The Latest Breaking News from Cuba

The United States will expand Trump-era restrictions to rapidly expel Cuban, Nicaraguan and Haitian migrants caught illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, President Joe Biden said on Thursday in his first major speech on border security.

More than 500 Cubans arrived in South Florida during the holiday weekend in makeshift, largely motorless boats. Most drifted up in the Florida Keys and at Dry Tortugas National Park, some 70 miles from Key West.

In an end-of-year video message for social media, Cuba’s leader, Miguel Díaz-Canel, recently acknowledged that 2022 was “one of the most challenging of Cuba’s revolutionary history.” He then admitted that 2023 “could be even more difficult,” but that, he added, would be “an attractive challenge for all who feel revolutionary.”

The U.S. Embassy confirmed this week it will begin processing immigrant visas, with a priority placed on permits to reunite Cubans with family in the U.S., and others like the diversity visa lottery.