As United States President Donald Trump’s second administration escalates its pressure campaign on Cuba, the humanitarian crisis on the island is plunging its population into hunger and insecurity. Meanwhile, Cuba has become a key issue in the US Supreme Court, where recent and upcoming decisions could have grave consequences for sovereign countries across the Western Hemisphere.
Last month, the court ruled in favor of Havana Docks, an American company that before 1960 had owned rights to use and operate the ports of Havana. In effect, that ruling decided that Havana Docks could be entitled to hundreds of millions of dollars from cruise lines that used these ports between 2016 and 2019.
Now, a second case, ExxonMobil v. Corporacion CIMEX (Cuba), et al, is pending a decision. In this case, the energy and petrochemical giant is suing three Cuban state-owned companies over the 1960 confiscation of Standard Oil’s (Exxon’s predecessor) oil and gas assets in the country. The ruling is expected to come before the end of June.
The case comes at a time when the Trump administration has issued sanctions against Cuba’s state-owned oil company, Union Cuba Petroleo, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio claiming that Havana has “weaponized energy as a tool of social control and kleptocratic profit.”
The 1996 Helms-Burton Act and the 1976 Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) form the core of ExxonMobil’s case, which it filed in 2019. Title III of the Helms Burton Act allows US nationals or entities to sue over the “trafficking” in properties Cuba confiscated after its 1959 revolution.
It is, of course, a key component of Washington’s longstanding efforts to destabilize Cuba — and the current case comes amid Trump’s growing threats of regime change in Havana.
The Helms-Burton Act’s Title I enforces existing US sanctions against Cuba, while Title II maintains US interference in Cuba. Title III further intensifies the blockade by penalizing anyone doing business with Cuba, and Title IV denies visas and excludes entry to the US of anyone violating Title III.
Citing national interests tied to the decades-old obsession of allegedly striving to bring democracy to Cuba, as well as the need to avoid rifts with American allies that do business with Cuba, US presidents have suspended the implementation of Title III since the bill was enacted. The suspension was renewed every six months until Trump waived it in 2019. This enabled ExxonMobil to file a lawsuit against CIMEX and Union Cuba Petroleo.
In 2021, US courts ruled that Cuban state-owned companies were within their rights to invoke immunity under the FSIA Act, prompting ExxonMobil to seek recourse in 2022 at the DC Circuit Court on whether Title III of the Helms-Burton Act supersedes the FSIA. In 2024, the DC Circuit halted the case pending further analysis on whether the alleged trafficking in property directly affects the US based on a clause in the FSIA legislation, which excludes immunity if commercial activity has a direct effect on the US.
With the case now at the US Supreme Court, ExxonMobil is seeking over $1 billion in damages from Cuba. If the Supreme Court determines that Cuba cannot claim immunity under FSIA, ExxonMobil’s case will set a precedent for other cases and also expose foreign companies in Cuba to liability.
Left out of the equation is the wider framework of US sabotage in Cuba since the revolution. At that time, Standard Oil was one of three refineries which, acting upon orders from President Dwight Eisenhower, refused to refine Russian crude oil that was sold to Cuba at a cheaper price. In August 1960, a US Department of State document noted that while the US directive did not affect petroleum product supplies, “such difficulties may develop in the future.”
The current difficulties Cuba faces — direct results of the decades-long illegal US blockade on Cuba and Trump’s ongoing executive orders targeting the island both economically and politically — take place against a backdrop of Cold War-era politics crafted to cripple the island. In true American fashion, petroleum was one of the first targets.
Founded in 1870 by oil magnate John D. Rockefeller, Standard Oil began operating in South America in 1914. In March 1937, Bolivia became the first country to expropriate and nationalize Standard Oil’s assets, creating the Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos in the same year. In January 1942, the Bolivian government agreed to pay $1.5 million to Standard Oil in compensation for nationalization, including “existing maps and geological studies” the company made in Bolivia.
Cuba was the second country to nationalize Standard Oil’s assets after the company failed to comply with Fidel Castro’s requests to refine shipments of Russian crude oil. In 1895, a subsidiary company of Standard Oil — a Panamanian corporation by the name of Esso Standard Oil S.A. — started operating from a refinery near Havana Harbour and acquired full ownership of the premises by 1922. By 1957, under the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, Esso was refining up to 34,500 barrels of crude oil daily.
In December 1958, a telegram from the US Embassy in Cuba to the US Department of State assessed the situation in which Batista’s rule was swiftly deteriorating as a result of the July 26 Movement led by Fidel Castro. Notably, the meeting included representatives of US businesses in Cuba, including G.W. Potts, Esso’s representative at the time. During the meeting, Potts warned that Fidel Castro and the July 26 Movement were communist, noting similarities with Guatemala’s Jacobo Arbenz who was overthrown in a CIA-backed coup in 1954.
On Jan. 6, 1959, US officials and business representatives agreed to recognize the provisional government before Fidel’s arrival in Havana. According to a telegram: “Group felt that early recognition would assist in strengthening 26th against more radical elements in revolutionary movement, and would also assist in curbing possible growth of Communist strength.”
