The package singles out companies working with the Cuban military’s Grupo de Administración Empresarial S.A. (GAESA) enterprise, a shadowy megaconglomerate estimated to control around 40 percent of the island’s economy, according to classified government ledgers obtained by the Miami Herald last year.
The state-controlled entity, whose finances are closely guarded, operates the country’s banking industry, gas stations, supermarkets and most of its tourism sector. The country’s hotels and resorts are not only drivers of the service sector that accounts for over 70 percent of the country’s economic output, but also a key source of the foreign currency the state uses to purchase basic necessities on the international market.
“GAESA virtually owns … the tourist sector,” U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said during a Senate hearing on Tuesday.
Over half of the hotels in the country are owned by GAESA’s subsidiary, Gaviota, and nearly all are managed by foreign hospitality groups. Until this week, Spain’s Meliá and Iberostar were the dominant foreign players on the island, managing a portfolio of 52 properties that included an all-inclusive golf resort off Cuba’s iconic Varadero beach and four luxury hotels in Havana.
The fresh sanctions are hitting Cuba’s once-powerful tourism sector at a moment when it is already in dire straits. Foreign visitors have been spooked by the country’s economic woes and energy shortages, which have made rolling blackouts a routine occurrence on the island, and turned to other destinations.
As a result, Cuban tourism authorities reported a dramatic drop in annual tourist visits, from 4.7 million in 2018 to just 1.9 million last year. According to the Cuban government’s Office of National Statistics and Information, those numbers have continued to decline, with only 30,551 tourist arrivals recorded in April 2026.