Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks during a joint news conference with Ecuador’s Foreign Minister Gabriela Sommerfeld at the Palacio de Carondelet, in Quito, Ecuador, Thursday, Sep. 4, 2025. Jacquelyn Martin/Pool via REUTERS
Cuba's foreign minister accused Secretary of State Marco Rubio of being corrupt and said the Cuban American "knows nothing about Cuba," The Hill reports.
In an interview with The Associated Press on Wednesday, Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla said Rubio, whose parents are Cuban immigrants, said he has made it his mission to carry out a "maximum pressure" campaign against the island nation.
"There is a very personal and corrupt agenda that he is carrying out, which seems to be sacrificing the national interests of the U.S. in order to advance this very extremist approach," Rodríguez Parrilla told the AP.
Since taking office, the Trump administration redesignated Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism, days after former President Joe Biden lifted that designation before the end of his term. Trump has also placed new restrictions on Cuban tourists and revoked legal protected status that shielded approximately 300,000 Cubans in the U.S. from deportation.
Despite all that, Cuba's top foreign diplomat since 2009 says he doesn't blame Trump, but, rather, Rubio.
"Trump 'portrays himself as an advocate of peace,' Rodríguez Parrilla said, but Rubio “promotes the use of force or the threat to use force as an everyday, customary tool.”
The foreign ambassador then cut into Rubio's Cuban American heritage, saying, “The current secretary of state was not born in Cuba, has never been to Cuba, and knows nothing about Cuba."