However, as agrarian reform took place, it was clear that a discrepancy would arise in terms of land and enterprise. The US warning was clear. While agreement that agrarian reform fell strictly within Cuban sovereignty, compensation for US private enterprises in Cuba was paramount: “If American private investors there, whose properties may be affected by the Agrarian Reform Law, receive what they feel to be fair and just treatment, public opinion in the United States will be influenced accordingly.”
By December 1959, Esso Standard Oil was starting to feel the repercussions of the Cuban Revolution, noting in particular: “Castro has developed the technique of going over the heads of the government to the people and this is a big problem — he has influence with large segments of the people.” Esso representative Collado suggested that the US cut Cuba’s sugar quota in retaliation for the obstacles American investors were facing.
In June 1960, Thomas Mann and Roy Rubottom met with Shell and Esso representatives in New York. A CIA representative was also present during the meeting. Following a trade agreement Cuba signed with the Soviet Union in February that included Moscow purchasing sugar from Cuba, the USSR also agreed to sell crude oil in exchange for sugar. The Cuban government had asked both oil companies to process Russian crude oil at their facilities. The estimates were that for that year, Cuba would obtain 50% of the oil required for commercial activities from the Soviet Union.
During the meeting, Robert Anderson stipulated five points that would “lay the groundwork for their decision [refusing to refine Russian crude oil] unfavorable to Cuba”: all three companies should collectively agree not to refine Russian crude oil, the decision would be consistent with US policy, in case of expropriation, the Washington would ensure compensation, no other American oil companies would enter the Cuban market, and influence other oil companies to adhere to US foreign policy decisions regarding Cuba.
Cuba expropriated Esso on July 1, 1960, based on a resolution by the Cuban Petroleum Institute. The Eisenhower administration soon decided it would reduce the US sugar quota which it imported from Cuba by 700,000 tons, noting that Cuba would likely retaliate against this sanction. The USSR stepped in to buy the sugar quota usually purchased by the US from Cuba.
Speaking at the Cerro Stadium on Aug. 6 1960, Castro noted that the US decision demonstrated “a clear attitude of economic and political aggression against our country.” Explaining that the Platt Amendment aided US oil companies in charging high prices for oil, thus interfering with Cuban sovereignty, Fidel announced Law 851, which nationalised the 36 sugar mills owned by the US companies in Cuba, telephone and electricity companies, as well as the oil companies Texaco, Sinclair and Esso Standard Oil.
As the US influence in Cuba dwindled, from October 1960 to April 15, 1961, the CIA carried out many acts of sabotage in Cuba, including the destruction of 300,000 tons of sugar cane in 800 fires. Other arson attacks were carried out in warehouses, as well as 110 bombings of Cuban infrastructure. Interestingly, the CIA has noted that these “sabotage activities had considerable psychological value but accomplished no significant results otherwise.” It also conceded that Castro had managed to counter the sabotage activities and even capture “three of the most important leaders under CIA control.”
On May 1, Trump signed an executive order targeting entities and individuals operating in Cuba’s energy, defense, and mining industries, as well as foreign banks and companies that do business with Cuban companies facing sanctions. Drawing once again upon Cold War rhetoric, Trump’s sanctions are based on the premise that Cuba — a country of some 10.9 million people — constitutes “an unusual and extraordinary threat.”
As part of Washington’s long campaign of imperial sabotage, the illegal blockade President John F. Kennedy’s administration introduced in 1962 remains in effect. Against this 64-year-old blockade, along with Trump’s recent attempts to strangle Havana, ExxonMobil’s case is yet another strand woven into the broader effort to bring down Cuba’s government.
ExxonMobil’s case, of course, enjoys the backing of the Trump administration, which views the claim as both corporate and political. Since early 2026, ExxonMobil has benefited from the Solicitor General’s involvement in the case, which ties the legal dispute to US foreign policy interests in Cuba — including the goal of ousting the Cuban government, in part, by “promoting accountability for … wrongful seizures and in supporting compensation for US victims of unlawful Castro-era expropriations.”
In short, if the US Supreme Court rules against Cuba’s immunity under FSIA, the ExxonMobil case will set a dangerous precedent. Undoubtedly, more claims against Cuba will enter the courts. The Foreign Claims Settlement Commission has already registered over 8,800 claims against Cuba, with over 5,900 eligible for compensation.
As the US Supreme Court inches closer to reaching a decision over whether the Helms-Burton Act takes precedence over FSIA later this month, Cuba’s sovereignty is not alone under the chopping block. Trump’s so-called “Donroe Doctrine” is only just getting started. From Venezuela to Cuba, from Colombia to Mexico, Washington has set its sights on toppling any government that even mildly resists becoming a client state. And with Trump raising the specter of military intervention in Cuba, it’s worth asking if any country in the Western Hemisphere can remain safe from American intervention.
Top photo: People walk along a street in Havana, Cuba, in March 2020 (JF Martin/Unsplash)
