Caribbean leaders during the 48th regular meeting of Caribbean Community, CARICOM, in Bridgetown, Barbados, which ended on Feb. 21, 2025. From left to right, Bahamas Prime Minister Philip Davis, Grenada Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell, Dominica Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit and Guyana President Mohamed Irfaan Ali. CARICOM
The leaders of several Caribbean governments being targeted under a proposed U.S. travel ban say they have received no formal notifications from the Trump administration that their nation is among dozens of countries whose nationals could be shut out of the United States.
The Miami Herald was first to confirm that along with Cuba and Venezuela, which would be hit with an absolute ban on its nationals entering the U.S., some Caribbean countries would also be joining Haiti on the list. The following day, the New York Times named the 43 countries under consideration, and which of the three tiers each would fall under in the plan being crafted by Trump adviser Stephen Miller.
The proposal would severely restrict access to the United States, including for high-ranking government officials, and has caught many Caribbean nationals by surprise. It is creating consternation not just from a policy standpoint, but among people who have children and other relatives living in the U.S. and would be unable to travel here even if they have a valid visa.
The proposal comes amid continued push-back from Caribbean leaders over U.S. visa cancellation threats over their governments’ employment of Cuban doctors. Last month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that the State Department is taking steps to cancel the visas of anyone participating in Cuba’s medical missions, which deploy nurses and doctors to countries around the world, including in the Caribbean.
“There’s nothing we’re not afraid to answer to. We have been very transparent. We engage governments in transparency. People know us. What we say in the night, is what we say in the day; our word is our bond,” Dominica Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit said Monday during a press conference when asked about reports that his tiny nation is among the four Eastern Caribbean countries targeted for a ban. “We are prepared to engage everyone, including the United States, in this matter. So whatever concerns the United States may have, which I do not know of yet, we are prepared to respond.”
Under the proposal, Dominica, Antigua, St. Kitts and St. Lucia would be on the third tier of the proposed travel ban, and would have 60 days to address U.S. officials’ concerns in order to have access to the U.S. restored. Haiti is on the second tier; its nationals would face slightly less harsh restrictions than those on the first tier, which includes Cuba. Haitians wanting to travel would need to request a waiver to the ban.
Over the weekend, the governments of both Antigua and Barbuda, and St. Kitts and Nevis issued separate diplomatic notes to the State Department seeking confirmation about the reports and clarification.
The two nations, along with Dominica, are area among five countries in the Eastern Caribbean currently operating Citizenship By Investment Programs, which they all referred to in their respective diplomatic notes. The controversial programs allow foreign nationals to buy a second citizenship, or “golden passport,” for as little as $100,000 that gives them visa-free access to more than 100 countries around the world. Initially viewed as a means to boost countries’ economies, the programs have increasingly become an object of concern among both U.S. and European Union over the lack of transparency.
“Antigua and Barbuda does not accept applications from any country that is currently on a U.S. banned list,” the Antigua Embassy in Washington said in its note to the State Department. “All applications are rigorously vetted by recognized international agencies, including INTERPOL, to ensure that no applicants with a criminal background or current charges (including terrorism) are considered.”
The government of St. Kitts noted that since 2022 it has maintained “consistent and open dialogue with the U.S. government, particularly in relation to significant reforms within” their version of the program. Following a meeting with senior officials with the European Union, the State Department and Treasury, the twin-island government said a consultant has been drafting a new regulatory framework for the citizenship programs across the five countries in the region.
State Department officials did not respond to the Herald’s request seeking comment.
READ MORE: Trump travel ban: ‘no exceptions’ for Cubans, Venezuelans. Other islands may join Haiti on list
Sources told the Herald that countries landed on the third tier due to concerns about their background checks on individuals and lack of cooperation in taking back nationals the U.S. wants to repatriate. Travel bans on those island nations potentially could be used as bargaining chips in negotiations to accept U.S. deportees whose home countries refuse to take them back.
The proposed travel ban was the latest blow to Caribbean governments, which were already concerned about the deportations of their nationals to the region, the U.S. policy on Haiti, U.S. aid freezes and its withdrawal from the World Health Organization and Paris Climate Accord. Some government officials now face the threat of having their visas cancelled over the use of Cuban medical professionals. The U.S. has long contended that the program is tantamount to forced labor.
“Cuba continues to profit from the forced labor of its workers and the regime’s abusive and coercive labor practices are well documented,” the State Department said in its statement announcing the new visa policy. “Cuba’s labor export programs, which include the medical missions, enrich the Cuban regime, and in the case of Cuba’s overseas medical missions, deprive ordinary Cubans of the medical care they desperately need in their home country.”
On Monday, some of Skerrit’s Caribbean colleagues continued to push back on the U.S. crackdown after several leaders last week came to the Cuban medical program’s defense. Some leaders said the were ready to forgo trips to the U.S. and risk the cancellation of their U.S. visas in favor of the Cuban medical professionals, who provide everything from primary healthcare to dialysis and eye treatments.
“We are not intentionally or willingly engaged in matters that amount to forced labor,” Bahamas Prime Minister Philip Davis said on Monday while visiting a high school in Nassau. Before engaging with anyone from Cuba, the government of The Bahamas sends a team to the island to conduct interviews, he noted.
During Trump’s first presidential term, the State Department said that up to 50,000 Cuban doctors were being forced into human trafficking situations in dozens of countries, and the medical brigades had become “the regime’s number one source of income.” The exploitative practices, critics of the program charge, include preventing doctors from having access to their passports and travel documents while on missions abroad, restricting their movements and not paying them directly.
Davis acknowledged that “a portion” of the salaries of the Cuban medical professionals hired in The Bahamas is sent to an agency in Cuba.
“I don’t know the relationship between that agency and the government of Cuba, but we are now looking into it,” he said.
Since Rubio announced the visa threats, leaders throughout the Caribbean have sought to make their case with the Trump administration. Last week, Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, chairwoman of the 15-member Caribbean Community known as CARICOM, went as far as saying she was prepared to risk her U.S. visa over the program, which according to Cuba’s Foreign Ministry had 23,792 medical professionals working in 56 countries in 2023.
“Barbados does not currently have Cuban medical staff or Cuban nurses, but I will be the first to go to the line and to tell you that we could not get through the pandemic without the Cuban nurses and the Cuban doctors,” she said last week during a speech in her island’s parliament. “I will also be the first to tell you that we paid them the same thing that we pay [Barbadians], and that the notion, as was peddled not just by this government in the U.S., but the previous government, that we were involved in human trafficking by engaging with the Cuban nurses was fully repudiated and rejected by us.
“I don’t believe that we have to shout across the seas, but I am prepared, like others in this region, that if we cannot reach a sensible agreement on this matter, then if the cost of it is the loss of my visa, to the U.S., then so be it,” she said. “But what matters to us is principles.”
Asked on Monday if he were willing to take a similar stance, Davis, the Bahamian prime minister said his country, which currently has Cuban doctors involved in an optometry program, “will do whatever it takes to protect” the interest of the Bahamian people. “We will be responding comprehensively to the request asked of us and if that does not find favor, well then, so be it.”
Miami Herald
305-376-2616
Jacqueline Charles has reported on Haiti and the English-speaking Caribbean for the Miami Herald for over a decade. A Pulitzer Prize finalist for her coverage of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, she was awarded a 2018 Maria Moors Cabot Prize — the most prestigious award for coverage of the Americas.