Trading with the Enemy Act (TWEA)

The Trading with the Enemy Act (TWEA) is a US wartime statute whose only live use today is the Cuba embargo. The statute dates from October 6, 1917, six months after the United States entered the war, and now sits at 50 U.S.C. (United States Code) 4301 et seq. For decades it underpinned everything: exchange controls, asset freezes, peacetime embargoes. In 1977 Congress confined its powers to declared war and handed the rest to IEEPA (International Emergency Economic Powers Act), while letting existing programs survive provided the president renews them every year. North Korea came off it in June 2008. Cuba remains: the Cuban Assets Control Regulations (CACR), 31 CFR (Code of Federal Regulations) part 515, adopted on July 8, 1963, still rest on this statute, and the latest presidential determination, dated August 20, 2026, extends them to September 14, 2027. The Helms-Burton Act of 1996 codified the embargo, so a president can no longer lift it alone. The interplay with IEEPA matters in practice: same agency, OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control), same blocking logic, but a Cuba-specific licensing regime, separate penalty caps, and a statute of limitations raised to ten years for both laws in 2024. For insurance, the CACR reach any "person subject to the jurisdiction of the United States," including foreign subsidiaries they own or control, and the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 shut the licenses that had let those subsidiaries trade with Cuba. A global program covering a hotel in Havana, a cruise ship or cargo bound for Mariel has to be read line by line. Title III of Helms-Burton, activated on May 2, 2019, adds civil suits against anyone "trafficking" in confiscated property. The European Union answered in 1996 with its blocking statute, which can leave a European insurer caught between two opposite obligations.