Commentary

For crying out loud: Code Pink’s Cuba Circus is peak left-wing hypocrisy.

Posted on by Kelly McCarthy

In March 2026, the so-called peace activists of Code Pink jet-setted to Havana as part of their self-congratulatory “Nuestra América Convoy,” supposedly to deliver humanitarian aid and rail against U.S. sanctions. What they actually delivered was a grotesque spectacle of elitist tourism, performative poverty porn, and unhinged ideological cosplay—while ordinary Cubans endured yet another round of nationwide blackouts, food shortages, and grinding misery under the very communist regime these trust-fund radicals came to lionize.

The Billionaire-Funded Trust-Fund Babies and Their Virtue-Signaling Farce

Code Pink’s delegation wasn’t some scrappy band of grassroots do-gooders. It was bankrolled by the kind of wealth these people pretend to despise. Co-founder Jodie Evans is married to billionaire Neville Roy Singham, whose deep pockets have funneled millions into the group and aligned causes. Medea Benjamin, the other key figure, draws from her own family fortune tied to the Benjamin Fund. Throw in the likes of streamer Hasan Piker and Ilhan Omar’s daughter Isra Hirsi—whose congresswoman mother gushed with pride over the trip—and you have a parade of pampered radicals playing revolutionary tourist. These aren’t workers rising up; they’re champagne socialists whose “solidarity” begins and ends with Instagram posts from air-conditioned luxury buses.

The Omar Connection: Dynastic Radicalism on Display

Hirsi’s presence tied the junket straight to one of America’s most prominent Squad members. Ilhan Omar couldn’t resist publicly celebrating her daughter’s adventure in “solidarity” with a dictatorship that jails dissidents and starves its people. It was a perfect family-values moment for the radical left: mom cheers from the U.S. Capitol while daughter hobnobs with regime officials in Havana, all while pretending this somehow advances human rights.

Tossing Food to Starving Children to Make Them Dance

The low point—though with this crowd, the bar is subterranean—came when delegation members, including Piker, were caught on video tossing cookies, candy, and scraps of food at malnourished Cuban kids in the streets. The children scrambled and danced on command, like trained animals in a zoo, while the activists filmed for content. Cuban adults nearby were audibly disgusted, calling out the dehumanizing exploitation of their children’s hunger for social-media clout. This wasn’t aid; it was a grotesque photo op, turning desperate kids into props for Western guilt-tripping propaganda.

Their Designer Threads vs. Cuban Reality

While Cubans scrape by on average monthly incomes equivalent to $15–50 in real purchasing power—barely enough for basics amid chronic shortages—the visitors strutted in outfits that mocked the locals’ poverty. Piker alone sported $1,383 Cartier sunglasses and a $690 designer shirt, enough to feed a Cuban family for months or even years. Other delegation members flashed Versace and gold chains. These clothes weren’t just expensive; in Cuban terms, they represented an obscene fortune that no ordinary islander could dream of touching. Yet the activists preened in them, oblivious or indifferent to the contrast.

“As Island People, They Like to Live This Way”

The condescension hit peak absurdity when Piker and company romanticized the misery. He praised the Cubans’ supposed “island mindset”—partying and chilling in the streets despite no electricity, no food, and no future. As if blackouts and empty shelves are some charming cultural quirk rather than the predictable result of seven decades of socialist failure. This is the left’s favorite trick: turning enforced poverty into “resilience” and “authenticity” while they themselves retreat nightly to powered hotels. Island people don’t “like” living without lights or medicine; they endure it because the regime these activists defend won’t let them do otherwise.

Burning Scarce Energy to Indulge Their Delusions

The hypocrisy burned brightest—literally—when it came to electricity. Cuba was reeling from multiple island-wide blackouts, with hospitals, schools, and homes plunged into darkness for hours or days. Yet Code Pink’s crew checked into five-star hotels like the Gran Hotel Bristol Meliá Collection, complete with backup generators humming away. Their events, concerts, and streaming sessions guzzled power that could have kept critical infrastructure running. A furious local even confronted them at the hotel, pointing out the obscene disparity. While Cubans dug through garbage or sat in the dark, these visitors partied under bright lights, proving once again that their “solidarity” requires first-class amenities the regime denies its own citizens.

Patronizing Aid That Would Be Better Replaced by a Free Economy

They arrived laden with medical supplies and generators, patting themselves on the back for “breaking the blockade.” How noble—handing out Band-Aids and solar panels while defending the system that makes such handouts necessary in the first place.

This patronizing charity is the left’s favorite crutch: dole out scraps, virtue-signal endlessly, and never once admit that Cuba’s real curse isn’t U.S. policy but its own suffocating, centralized economy. If Code Pink truly cared about Cubans, they would demand the end of the dictatorship, not prop it up with aid drops and luxury junkets. A free economy—open markets, property rights, and individual liberty—would do more for the island in a year than a century of these smug convoys. Until then, their trips remain what they always were: expensive vacations for radicals too ideologically bankrupt to face the truth. Cuba doesn’t need more performative tourists. It needs freedom.

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