Secretary of State Marco Rubio was right to reject the claim that the United States is imposing an “oil blockade” on Cuba. The term is being used by the Cuban regime and its defenders because it reframes the crisis in a way that makes America look like the aggressor and Cuba look like the victim. That framing ignores the reality of why Cuba is in this position.

The real question is not whether the United States owes oil, trade access, or economic relief to a communist dictatorship, but whether America should continue allowing hostile governments to keep Cuba’s failed economic system alive while ordinary Cubans suffer under it.

Rubio made that point clearly this week when he said there is “no oil blockade on Cuba, per se.” He explained that Cuba had long relied on subsidized oil from Venezuela and that the regime frequently resold roughly 60% of that oil for cash rather than using it to benefit its own citizens. Rubio argued that the real problem is not American policy, but the collapse of a system built on dependence and corruption.

President Donald Trump has also taken a harder approach by threatening tariffs on countries that “directly or indirectly” provide oil to Cuba. Democrats portray that as extreme, but the United States has no obligation to maintain normal trade relationships with governments that actively help hostile regimes survive. If economic pressure can weaken a dictatorship that has oppressed its people for decades, we should be willing to use it.

Much of the criticism directed at Trump follows a familiar pattern: America is blamed first, while authoritarian governments are treated as passive victims of U.S. power. Cuba’s economic collapse is routinely blamed on sanctions while decades of communist mismanagement, corruption, and political repression are ignored.

Cuba is not poor because the United States refuses to prop up its government, but because communism has consistently failed to generate prosperity. The regime has spent decades restricting private enterprise, suppressing dissent, and consolidating political power while ordinary Cubans face shortages of food, medicine, and basic necessities. The current fuel crisis is simply the latest example of a system that has repeatedly failed its own people.

Now, as blackouts worsen and fuel shortages intensify, defenders of the regime want the United States to help stabilize the very government that created the crisis. Democrats are continuing on their trend of being the party of hypocrites.

Rubio also exposed the moral contradiction behind the regime’s complaints. He said the United States is willing to increase humanitarian aid to Cuba and distribute it through trusted institutions, such as the Catholic Church, so that assistance reaches ordinary citizens rather than government officials. The Cuban regime would simply need to allow that aid to reach its people.

The United States should support the Cuban people, not the regime that continues to deny them economic freedom and political rights.

The United States used a similar strategy in Gaza through the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, where American and Israeli officials helped deliver millions of meals directly to civilians without allowing Hamas to seize the aid and resell it for profit. Instead of relying on organizations such as the United Nations, aid was sent directly to civilians. Despite that, many on the Left still criticized the effort, even though the model was designed to prevent terrorist groups from profiting off humanitarian aid.

Trump and Rubio are right to draw a hard line. The Cuban people deserve freedom, humanitarian support, and a future beyond communism. Cuba’s regime deserves pressure, isolation, and the end of the foreign lifelines that have kept a failed dictatorship alive for far too long.