Radio y Televisión Martí

Radio y Televisión Martí is an American state-run radio and television international broadcaster based in Miami, Florida, financed by the federal government of the United States through the U.S. Agency for Global Media (formerly Broadcasting Board of Governors, BBG). It transmits propaganda in Spanish to Cuba and its broadcasts can also be heard and viewed worldwide through their website and on shortwave radio frequencies.

Named after the Cuban national hero and intellectual José Martí, Radio Televisión Martí was established in 1983 and TV Martí was added in 1990. The 2014 budget for the Cuba broadcasting program was approximately US$27 million.

Radio y Televisión Martí is overseen by the Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB), and is an element of the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB).

On 14 March 2025, the second Trump administration issued an executive order dismantling the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, the parent agency of the Cuban Broadcasting Bureau, which oversees radio and television. As a result, all Radio Televisión Martí employees were placed on administrative leave with pay, and instructed not to seek to access buildings or computer systems.

On 26 March 2025, the U.S. Agency for Global Media, through its Office for Cuba Broadcasting, notified federal employees, who had been placed on leave on 15 March 2025, that they could return to work at Radio Martí in Doral, Florida.

On 26 March 2025, Radio Martí announced it was returning to the air on X (formerly Twitter), and Martí Noticias website resumed publishing.

Radio Martí

History

In the early 1980s, the U.S. Government planned to create a radio station to be known as Radio Free Cuba, modeled on Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty, the mission of fighting communism in the hope of hastening the fall of Cuban President Fidel Castro. The station – renamed ''Radio Martí'' after Cuban writer José Martí, who had fought for Cuba's independence from Spain and against U.S. influence in the Americas – was established in 1983 by President Ronald Reagan at the urging of Jorge Mas Canosa. Existing North American broadcasters objected strenuously to the establishment of Radio Martí, fearing that its broadcasts would lead Cuba to retaliate by jamming existing commercial medium-wave broadcasts from Florida.

On May 20, 1985, Radio Martí began broadcasts to Cuba from the United States. The first day of broadcasting was chosen to commemorate the 83rd anniversary of Cuba's independence from United States rule on May 20, 1902. The fears of broadcasters proved well-founded, when Cuba-based transmitters briefly broadcast powerful signals on the medium-wave band in 1985, disrupting U.S. AM radio station broadcasts in several states. Cuba continues to broadcast interference against U.S. broadcasts specifically directed to Cuba in attempts to prevent them from being received within Cuba.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991, the budget for all U.S.-government-run foreign broadcasters, with the exception of Radio Martí, was sharply reduced. In 1996, Radio Martís studios were moved from Washington, D.C. to Miami, Florida. The move, in addition to placing the station's studios closer to its target audience, also underscored its growing independence from the Voice of America, another U.S.-government-run foreign broadcaster with which Radio Martí had previously shared studios.

Today

Today, Radio Marti broadcasts a 24-hour radio program over short-wave transmitters in Greenville, North Carolina, and a medium-wave transmitter in Marathon, Florida (GC: ). Its studios are located in Miami, Florida. Cuba jams both the medium-wave and shortwave signals, but the shortwave program is heard throughout the Americas.

Two hours of Radio Martí's news programs are carried each night, 10:00 PM to midnight local time, by Miami's WSUA (Caracol 1260 AM). It is also available at various times to subscribers of SiriusXM Satellite Radio on its bilingual channel 153, ''La Politica Talk''.

Radio Martí operates with about 100 employees and a budget of $15 million. Its mission, in its own words, is to provide "a contrast to Cuban media and provide its listeners with an uncensored view of current events." Former prisoners in Cuba and Cuban exiles often speak on Radio Martí, and on Saturdays a Spanish-language version of the U.S. president's weekly radio address, as well as the opposition's response, are transmitted.

Assessments

There is much debate about the effectiveness of these broadcasts. As with Radio Free Europe during the Cold War, there is no way to judge the station's true audience through the usual listener surveys. Thus, the actual number of listeners is open to speculation. However, after the fall of the communist Soviet satellite governments of Eastern Europe in 1989 and of the Soviet Union itself at the end of 1991, a Hoover Institution conference reviewing reports from citizens in newly independent Russia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and other countries tended to substantiate the effectiveness of RFE and U.S. Voice of America broadcasts both in providing information and bolstering pro-liberal democracy movements within those countries, despite attempts at electronic jamming and counter-propaganda.

The watchdog group Cuban Americans for Engagement (CAFE) has been critical of the radio and television station for broadcasts critical of warming relations and cooperative efforts with U.S. organizations. A report by the Committee on Foreign Relations in 2010 stated that less than 2 percent of Cubans listen in. U.S. Senator Mark Pryor ( D-Arkansas) and U.S. House of Representatives member Betty McCollum introduced the Stop Wasting Taxpayer Money on Cuba Broadcasting Act to shut the stations down. The Alliance for Responsible Cuba Policy has also been critical of the stations.

TV Martí

History

In 1990, the U.S. Government created TV Martí to broadcast television programming to Cuba. It began broadcasting on March 27, 1990, beaming daily programs in Spanish via a transmitter affixed to an aerostat balloon – nicknamed "Fat Albert" by people in the area – tethered 10,000 feet (3,048 m) above Cudjoe Key, Florida. Weather affected the broadcasts; "Fat Albert" sometimes was hauled down because of high winds, once broke loose and drifted into the Everglades in 1991, and was destroyed by Hurricane Dennis in 2005. After the aerostats destruction, TV Martí in October 2006 began to use fixed-wing aircraft to transmit its signals, first a military C-130 Hercules which proved too expensive to operate, and then a Gulfstream twin engine airplane flying a figure-eight pattern off Key West, Florida. One of these aircraft has since been retired.

The first TV Martí broadcasts took place in the very early morning hours to avoid interference with Cuban domestic television programming. This combined with Cuban jamming of the signal has led to low viewership of TV Martí in Cuba, where, according to a U.S. official who was stationed in Havana

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