Cuba Interferes With Florida 2022 Elections, Says US Intelligence 1

By Bert Hoover, Latin Post  

The US intelligence community revealed in a report on Monday that the Cuba government engaged in influence operations targeting specific US candidates in Florida during the 2022 midterm elections, according to the Miami Herald.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated that Cuban officials built relationships with American media members critical of Havana’s critics in Congress.

Additionally, a network of social media accounts, likely linked to Cuba, was identified as amplifying derogatory content about US politicians deemed hostile to the Cuban state.

The declassified intelligence assessment does not specify targeted individuals or the effectiveness of Cuba’s influence campaign in Florida.

The report acknowledged only a few countries with targeted campaigns against the US democratic system, including Russia, China, Iran, and Cuba.

Foreign Meddling Expands in US 2022 Midterm Elections

Declassified US Intelligence findings on Monday indicated an increase in foreign government efforts to influence the US 2022 midterm elections compared to the 2018 elections, CNN reports.

While no foreign leader ordered a comprehensive influence campaign like Russia’s in 2016, the report highlighted meddling attempts by China, Russia, Iran, and Cuba in the 2022 congressional elections.

The intelligence community, with high confidence, asserts that China implicitly sanctioned efforts to influence selected midterm races involving members of both US political parties.

This aligns with a broader set of directives issued by Chinese Communist Party leaders since 2020, aiming to intensify endeavors to shape US policy and public opinion favorably toward China.

Feature continues here: Cuban Interference

Ex-U.S. Ambassador Accused of Being Cuba’s ‘Clandestine Agent’ Since 1981 2

Manuel Rocha is charged with acting secretly on Cuba’s behalf for decades

By Devlin Barrett

The Justice Department unsealed charges Monday against a retired ambassador, accusing him of being a “clandestine agent” for decades — allegedly betraying his country by acting covertly on behalf of Cuba’s spy agency.

The arrest of 73-year-old Manuel Rocha capped an undercover sting operation that lasted more than a year, in which an FBI agent pretending to be a Cuban intelligence operative secretly recorded Rocha making incriminating statements about his life of diplomatic deception.

Attorney General Merrick Garland called the Rocha case “one of the highest-reaching and longest-lasting infiltrations of the United States government by a foreign agent,” adding that in those secretly-recorded conversations, Rocha repeatedly referred to the U.S. as “the enemy.”

Court papers filed in Miami describe a series of meetings in which Rocha discussed his secret work for Cuba, including one where he said that the “Direccion” — a reference to that country’s General Directorate of Intelligence — “asked me … to lead a normal life.”

Rocha allegedly said he followed that instruction by creating a public reputation as “a right wing person,” when he in fact was committed to the cause of communist Cuba.

At one secretly recorded meeting between Rocha and the undercover agent, the suspect allegedly described how he became a State Department employee: “I went little by little. … It was a very meticulous process. …I knew exactly how to do it and obviously the Direccion accompanied me. … They knew that I knew how to do it.”

Rocha was born in Colombia and became a U.S. citizen in 1978. He joined the State Department in 1981. The criminal complaint against him says that at least as early as that year,he “secretly supported the Republic of Cuba and its clandestine intelligence-gathering mission against the United States by serving as a covert agent of Cuba’s intelligence services.”

Rocha pushed false and misleading information within the U.S. government, authorities say, and met with Cuban intelligence operatives. In the secretly recorded conversations with the undercover FBI agent, Rocha allegedly insisted he was still committed to the revolutionary cause of communist Cuba, according to the court papers unsealed Monday. Rocha’s arrest late last week was first reported by the Associated Press.

Over the years, Rocha rose through the ranks of the State Department to serve in positions at the U.S. embassies in the Dominican Republic, Honduras, Mexico, and Argentina before ascending to more sensitive governmentposts.

From mid-1994 to mid-1995, Rocha served on the U.S. National Security Council, with a portfolio that included Cuba.

From 1999 until 2002, Rocha served as the U.S. ambassador to Bolivia.

Feature continues here: FBI arrests ex-Ambassador