#SCOTUS on Thursday sided with #Trump admin backed lawsuits brought by the #HavanaDocksCorporation, a US-owned port business, whose dock front property was seized in 1960 when #FidelCastro came to power in #Cuba & #nationalized #PrivateProperty, possibly opening the door for similar claims from #US companies & individuals.
#law #geopolitics
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/21/us/politics/supreme-court-cuba-cruises-oil.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share
The 8-to-1 ruling in favor of the #HavanaDocksCorporation landed as #Trump is ratcheting up pressure on #Cuba, which has experienced a #HumanitarianCrisis after the #US blocked #oil shipments to the island from Venezuela & Mexico.
The #Trump admin backed the US-owned entity, which sued major cruise lines that were using the confiscated docks. The admin told #SCOTUS such lawsuits…, authorized by #Congress in the 1990s, were an important #ForeignPolicy tool for discouraging investment in Cuba.
Justice #ClarenceThomas, writing for the majority, said those who use property “tainted by a past confiscation” are liable to “any United States national who owns a claim to that property.” Havana Docks, he wrote, only had to show that the cruise lines had used seized property to which the company owned a claim.
Justice #ElenaKagan dissented, saying the docks had belonged to the Cuban government all along & that the company’s interest in the property expired before the cruise lines ever used it.
@Nonilex This ruling is only enforceable if all parties, including the judges, traveled from the 18th century.
@BLTpizza such a requirement is not present in the statute...
@volkris The old colonizer loophole. Just act like you aren't a colonizer and think everyone else will go along with your brutality
What loophole? This is how the law is written and passed by the folks we elect and reelect. This is intentional, not some little detail discovered, some little crack in the system.
If you want to say colonizers write the laws, well ok then, but we need to be emphatic that these are the laws maintained by the folks we keep electing. If we want better laws we need to stop reelecting the same jerks that sanction what we have.
