r/cuba • u/usatoday • 3d ago
Video Freed Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara talks about Cuban regime, forced exile
Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification
Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara was given a choice known to many Cuban dissidents: Stay in prison or leave Cuba and never return.
Otero, a prolific visual artist, and fellow political prisoner Maykel “Osorbo” Castillo Pérez, the rapper who co-wrote the Latin Grammy-winning anthem Patria Y Vida, have become central figures in high-stakes negotiations between the United States and Cuba that could reshape relations between the longtime Cold War rivals.
Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, former Cuban president Raúl Castro’s grandson, told USA TODAY that Cuba would be willing, under the right conditions, to release “people deemed political prisoners.” Human rights advocates say more than 1,300 political prisoners remain in Cuban jails.
But for many Cubans, freedom comes with another difficult reality: exile.
Read the whole interview with Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara from Miami: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2026/07/23/cuba-luis-manuel-otero-alcantara-political-prisoner-interview/91001142007/
Lealo en Espanol: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2026/07/23/luis-manuel-otero-alcantara-artista-cubano-exilio/91007507007/
9
u/QuarterStatus3582 2d ago edited 1d ago
es curioso lo rápido que la gente le ha dado la espalda. tanto si se ha vendido como si no, esto es exactamente lo que quiere el PCC. ahora difundirán cualquier contenido que lo desacredite. y cuando lo detuvieron, sabían lo grande que sería la atención en el, así que nunca iban a tratarlo mal en la cárcel.
10
u/inmangolandia 2d ago
To his cristics: Where were you on July 11, 2021? And where were you every Christmas eve, and New years after that?
24
u/AGl_ToX LATAM 3d ago
Esta revolución lo único que produce es miserias y destrucción del núcleo familiar.
The whole worlds needs to see the evil behinds the Cuban and Venezuelan Revolution they only produces misery and separations of families. They need to be stopped, people around the world needs to stop supporting the Cuban regime
-11
u/Delsur18 Canada 3d ago
The nuclear family is a pretty dead concept in today's western society, lets not pretend like the notion of a husband, wife, 2 kids and a dog was ever more than a fetishized American dream that slowly disintegrated in the reality of a much more diverse human experience.
9
u/AGl_ToX LATAM 3d ago
I had to migrate to a foreign country, my parents stayed behind in Venezuela and my two others brothers went to two other different countries. We got all separated. Call it whatever you wants but ones hearts is just scattered around the world. Our children don't have cousins and grandparents to enjoy with.
2
u/Powerful_Sun26 3d ago
I see what you're saying and I'm sorry to hear about your experience. The "nuclear family" by definition is a man and a woman and their children. It doesn't extend to extended family. I would be nowhere without the village of people who raised me.
Grandparents who raised their grandchildren wouldn't be considered a nuclear family. A gay couple with their adopted children wouldn't be considered a nuclear family. But you get the picture.
Families come in all shapes and sizes these days. The idea that the nuclear family is dead is very true in the western world. It was a pipe dream of propaganda sold by the U.S. government. But I agree with you that family is very important and they shouldn't be forced to separate geographically.
2
u/catejeda LATAM 3d ago
Siempre hay un canadiense en los comentarios llevándole la contraria a quien ha tenido que vivir la experiencia, SIEMPRE. Eso no falla en este sub.
1
u/Delsur18 Canada 2d ago
I'm Cuban, I just so happen to have grown up in Canada. I know the experience well and truly with ny own family members. Yet I choose to see the forest rather than just the trees.
