Six Days Later, Did Mr Rubio’s Cheque Bounce?

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio looks on as he meets with Indian External Affairs Minister Dr. Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong, and Japanese Foreign Minister Iwaya Takeshi at the State Department in Washington, U.S., January 21, 2025. (Photo: REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz)

Six days can be a long time in the business of purchasing diplomatic goodwill.

On 28 October, Jamaica abstained on the United Nations resolution calling for an end to the United States’ economic embargo against Cuba. Trinidad and Tobago voted against it. On 3 November, American voters delivered a politically impoverishing congressional defeat to President Donald Trump’s Republican Party.

Hence my question: did Mr Rubio’s cheque bounce?

The cheque here is diplomatic favour: the anticipated return when a small country accommodates a powerful administration. No evidence presented here establishes a payment or a secret agreement. The question is whether our governments can demonstrate a public benefit from their changed positions—or whether they have spent regional credibility on goodwill whose value they cannot guarantee.

That question deserved an answer before the American election. It deserves one still.

The UN resolution passed by 130 votes to 17, with 25 abstentions, compared with 165 in favour, seven against and twelve abstentions the previous year. Washington’s lobbying campaign had secured a substantial reduction in support.

CARICOM’s division was particularly painful. Jamaica, Guyana and Haiti abstained. Trinidad and Tobago voted no. Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica and St Lucia recorded no vote. Seven members supported the resolution: the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Suriname.

These were different diplomatic acts, and should be judged distinctly. An abstention is not a vote against. An unrecorded vote does not, by itself, explain a government’s intentions. Nevertheless, the disappearance of a familiar regional front requires more than soothing phrases about sovereign decision-making.

Sovereignty includes the right to change policy. Accountability includes the duty to explain why.

[FILE PHOTO] Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Senator the Hon. Kamina Johnson Smith.

Jamaica’s Foreign Minister, Senator Kamina Johnson Smith, offered a substantive explanation. Jamaica continued to oppose unilateral restrictions, but the annual resolution had brought no improvement while Cuba’s humanitarian crisis deepened. The Government wanted a broader approach, including reform and dialogue. Information Minister Dana Morris Dixon expressly denied that American pressure had influenced the decision.

That denial belongs in the record. So does the question it leaves unanswered.

Will someone bright patiently explain to me: how does withholding support for ending the embargo improve the circumstances of the Cuban people?

The annual resolution cannot itself repeal American legislation. That limitation is real. But failure to secure compliance does not automatically invalidate the principle being affirmed. A smoke alarm does not extinguish a fire; its inability to do so is hardly a reason, in my book, to disconnect it.

If the Government considers the resolution inadequate, what effective alternative has it advanced? What diplomatic initiative, humanitarian arrangement or negotiating process accompanies the abstention? By what measure, and over what period, should Jamaicans judge the result?

An explanation of dissatisfaction is not yet a programme of action.

Kamla Persad-Bissessar, Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago

In Trinidad and Tobago, Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar defended opposition to Cuba’s dictatorship and invoked the rights of ordinary Cubans. Those concerns deserve serious examination. Political repression does not become acceptable because its victims live under a government opposed by Washington.

But condemning repression does not establish that an economic embargo advances freedom. That requires its own argument about consequences: who bears the burden, what change the policy can realistically produce, and what safeguards protect ordinary people.

A government can oppose both dictatorship and an embargo. The ballot did not require anyone to acquire a complimentary portrait of Fidel Castro or Che.

Then came the American election.

Let us be constitutionally exact. Democrats won the incoming congressional majorities; their terms begin in early January. Trump remains President, and his administration retains substantial powers. No reserve bank collapsed on election night. Nor does a Democratic victory guarantee a different policy towards Cuba.

The election impacts bigly because it illustrates how quickly the political circumstances surrounding diplomatic accommodation can change.

If Caribbean governments anticipated benefits from pleasing the administration, they must explain what those benefits are and how durable they can be. Some may fall within executive authority; others may require congressional support. Without knowing the supposed return, nobody can honestly pronounce it either secure or worthless.

That uncertainty is precisely why citizens should demand an account.

Nor did our governments choose the date of the UN vote. The six-day interval is not proof that they engineered an electoral offering. Chronology supplies the irony; it cannot, unaided, establish the motive.

The stronger test is whether their decisions withstand scrutiny regardless of which American party wins.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks during a joint press conference with Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness, in Kingston, Jamaica, March 26, 2025. (Photo: REUTERS/Nathan Howard/Pool)

Had Republicans expanded their majorities, would an untidy and unexplained retreat from a longstanding position suddenly have become principled? Certainly not. Equally, their defeat does not automatically prove that every accommodation was foolish.

Our standard must be the public interest, supported by an intelligible account of means and ends.

For small Caribbean states, consistency has practical value. We repeatedly need larger countries to respect sovereignty, accept multilateral rules and recognise that vulnerability confers no licence for coercion. Departures from established positions therefore require careful justification.

The Government owes us that justification in language more exact than “the old approach was not working”. What is the new approach? How does this vote advance it? What evidence would demonstrate success?

Mr Rubio’s cheque may never have existed beyond the expectations of those who hoped for favour. If so, that possibility makes the demand for scrutiny more urgent.

Diplomatic goodwill is not legal tender. Jamaica’s and T&T's vestal credibility is a superbly precious asset, Minister Kamina and PM Kamla.

Before our governments spend any more of it, let them show us what their changed votes are meant to achieve—and how Caribbean people will know whether the promised improvement has arrived.