The United States on Thursday sanctioned Union Cuba-Petroleo, Cuba’s state-owned oil and gas company, escalating the Trump administration’s pressure campaign against Havana under an executive order issued last month.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the designation of the company, known as CUPET, under Executive Order 14404 of May 1, 2026, for operating in the energy sector of the Cuban economy. Rubio said key CUPET assets were unlawfully expropriated from American owners years ago.

In a statement, Rubio accused Cuba’s Communist government of wielding energy as “a tool of both repression and self-serving regime kleptocracy.” He said the country’s leaders have resold scarce fuel on the secondary market, rationed energy as an instrument of social control while ordinary Cubans endure prolonged fuel shortages and blackouts, and hoarded supplies for the military, intelligence, and security services.

CUPET, which owns refineries and fuel storage facilities, has come under the control of GAESA, the Cuban military conglomerate that operates the country’s gas stations and controls much of the island’s economy, the Miami Herald reported. 

The designation lands two days after Vanguard Energy, a Coral Gables-based company, announced a deal with the Cuban government to store fuel on the island for sale to the private sector using storage tanks owned by CUPET, the Herald said. Vanguard had believed it did not need a specific license because the Commerce Department had issued guidance authorizing fuel sales to the private sector, but the administration said after the Herald reported on the deal that the company needs authorization to contract with Cuban state entities sanctioned under the May executive order.

The sanctions could deepen Cuba’s acute energy crisis, the newspaper said. The island lost free Venezuelan oil shipments after Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro was captured by U.S. forces, and a separate executive order has threatened tariffs on Cuba’s other oil suppliers.

Cuban leader Miguel Díaz-Canel said the country has received only one oil tanker from Russia in five months and called the cutoff an act of “genocide,” the newspaper reported, while blackouts now stretch beyond a day, including in Havana, and fuel shortages have disrupted water distribution and public transportation.

On Monday, U.N. human rights chief Volker Türk issued a statement warning that U.S. sanctions are now directly harming vulnerable Cubans, including by limiting healthcare services for children. According to the statement, infant mortality has doubled to 9.9 per 1,000 births, childhood cancer survival rates have fallen from 85 to 65 percent, and critical medicines are available at only around 30 percent of normal supply levels.