President Donald Trump told a Fort Myers crowd that U.S. warships could force Cuba’s communist government to fold after Iran, with Secretary Marco Rubio finishing the deal.
At a campaign rally Friday at Alico Arena on the Florida Gulf Coast University campus, Trump answered an audience question about Cuba with a direct vow aimed at one of the state’s most watched foreign-policy fights.
Trump told the crowd the United States would handle Havana on the return path from Iran, using Navy ships and his secretary of state to close it out. The appearance also backed Republican Rep. Byron Donalds in the Florida governor’s race against Democrat David Jolly.
Cuba remains a major political issue in Florida, where Cuban Americans form an influential voting bloc. Trump has said he wants to fundamentally change the island’s communist government and has increased pressure on Havana in his second term.
Trump framed the plan in plain terms after the audience member raised Cuba.
"No, Cuba, he wants to know what about Cuba. Give me a break. Give me a break."
He then laid out the sequence.
"Don’t worry. We’ll take care of Cuba on our way back from Iran. We’ll do a little stopover."
He repeated the stopover idea and pointed to the fleet.
"No, we’ll do a little stopover. Actually, what we’re going to do with Cuba is we’re going to come back from Iran. Those beautiful ships will pass Cuba."
The next step, as he described it, was a short-range show of force and a diplomatic closer.
"We’ll have one of them stop about 50 yards off the coast. They’ll raise up their hands. And then we’re going to send Marco Rubio in to finish up the deal."
Trump added that a full stop might not even be required.
"We’ll have Marco. We don’t even have to stop. We could just put him in there and he’ll figure it out. He’s a great guy."
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a former Florida senator, has handled much of the administration’s Cuba policy. In a September interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity, Rubio described the country as a failure under leaders who kept promoting a revolution that had not worked, and he publicly questioned how long Cuba’s current system can survive.
The rally line landed on top of concrete pressure already in place. In September, the administration announced additional sanctions aimed at Cuban elites, financial channels, and resource operations.
The State Department accused the communist government of posing a threat to U.S. national security. That charge sits alongside Trump’s stated goal of forcing fundamental change on the island rather than managing the status quo.
Florida voters have watched this fight for decades. Communist control in Havana, repression at home, and the regime’s reach into the hemisphere have kept the issue live in South Florida living rooms and in statewide races. Trump’s Fort Myers stop tied that history to a second-term posture: more sanctions, more pressure, and a public promise that American ships and Rubio would not treat the regime as permanent.
The rally itself was built to boost Donalds in the governor’s contest. Naming Jolly as the Democratic opponent kept the domestic politics clear. The Cuba exchange showed how foreign policy and Florida elections still travel together.
Trump did not present a lengthy operational brief. He offered a sequence the crowd could picture: ships returning from Iran, a pass by the island, a stop roughly 50 yards offshore, hands raised, and Rubio sent in to close the matter. He left open the simpler option of inserting Rubio without the stop and letting him work the outcome.
That message matches the administration’s broader track, sanctions on elites and money routes, a State Department national-security accusation, and a secretary of state already on record calling the system a failure. For Cuban Americans and other Florida voters who have waited through empty openings and broken promises, the point was accountability for a communist government that has held power through force and failure.
Communist regimes rarely reform themselves. Pressure, clarity, and a refusal to pretend the revolution worked are how free nations force the issue, and Florida heard that case out loud.
