Congressman Carlos Giménez will name more of Havana’s “repressors, henchmen, and front men.”
14ymedio, Madrid, 23 July 2025 — Without specifying that Jorge Javier Rodríguez Cabrera arrested on Monday by the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), was on the list with more than one hundred names of Cuban repressors in the United States that he handed over a few months ago to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Carlos Giménez said he was “very happy” about the arrest of the former Cuban official, owner of a successful company in Las Vegas, and he predicts Rodríguez Cabrera will face a prompt deportation.
“Jorge Rodríguez was conducting business illegally with the Castro regime,” the legislator told journalist Mario J. Pentón, who had previously reported the Cuban’s arrest in Martí Noticias. “We know that this man was also a friend of Castro’s family, so I don’t know why he was here,” he said, referring to Rodríguez’s friendship with Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, alias El Cangrejo [The Crab] Raúl’s grandson and bodyguard.
“We know this man was also a friend of Castro’s family, so I don’t know why he was here.”
Giménez also hopes this is the first of many similar cases—of “many people who are conducting business with Cuba illegally,” he said—for which he is asking the federal government to deport them.
Likewise, he announced this Tuesday: “We will be providing the Department of Homeland Security with additional names of repressors, henchmen, and front men of the Cuban regime who have infiltrated our country.”
According to information released by Pentón, Rodríguez was placed in expedited deportation proceedings, meaning he could be returned to Cuba within days. His ex-wife and children already have permanent residency in the US, but after a year of keeping a low profile, he reappeared with a business venture that has raised suspicions.
Of all the images on social media that demonstrate his closeness to the Castros, this was “the one that broke his back.”
The report published by Martí Noticias indicated that Rodríguez arrived in the United States in 2022 via the southern border, accompanied by his wife and minor children, and requested political asylum. However, he had worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in the diplomatic mail section, and had been photographed alongside Raúl Castro and El Cangrejo during an official visit to New York in 2015. According to Pentón, of all the images on social media that demonstrate his closeness to the Castros, this was “the one that broke his back.”
Just last November, Rodríguez founded Gran Azul LLC, a company registered in the state of Nevada dedicated to door-to-door shipping, logistics, tour packages to Cuba, and the sale of automobiles and food products. Official documents list him as the company manager, and also include the name Marcel Blanco Fernández. In a short time, Gran Azul deployed an aggressive marketing strategy and established a presence in key cities such as Miami, Orlando, Houston, and Phoenix. On its social media, the business promotes itself as a fast and reliable solution for Cubans in the diaspora seeking to help their families on the island, but behind the commercial facade lie its ties to power.
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