First Draft: Is Trump About to Attack Cuba?

Stirring echoes of Iraq and WMDs, the admin planted a media story about Cuban drones aimed at Florida. In DC, Christian nationalists flocked to the Mall. And breaking news about the Gaza aid flotilla.

🚨 Breaking: Israel is illegally intercepting the Gaza aid flotilla in international waters near Cyprus. The last report we got from Zeteo contributor Alex Colston, who is on the flotilla, was that an Israeli speedboat was approaching the boat he was sailing on. He reported earlier that the crew on the boats that have already been intercepted are being taken to an Israeli ship, similar to the one on which the abducted participants were held when the fleet was last intercepted.

Good morning! Martin here, with your first ‘First Draft’ of the week, having somehow resisted the temptation on Sunday to catch the D6X down 16th Street and take in the Trump administration’s massive Christian Nationalist prayer rally on the National Mall, and yet ended up watching it anyway, all the while picking up a growing whirring sound as the Founders rolled in their graves…

In today’s ‘First Draft,’ a leading news outlet carries water for the administration as it plans yet another war, Donald Trump apparently does “do God,” a drone strike causes a fire near a UAE nuclear power plant, and the president’s polling somehow finds new depths to plumb…

Cuba ‘Threat’ Is Not Axios-matic

A sign displays a prohibition on drone cameras near a public beach at Naval Station Guantánamo Bay on June 25, 2023, at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Photo by Elise Swain/Getty Images

On Sunday, Axios published what seemed a startling exclusive.

Under the headline “U.S. eyes attack drone threat from Cuba”, the piece read: “Cuba has acquired more than 300 military drones and recently began discussing plans to use them to attack the U.S. base at Guantánamo Bay, U.S. military vessels and possibly Key West, Florida, 90 miles north of Havana, according to classified intelligence shared with Axios.”

Noting that said shared intelligence “could become a pretext for U.S. military action,” the piece said the Trump administration sees Cuba as a threat due to factors including “the presence of Iranian military advisers in Havana.”

An unnamed “senior U.S. official” was quoted as saying: “When we think about those types of technologies being that close, and a range of bad actors from terror groups to drug cartels to Iranians to the Russians, it’s concerning. It’s a growing threat.”

It was enough to prompt Sheriff Rick Ramsey of Monroe County, covering the Florida Keys, to put out a statement, saying he was monitoring the situation.

But Sheriff Ramsey also said he had not heard from the administration, and given President Donald Trump’s frequent threats to invade Cuba, his oil embargo that has wrecked the island’s economy, the reportedly imminent U.S. indictment of 94-year-old former Cuban President Raúl Castro, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s visit to Havana just last week, there to deliver more threats, all widely reported, even the least curious reader of the Axios exclusive might’ve wondered just how serious this supposed Cuban drone threat might be, and just what motivation might lie behind its release via the press.