A top Justice Department prosecutor has launched an inquiry into Cuban government officials that could result in indictments against the Communist regime’s leaders, according to multiple reports.
The “working group” assembled by US Attorney for the Southern District of Florida Jason Reding Quiñones, includes federal prosecutors and officials with the Treasury Department, State Department, Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and other agencies, multiple outlets reported on Friday.
Quiñones’ aim is to build criminal cases against people inside the Cuban government, which could allow the Trump administration to forcibly remove some of the island’s top leaders in a manner similar to the operation that deposed Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro in January.
It’s unclear which Cuban leaders or people linked to the regime Quiñones’ office is targeting.
“Federal prosecutors from across the country work every day to pursue justice, which includes efforts to combat transnational crime,” the DOJ said in a statement, according to the Associated Press.
The US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
The move comes as President Trump has suggested Cuba’s Communist dictatorship is in its death throes.
“Cuba is gonna fall pretty soon, by the way, unrelated, but Cuba is gonna fall too,” Trump told CNN host Dana Bash in a phone interview.
“They want to make a deal so badly. They want to make a deal, and so I’m going to put [Secretary of State] Marco [Rubio] over there and we’ll see how that works out. We’re really focused on this one [Iran] right now. We’ve got plenty of time, but Cuba’s ready — after 50 years,” the president added. “I’ve been watching it for 50 years, and it’s fallen right into my lap — because of me, it’s fallen — but it’s nevertheless fallen right into the lap. And we’re doing very well.”
Meanwhile, Cuban-American lawmakers have pushed Trump to seek an indictment against Raul Castro – the 94-year-old Cuban general, ex-president and brother of dead dictator Fidel Castro.
Florida GOP Reps. María Elvira Salazar, Mario Díaz-Balart and Carlos Giménez, alongside Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY), wrote to Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi last month to outline Raul Castro’s alleged role in the deadly 1996 shootdown of two planes belonging to the humanitarian group, Brothers to the Rescue.
“We respectfully request the Department of Justice consider indicting Raul Castro who is responsible for the cold-blooded murders of three Americans and a U.S. permanent resident in the 1996 Brothers to the Rescue shootdown of two civilian aircraft by Cuban Mig fighter jets, and consider whether Interpol ‘red notices’ should be issued against him,” the lawmakers wrote.
“It is our understanding, based on public information, that on February 24, 1996, Raul Castro ordered a Cuban Mig fighter jet to engage and obliterate two Brothers to the Rescue civilian aircraft over international waters,” they added.
Castro turned the presidency of Cuba over to Miguel Díaz-Canel in 2021, but he and his family are believed to still wield immense power on the island.
Salazar was encouraged by the reports of the new DOJ working group.
“Promising news that [DOJ] is gathering evidence to potentially indict Cuban Communist officials,” the congresswoman wrote on X. “The message to Havana is clear: the era of impunity is ending.”
Salazar warned that “the regime’s crimes do not stop at the island.”
“Its networks reach our shores and are enabled by businesses operating here in South Florida. That is why the Southern District of Florida is exactly where these charges belong. The men who have brutalized the Cuban people for decades must finally face justice,” she asserted.