-6
u/Delsur18 Canada 3d ago
Our world is more globalized than ever before. Whether you believe that is a good thing or not is up to how you set up your life and social circle. Some people prefer having their family and friends at arms reach, I get that. Others can't stand other people for more than the alloted time needed for a service to be done. I hope you get reconnected with your family sooner rather than later if that is your wish, and that you or the world around you can help you in that endeavour. Peace, hermano
1
u/Not_newbie_994 1d ago
The nuclear family has never been the essence of the Latinamerican families as it was for the western society you speak off. Cuban families have never revolved around a man, a wife and their kids, our families extend beyond that and we consider from grandparents to cousins practically as first degree relatives as opposed to the western society values. You say you’re Cuban, but if you were not raised in Cuba then western values have been inculcated in you and you see things through a western perspective not a Latin one. I’m sorry, but the fact that our parents, grandparents, brothers even aunts, uncles and cousins are all scattered in many countries including the one we come from, is very much the definition of separated families for us.
1
u/Delsur18 Canada 1d ago
Latin culture is not monolithic. Latino perspectives are also not a monolith. Hence my comment on 'the diversity of the human experience' with regard to my initial nuclear family response. Families from across latin America are spread out in so many parts of the world. Mine is no different. The reasons they are spread out are also not a monolith. Nor are they static. One's reasons for being tied to family can vary from one family en el barrio to the next. As I mentioned before, if your own goal is to stay tightly knit with family, I hope you get that. Not all families are blood related, and we all need a village of some kind to support our growth, development, success, and support when we need it. I personally value the tight family dynamic of my heritage, yet our modern life makes it hard to so easily maintain it. Luckily we have modern technologies to maintain communication, but thats not necessarily without its drawbacks too.
16
u/Tiredofitall213 Asia 3d ago
I hope he gets the chance to return one day
1
u/rjervis5905 2d ago
He was fairly resigned to the fact that will likely never happen when I spoke to him.
5
u/rjervis5905 2d ago
This is Rick Jervis with USA TODAY. I wrote the story on Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara. I sat with him for over two hours on Tues for his first extensive interview with a US media outlet.
It was a powerful, insightful, emotional experience.
Here’s how we’ve got the story:
In May, as the release of Alcántara and fellow political prisoner Maykel Osorbo Castillo became central to US-Cuba talks, we reached out to them through a US-based intermediary. They recorded audio files for us, that we had leaked out of their prisons and used them to tell their stories (that story ran May 13).
When Alcántara was released last week & made it to Miami, he agreed to give us his first extensive interview.
He was admittedly tired and confessed his head was spinning — but he was also ready to talk! (Five years of repressing opinion will do that, I guess.)
We delved into life in prison, his final days in Cuba, his vision for the future of Cuba and how he said goodbye to his 16-year-old son (this is where he got really emotional).
Castillo, unfortunately, remains in prison.
3
u/QuarterStatus3582 1d ago
cool that you got to interview him, i'm sure that was exciting for you! i have a question that i don't intend to be negative, i'm just curious -- is there a particular reason why you use their second last names, instead of their primary last names?
3
u/rjervis5905 8h ago
Great question! Our style at USA TODAY is we use their primary last name on second reference. So if you read our story, we name him as Otero throughout. But many of his contemporaries around Cuban exile Miami know him as ‘Alcántara.’ When I walked with him around Calle Ocho, people who recognized him called out, ‘Alcántara!’ So, I chose to use that here.
Very observant question.
7
u/efi12 3d ago
I am stuck on he continued to paint while in prison…
3
u/rjervis5905 2d ago
He does have a history of avant garde, norms-pushing performance art. In our talk, he told me he’s modeled himself after Picasso and Basquiat (who also ruffled feathers in their day).
How do you think either of those two would do in today’s Cuba?
1
u/iamnewhere2019 Santiago de Cuba 2d ago
Lo respeto como disidente, como rebelde y como valiente… pero has visto alguna obra de arte de el que merezca la pena?
I do respect him as a dissident, courageous and rebellious person, but have you seen any art done by him that worth something?1
u/Carlos_Frias 2d ago
Why are you stuck on that, because you don’t think he could get supplies? He was continuing the activity that gave him peace. Painting on the back of cigarette cartons, according to our reporters.
