Biden moves to remove Cuba from terror list in prisoner deal
Event date: January 14, 2025. The White House says Cuba will be removed from the US list of state sponsors of terrorism in exchange for the gradual release of 553 prisoners, a late-term shift in policy that could reshape the next phase of Washington’s relations with Havana.
President Joe Biden announced the move in one of his final acts in office, according to the supplied BBC report. It reverses a designation imposed under Donald Trump and comes days before Trump returns to the White House. The timing matters because the change may exist in a narrow window: it is being made by one administration and could be quickly revisited by the next.
The arrangement was brokered with help from the Catholic Church, the BBC report said. Cuba said it would gradually release 553 prisoners, while the White House described the people involved as prisoners who had been detained unjustly. Havana did not immediately provide a public list of names, so families are left waiting for confirmation.
The decision reaches beyond symbolism. Biden also plans to reverse Trump-era financial restrictions on some Cubans and suspend the ability of individuals to pursue claims over confiscated property in Cuba, according to the same report. Those steps suggest a broader attempt to loosen the most punishing pieces of the previous administration’s Cuba policy.
Cuba’s foreign ministry argued that the deal ends specific coercive measures that have hurt the country’s economy. That is Havana’s version of the case, but the practical effect is easier to see than the rhetoric around it. The state sponsors list has long made banking, investment and trade more difficult, and a removal would be an important signal even if the political relationship stays tense.
The human side of the story is the prisoner release. The BBC report noted that relatives of people jailed after anti-government protests in 2021 were hoping their loved ones would be among those freed. For those families, the announcement is less about diplomacy than about whether a long prison sentence is about to become a release date.
The political side is just as sharp. Trump put Cuba back on the list during his first presidency and his choice for national security adviser, Mike Waltz, has already indicated that the next administration could reverse Biden’s step. That makes the announcement a test of whether an outgoing president can leave behind any durable foreign-policy change on the way out of office.
For Cuba, the deal could ease pressure and open a small channel for dialogue. For Washington, it is a late move that tries to trade a punitive label for a humanitarian concession. Whether it survives beyond the transition will depend on how the new administration reads both the politics and the leverage.
