Nothing shows a people more than culture. In it are recognized and expressed the values, principles, and human dignity of those who inhabit it.
In Cuba, and any other country, sports are a showcase of that heritage of customs, traditions, feelings, and also art. We vibrate with a home run of the baseball players, with a jab of the boxers, with the jumps of the athletes, the spikes of the volleyball players, or the lifts of the weightlifters. We are moved by their presence, with their modesty and combativeness, on the highest competitive stages.
When those heroes are cheered for their efforts in the arena by those who live in their homeland or any other latitude, then an ecumenical altar is raised, because the heart beats for their flag and their shield, no matter where they want to leave their Cuban chest.
It is, in other words, a symbol of identity, of Homeland, and, as it is not isolated, it goes through the same difficulties that today suffocate a society that only aspires to the welfare of its people; a yearning that seeks to do good, without looking at whom.
That is why it is attacked by the same enemy that opposes the model of country that Cubans have chosen to live and develop. U.S. imperialism's attacks on the sports movement on the island are nothing new. Since it emerged in the world with its Revolution, it has not ceased to harass it.
That opponent, now with a visceral radicalization of its policy, has identified in its war of symbols that communion of emotions that sprouts in any geography where a Cuban breathes.
In its cultural war, so much beauty is frightening, so much love is feared, as is the fact that those who decided to settle in other lands help their compatriots with supplies for sports practice.
That is the reason why Donald Trump and Marco Rubio bristle. They could not bear to see a Cuban American, as happened in the last World Baseball Classic, support his country's team, the "Vamos Cuba", regardless of the eccentric haters who play along with their "coaches".
They are dressed with technical-tactical elements, not those used in sports, to win with fair play through peaceful emulation, but with those created in the culture war laboratories. They are the ones that bear the stamp of Frank Luntz, Republican Party advisor and pioneer of political framing: "It doesn't matter what you say, it matters what people listen to."
In that confrontation, sport is a prioritized objective because it brings out our patriotism and unites us, even above ideologies or creeds. Reason enough for the inhuman algorithms to fall like missiles on Cuban athletes, testing words that provoke fear, insecurity, fight, disgust, or rejection.
They also seek to viralize those emotions and contradictions to package their fake news, which demonize not only sports, but everything that smells of Cuba or the Cuban Revolution.
According to a study by Science magazine, fake news spreads 70% faster than real news and reaches more people because lies appeal to fear, indignation, and surprise.
Steve Bannon, the designer of the Trumpist strategy, puts it this way: flood the public space with toxic content so that the truth has no place.
That is why when one reads in the discourse of the networks that there is no democracy in Cuba, that human rights are violated, that the government is incapable of getting ahead, that doctors are victims of human trafficking and that athletes have no freedom or are subject to what a government decision says or dictates, the matrix is installed not because it is true, but because it is repeatable and generates a reaction.
Then, in the name of human rights and freedom, those who have trampled it the most in the whole planet, throw themselves on their bellies to prevent Cuban athletes from attending international competitions.
The country that abrogates the right to say who competes or not in its territory, in addition to committing a low and cowardly act of discrimination, violates all the precepts that the sports universe has raised, even from a binding platform such as the Olympic Charter.
This is the statutory document that establishes the fundamental principles of Olympism; it is its organizational code; it regulates the policies and processes of the Olympic Movement; it regulates all the integral elements for the planning and execution of the Olympic Games; and, consequently, it is also binding for the rights, obligations, prerogatives and integration requirements of the international sports federations, the National Olympic Committees, the sports judges, the athletes, the authorities and the organizations linked to the realization of the Olympic competitions.
This year, which has already covered half of its calendar, the United States has failed to fulfill its obligations as host country of competitions organized by international sports federations, by not guaranteeing participation and facilities to all teams or competitors.
It has even extraterritorialized its hostility and its discriminatory and violating measures, just as it does with its genocidal economic, commercial, and financial blockade, which for more than 60 years has sought to kill an entire people with hunger, grief, and despair.
The table tennis World Cup champion, Brazil's Hugo Calderano, cannot take part in tournaments in the United States because he has been in Cuba before, which, according to Political Bureau member and Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla, "demonstrates the ridiculous and fraudulent nature of the inclusion of our country in the arbitrary list of alleged sponsors of terrorism."
We recall the Olympic Charter, because that nation will host the next Games under the five rings and, consequently, it will host, as it has already done, several competitions, whether preparatory or qualifying, in preparation for that event.
In this normative text of the world governing body of sport it is clear, also in a binding way, that the enjoyment of the rights and freedoms established in the Olympic Charter must be guaranteed without discrimination of any kind, whether by skin color, sex, sexual orientation, language, religion, political or other opinions, national or social origin, wealth, birth or other status.
But for the United States, Donald Trump and Marco Rubio that is a dead letter, as have been the demands for the cessation of the crime against humanity in Gaza, or the international demand for the end of their criminal blockade of the island, which is the most flagrant violation of the human rights of Cubans, because it is the main obstacle to their development.
Cuba, aside from these attacks, continues to prepare for the increasingly closer 6th World Baseball Classic, in which it would have to play in the United States, from the first round to the semifinal home run; it continues in search of the best form of its athletes, to be present at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles-2028.
It will be left to the judgment of international public opinion as to the U.S. position as host.
U.S. VISA DENIALS TO CUBAN SPORTS IN 2025
Eighty-two people from eight sports have been unable to travel to the United States, Puerto Rico, or the Virgin Islands.
None of the sports visas requested in 2025 from Cuba have been accepted.
In February, the men's basketball team lost a game because they were unable to travel to Puerto Rico.
In April, the track and field team was unable to participate in the World Indoor Masters.
In May, the president of the Cuban Olympic Committee, Roberto León Richards, was unable to participate in the PanAm Sports meeting.
Also in May, María Caridad Colón, a member of the International Olympic Committee, was unable to attend a women's sports event.
In June, the women's volleyball team was denied participation in the Final Four tournament in Puerto Rico.
Also in June, the goalkeeper of the national soccer team, Rayko Arozarena, left the training camp due to concerns about immigration restrictions.
The Cayman Islands did not participate in a soccer match in Cuba due to concerns that it would jeopardize its access to the United States.
A CYNICAL DOCUMENT
WHAT DID THE U.S. EMBASSY IN HAVANA SAY WHEN IT DENIED THE VISA TO THE CUBAN VOLLEYBALL PLAYERS?
"You are not eligible for a nonimmigrant visa under section 212 (F) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, pursuant to the Presidential Proclamation 'Restricting the Entry of Foreign Nationals to Protect the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other Threats to National Security and Public Safety'."
THE REALITY
The United States and its international agencies have organized and sponsored terrorist acts against Cuba. Criminals who have attempted to take the lives of Cubans live there. Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch, perpetrators of the bombing of the Cuban airliner in Barbados, which caused the deaths of 73 people in the largest of the Antilles, died there without being tried. They, together with Guillermo Novo Sampoll, another assassin, were even protected in U.S. territory by the FBI. (Granma)