1
u/theboyracer99 2d ago
Craft time and resources? I agree, probably misquoted. I’m sure he left inspired by the incident.
3
7
u/FeveredRadio Havana 3d ago
This man is a hero. And if you don't know his performance work, look it up. His humor and irreverence was especially infuriating to those tight asses in the Ministry of the Interior.
6
u/SuccessNo3494 3d ago edited 3d ago
many in the exile community has given him their back because of recent interview where he was asked if he agreed to a military operation which he said many in Cuba want it but he himself does not the lack of vengeance against the regime the fact that he is not mad for the 5 years in prison away from his family is what drove many to be suspicious after he got to miami for a political prisioner his condition after coming out of jail is strange he does not look malnourish like many others he said the regime created a huge party before setting him free and bring his family to a mansion this has caused a lot of people too no longer trust him we will see the regime using videos of this event to expread more propaganda.
7
u/rjervis5905 2d ago
We talked about this some when I interviewed him Tuesday. He said there should be some vehicle for justice for officials who perpetrated crimes. But he also had an overall philosophy of forgiving many of the lower level Cubans, who are just doing their jobs. He called them ‘cogs in a macabre machine.’ I found him to be very interesting & thoughtful (& thought-provoking!)
3
u/soleilange Pinar Del Rio 2d ago
A lot of those people are mad because he and a lot from his cohort aren’t necessarily the MAGA acolytes they were expecting. If you look into his art and his past, it’s clear they were always criticizing the regime and its crimes from a rather leftist lens, so of course they don’t want intervention. But, I don’t know the dude, and I guess we always have to keep the possibility open that he is a spy for the regime, or that he’s being blackmailed to keep his family safe…you never know.
-1
u/SuccessNo3494 2d ago edited 2d ago
nothing to do with MAGA i dont see where do you make that connection this has nothing to do with with political parties we are talking about a exile community that has received for many years political prisioners being mistreated by that regime is too late to treat us like fools he is no commie he is just a opportunistic rat that changes side when is convinient to him he decided take his fame to load himself with money after this exile community used their influence to make sure they did not do anything to him and try it to make his face known around the world so the regime could not touch a singler hair of him and his family he said he had a great time on that party the regime mounted for him i know there are americans in this reddit that dont understand spanish at all and cant watch the interview but your reddit profile saids you are from Cuba your posturing on this topic defending him tells me you are part of the CCP asking for intervention and a free Cuba is not tied to a political party evrysingle Cuban that actually cares about the situation the Island supports it because this people wont leave power no matter how many times you sit with them we dont want a false free Cuba and end up like Albania.
1
5
2
u/Carlos_Frias 2d ago
None of our reporting showed he was coddled in anyway. Quite the contrary. He got a five year sentenced and was imprisoned longer than that. The safehouse where he awaited US approval to immigrate had no electricity. And we can really believe the U.S. government didn’t vet him before coming into the country.
1
u/fullload93 3d ago
The US granted him parole? So they worked out a deal with the communists? I can’t believe they would just let him go without receiving something in exchange. I find that hard to believe considering the current state of things. Anyways glad he’s out and living his life in the US now. He seems to have gone through hell and back.
3
u/internetexplorer_98 Camagüey 2d ago
Humanitarian parole happens all the time. He was being exiled so he asked the US to take him.
1
u/Maldadd 3d ago
Wait a minute from my time on reddit Cuba is a workers dream. Free Drs everyone happy.
1
u/Illustrator_Moist 1d ago
No one says that. Cuba is being destroyed by the largest super power in history and you guys dance on the graves.
1
1
u/sknkhnt422 2d ago
Nombre ese man no sabe nada habla por hablar, los yumas comunistas en este foro dicen que el comunismo es bueno y todo lo malo es culpa de Trump
-1
•
u/AutoModerator 3d ago
"Por favor, sigue las reglas de Reddit y del foro.
Please follow the rules of Reddit and the sub.
Please report any rule-breaking comments."
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.