted this Tuesday on his X account a prediction that sparked debate about the future of Cuba: “The U.S. will acquire Cuba. Remember this message”, accompanied by a map of the Caribbean with the island highlighted in orange.
Cardone did not clarify what he meant by "will acquire" or how his prediction would materialize. His statement adds to the remarks made by Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio regarding the future of Cuba, against a backdrop of increasing pressure from Washington on the regime in Havana.
Cardone and Trump share more than just political affinity: both built their fortunes and media brands in the real estate sector, and both have made aggressive expansion their public philosophy. The entrepreneur is the founder and CEO of Cardone Capital, a firm that manages a reported real estate portfolio of approximately $5.3 billion.
The ties between them are strong and well-documented. Cardone spoke as a speaker at Trump's massive rally at Madison Square Garden in October 2024, attended the election night at Mar-a-Lago in November of that same year, and organized Trump's participation as the keynote speaker at his 10X conferences in 2021 and 2022. His tweet about Cuba can be seen as a natural extension of that shared worldview: the island as a platform for expansion, not merely as a geopolitical issue.
The rhetorical device of "remember this message" is common in Cardone's work to present his predictions as verifiable future certainties, a style that has made him a highly influential figure in the world of finance and entrepreneurship in the U.S.
The political context supports the interpretation that the message is not an isolated occurrence. Trump has used the language of "acquisition" multiple times throughout 2026 to refer to Cuba, in a pattern similar to that which he employed with Greenland and the Panama Canal. In March, he spoke of a possible "friendly acquisition" and weeks later claimed that he would have "the honor of taking Cuba".
On October 23rd, at a rally in Fort Myers, Florida, Trump was even more explicit: “We will deal with Cuba on the way back from Iran. Those beautiful ships will pass by Cuba”, and he announced that he would send Rubio to “close the deal.”
Two days later, Rubio declared that Cuba "needs a very drastic change" and that this is a "completely different" situation than that of Venezuela, without specifying concrete measures.
The pressure on the regime of Raúl Castro and Miguel Díaz-Canel has intensified since U.S. forces captured Nicolás Maduro on January 3, 2026, depriving Havana of its main regional ally.
"We believe that Cuba needs a very drastic change, and it is a completely different case from that of Venezuela. The situation is very different, and I will leave it at that," Rubio stated on October 26 during a teleconference with journalists.
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