{"id":30870,"date":"2026-05-28T07:52:50","date_gmt":"2026-05-28T07:52:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/30870\/"},"modified":"2026-05-28T07:52:50","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T07:52:50","slug":"another-250-years-of-unbreakable-us-spain-friendship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/30870\/","title":{"rendered":"Another 250 years of unbreakable US-Spain friendship"},"content":{"rendered":"

\tFrom Cuba to the embassy: the profile of Benjam\u00edn Le\u00f3n Jr.<\/a><\/p>\n

\tThe disagreement with Pedro S\u00e1nchez and the NATO commitment<\/a><\/p>\n

\tGeopolitical key issues: Cuba, Venezuela and the \u2018Zapatero case\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cIf the Spanish Prime Minister hasn\u2019t even received me, I very much doubt he\u2019ll want to invite President Donald Trump.\u201d With this simple deduction, US Ambassador Benjamin Le\u00f3n Jr. concluded the breakfast organised for him by the New Economy Forum, attended by over a hundred business leaders, journalists and some Spanish politicians.<\/p>\n

Introduced by Josu Jon Imaz, current CEO of Repsol and former president of the PNV, the highest-ranking representative of the US administration in Spain demonstrated that, at 82 years of age, his diplomatic skills remain fully intact.<\/p>\n

Without treading on the exclusive territory of either his superiors Donald Trump or the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, the ambassador did not shy away from any question, taking great care to distinguish, in the controversies and disputes between Spain and the United States, the \u201cdifference between governments that come and go and peoples that remain\u201d.<\/p>\n

Recalling the 250 years of existence that the United States will celebrate this very year, 2026, and to whose independence the Spanish Monarchy contributed so much at the time, Benjamin Le\u00f3n Jr. noted that \u201cin these great relations, the best is yet to come in the next 250 years, in which joint cooperation and innovation will continue to be the norm\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"Josu
\nJosu Jon Imaz, current CEO of Repsol and former president of the PNV – PHOTO\/Pedro Gonz\u00e1lez<\/p>\n

From Cuba to the embassy: the profile of Benjam\u00edn Le\u00f3n Jr.<\/p>\n

The ambassador, of Canarian descent, like his wife, was born in Cuba, which he left at the age of sixteen, \u201cfollowing the Castro regime\u2019s betrayal of the Revolution, for which it had relied so heavily on the support of the people that it entered Havana without firing a single shot\u201d. With barely five dollars in his pocket, he began a new life in Florida, in a country that gave him every opportunity, both to pursue his projects and life ambitions, and to be called upon to serve as its ambassador to Spain.<\/p>\n

A post which, after thinking it over for five days, he accepted and \u201cof which I feel proud, full of satisfaction and ready to lay the foundations so that the United States and Spain remain united and firmly established on the shores of freedom for another 250 years\u201d.<\/p>\n

The ambassador set out four priorities for his term of office:<\/p>\n

\tStrengthening collective security.
\n\tBuilding a fairer economic relationship.
\n\tWarning of the real risks posed by China.
\n\tDeepening mutual cooperation with regard to Latin America.<\/p>\n

To achieve all this, \u201cthe future,\u201d he said, \u201cdemands leadership, vision and action, because that is how great alliances are strengthened\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"El
\nAmbassador Benjamin Le\u00f3n Jr. outlines the key aspects of the Trump administration – PHOTO\/Pedro Gonz\u00e1lez<\/p>\n

The disagreement with Pedro S\u00e1nchez and the NATO commitment<\/p>\n

In case anyone harbours any doubts as to why President Donald Trump has Pedro S\u00e1nchez in his sights, the ambassador referred to the commitment made at the Hague summit in 2025 \u201cby all NATO member states, including Spain, to increase their defence budgets to 5% of their respective GDPs. The Spanish Prime Minister also made this commitment and signed it, only to then proclaim that he will not fulfil what he promised to fulfil.\u201d<\/p>\n

In this instance too, Benjam\u00edn Le\u00f3n reiterated that, whenever President Donald Trump recalls this episode and this serious point of contention, he is also careful to conclude with a final remark: that the best thing about Spain is the Spanish people, thereby drawing a clear distinction between the government and the Spanish people.<\/p>\n

With regard to many of the other burning issues in current geopolitics, the US ambassador delved into some; he highlighted and recalled obvious aspects in others, and referred the most sensitive ones to whatever Trump and Rubio decide, associating them on practically every occasion he mentioned them.<\/p>\n

Geopolitical key issues: Cuba, Venezuela and the \u2018Zapatero case\u2019<\/p>\n

Scepticism regarding aid to Cuba<\/p>\n

Regarding his native Cuba, after highlighting the deplorable situation of poverty, hunger, lack of resources and even the risk of the spread of unknown diseases on the island, the ambassador stressed that his administration has set aside one hundred million dollars in humanitarian aid for Cuba, but that it will only be delivered if such aid is distributed by the Catholic Church.<\/p>\n

This mistrust stems from the bad experience of seeing how 80% of the humanitarian aid sent by Europe to Cuba has ended up in the pockets of GAESA, the Castro regime\u2019s state-owned company, which owns virtually the entire island\u2019s economy and whose assets abroad are estimated at around 20 billion dollars.<\/p>\n

The accusation against Ra\u00fal Castro of having shot down light aircraft and murdered members of the organisation Brothers to the Rescue is based on a video in which Castro himself orders the shooting down and murder. A single aircraft was not shot down at that time.<\/p>\n

\"El
\nAmbassador Benjamin Le\u00f3n Jr. outlines the key aspects of the Trump administration – PHOTO\/Pedro Gonz\u00e1lez<\/p>\n

It was piloted by the founder of Hermanos al Rescate himself, a personal friend of Benjamin Le\u00f3n Jr. That aircraft, for which the current ambassador paid $100,000\u2014which was used to help alleviate hunger in Haiti\u2014has been fully repaired and restored to its original condition, with the same colours it displayed during that failed rescue mission. \u201cI am keeping it to return in it to my country of birth when this regime, which betrays the Revolution it so loudly proclaims, disappears,\u201d revealed the diplomat.<\/p>\n

The three phases for Venezuela<\/p>\n

Regarding Venezuela, he stated that he has not the slightest doubt that the opposition leader, Mar\u00eda Corina Machado, will return to the country and stand in democratic elections. However, he qualified this by saying that Trump and Rubio\u2019s programme for Venezuela consists of three phases, \u201cand we are only in the first, which, due to the war in Iran, is taking longer than anticipated\u201d.<\/p>\n

Caution regarding Rodr\u00edguez Zapatero<\/p>\n

And, finally, the name that dominates the headlines in Spain and some other countries could not be left out: Rodr\u00edguez Zapatero. The ambassador\u2019s body language suggested he had a very firm opinion regarding the man so often praised as a moral beacon of socialism. Nevertheless, with great diplomatic caution, he limited himself to explaining that \u201cthe Zapatero matter is under investigation in the United States and in Spain, so I cannot make any comment\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From Cuba to the embassy: the profile of Benjam\u00edn Le\u00f3n Jr. The disagreement with Pedro S\u00e1nchez and the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30871,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4108,3645,3886,6807,3648,6805,24,6806,17,26,564],"class_list":["post-30870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-cuba","tag-espana","tag-estados-unidos","tag-etats-unis","tag-l","tag-politica","tag-politics","tag-politique","tag-spain","tag-united-states","tag-venezuela"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30870"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30870\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30871"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}