THE upcoming US presidential election is being touted as one of the most important in the nation’s history. But there’s another country also extremely interested in the results on November 5: the outcome will have a vital impact on current and future US-Cuba relations.

There are two starkly different scenarios at play: one cautiously optimistic, the other utterly negative.

If Donald Trump wins, Cuba loses.

A victory for the Republican nominee will leave little opportunity for improved relations. While Trump paid scant attention to Cuba during the first half of his term, in 2019, he ended all of Barack Obama’s initiatives and introduced 243 extra sanctions and measures as part of a “maximum pressure” policy.

He acquiesced to hard-right, pro-blockade Cuban-US politicians, denying the tangible benefits that improved relations had delivered, including bilateral agreements on the environment, customs and drug-trafficking.

Relations between Cuba and the US improved significantly under Obama. The easing of financial and travel restrictions had a positive effect on the Cuban economy, as well as seeing the freeing of the remaining members of the Miami Five and the opening of respective embassies in both countries. However, the blockade remained firmly in place and Obama’s policy goal remained regime change, only this time the strategy was to use the carrot and not the stick.

Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign fell firmly into the latter category: cut off Cuba’s principal sources of foreign currency and collapse the economy and the revolution with it.

To deter foreign investors, Trump activated Title III of the 1996 Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act, enabling US nationals, including Cuban-Americans, to sue Cuban, US or foreign companies for using property nationalised after the revolution. The administration targeted the energy supply by imposing sanctions on companies shipping Venezuelan oil to Cuba.

The State Department pressured countries to cancel their medical assistance contracts with Cuba or risk losing US aid and conservative governments in Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia and El Salvador obliged.

Trump ended his term by designating Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism (SSOT) — an entirely hypocritical political move that continues to cripple the economy by restricting and discouraging international investment. This action, during a period when Cuba is already experiencing unprecedented shortages, has contributed to record levels of emigration.

Conversely, until he stepped down, there was little optimism for improved Cuba-US relations under a Biden second term either. His presidency has been extremely disappointing for those who favour engagement with Cuba. He has done little to reverse Trump’s sanctions despite making election campaign commitments to do so.

Only in recent months has there been any sign that a Biden second term might have adopted a softer approach.

In May, the State Department removed Cuba from its list of countries “not fully co-operating against terrorism.” However, Cuba remained on the SSOT list after the July 21 deadline to remove it in 2024 passed.

The Department of the Treasuryʼs Office of Foreign Assets Control has also recently amended the Cuban Assets Control Regulations to “independent private sector entrepreneurs,” including co-operatives with up to 100 employees.

In August, the US embassy in Havana expanded visa regulations for athletes, artists, entertainers and others. However, visas for business and tourism remain excluded and still require an interview in a third country.

Speculation over whether Biden would have introduced additional positive measures in his second term became a moot point when his vice-president replaced him in the race for the White House in August.

How will Kamala Harris treat Cuba if she becomes president? Her past statements may shed some insight into her thinking.

Although Harris repeats the standard US talking points on supporting “human rights and democracy” in Cuba, as a presidential candidate in 2019, she did comment directly on the blockade.

In response to a Tampa Bay Times questionnaire on issues of interest to Florida, her team replied: “Senator Harris believes we should end the failed trade embargo and take a smarter approach that empowers Cuban civil society and the Cuban US community to spur progress and freely determine their own future.”

A month before the 2020 election, Harris said if she and Biden won the White House, they would repeal Trump’s 243 extra sanctions and restrictions. “We will reverse Trump’s failed policies.” But in interviews, she has parroted the same tired lines long used to justify the blockade: “The embargo is the law; a Congressional Act is needed to lift it, or the president needs to determine that a democratically elected government is in power in Cuba. We don’t expect any of these things to happen any time soon.”

Harris is very much a product of the US political system, particularly when it comes to foreign affairs, and as such, she has internalised the standard anti-revolution propaganda. We can only hope that she can overcome those ill-informed prejudices just as Obama did, even if his engagement policy was rooted in regime change objectives.

The most optimistic could hope that her more recent silence on Cuba might indicate disagreement and frustration with Biden’s inaction on overturning Trump’s measures. Harris was born in 1964 and belongs to a post-cold war generation with a different world vision, which might benefit future relations between Cuba and the US.

Nothing is guaranteed, but after four years of Trump followed by little change under Biden, a Harris administration could not be any worse. It is the only one with the potential to improve relations.

This potential may lie in her running mate. In 2010, Tim Walz voted in favour of a Bill to end travel restrictions and allow US farmers to sell food on credit to Cuba. In 2015, he co-sponsored the Free Trade with Cuba Act, which called for an end to the blockade. Trump’s victory ensured that legislation did not advance. In 2017, he criticised Trump’s reversal of Obama’s policy, saying it was “shortsighted and misguided” and “hurting [US] interests.”

A Democrat White House that wanted to reverse Trump’s policy on Cuba would have the decisive advantage of not having to deal with a senior and pro-blockade member of their own party fighting them all the way.

While the majority of pro-blockade politicians are Republican, one of the most influential voices opposing engagement came from New Jersey Democrat senator Robert Menendez. As chairman of the powerful Senate foreign relations committee (SFRC), he had tremendous influence and convinced Biden to maintain Trump’s policies.

Fortunately, Menendez has lost all influence over Cuban affairs. He resigned in disgrace last year over charges of corruption and bribery and is no longer even a member of the Democratic Party.

Replacing him on the SFRC is Ben Cardin, who, although a conservative Democrat, doesn’t have such hard-line views as Menendez. Responding to a letter from a Cuba Solidarity Campaign member in November 2023, Cardin was critical of Trump’s policies.

Reflecting on his visit to Cuba as part of a bipartisan Senate delegation in 2015, he wrote: “I was delighted by the friendliness and hospitality of the Cuban people and engaged with government officials on critical issues related to US-Cuba normalisation, human rights, and democratic governance. These meetings further confirmed to me that bilateral normalisation would uplift both the US and Cuban people and economies.”

There is a glimmer of hope that Harris might accelerate the rolling back of Trump-era sanctions and end Biden’s bizarre hybrid policy, which has left most in place — an impossible compromise between Obama’s efforts at coexistence and Trump’s policy of regime change.

The administration’s watchword has been to be “tough on the regime” while “supporting the Cuban people” — a contradiction in its essence, as it is not possible to bankrupt the government without immiserating the population.

Cuban President Manuel Diaz-Canel recently commented on how hypocritical and irrational the blockade and Washington’s historic attempts at regime change are:

“If we are wrong, if we are so inefficient, if we are such failures, then do not apply any sanction, and simply let us fall. But no. We know that the example of Cuba, and I say it without boasting and without any Cuban chauvinism, we know that we represent an example for Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world because one constantly sees so many people in the world that have placed solidarity with Cuba at the centre of their lives, having trust and seeing a light that guides.

“For this reason, we assume a tremendous commitment; we cannot let them down. That is the only thing that explains why such a powerful government has to resort to such practices in order to bring a small country to its knees.”

Keith Bolender is a Canadian freelance journalist and author of Cuba Under Siege: US Policy, the Revolution and Its People. He will be speaking together with the Cuban ambassador, Ismara Walter Vargas, and others at a public meeting, “What will the next US president mean for Cuba?” at 6pm Thursday November 14, at Hamilton House, London. Full details at www.cuba-solidarity.org.uk.