U.S. Ambassador to Cuba...or Miami?

U.S. Chargé d’Affaires to Cuba Mike Hammer held a press conference Wednesday in Weston, Florida, a Miami-area suburb. While it's unusual for an ambassador representing the United States in another country to be making press appearances on U.S. soil, this is standard practice when it comes to Cuba.

Since Trump assumed office and Rubio became Hammer's boss, the top U.S. diplomat to Cuba has spent much of his time meeting with pro-embargo activists, visiting South Florida and posting influencer-style social media videos from the island. He has encouraged Cubans to reach out to him about their “perspectives” and “ideas" — while his government imposes collective punishment on the Cuban people through economic warfare.

In one video, Hammer visited the beach resort town of Varadero, where he jokingly commented on the number of Russian tourists, but failed to mention that U.S. regulations prohibit U.S. tourism in Cuba and punish European tourists for visiting the island by stripping them of their visa waiver privileges. See Belly of the Beast journalist Yohan Rodríguez's video about Hammer's provocative social media videos here.

At the Wednesday press conference, which was held to announce U.S. hurricane aid to Cuba (see below for more) Hammer urged those present "not to pay attention to the propaganda coming out of Havana." Instead, he said, they should listen to Donald Trump and Marco Rubio.