President Donald Trump said on Friday that U.S. warships returning from the Middle East could make a stopover in Cuba on their way home from the Iran war, reviving his suggestion of an interventionist approach toward the neighboring island.

Trump first floated the idea earlier this year but had not raised it in recent months. He brought it back in response to a shouted question from the crowd at a rally for candidates in South Florida, where he was campaigning just days ahead of midterm elections. South Florida is home to one of the largest Cuban diaspora communities in the United States, and U.S. policy toward Havana has long resonated with voters there. The appearance comes as voters have expressed concern about the impact the U.S. war on Iran has had on prices of goods from gas to groceries.

“We’ll do a little stopover,” Trump said. “Actually, what we’re going to do with Cuba is, we’re going to come back from Iran. Those beautiful ships will pass Cuba. We’ll have one of them stop about 50 yards off the coast. They’ll raise up their hands. And then we’re going to send (Secretary of State) Marco Rubio in to finish up the deal.”

Both Trump and Rubio have been bullish on action against Cuba. Trump previously suggested the country would “be next” in terms of U.S. intervention abroad, following the winding down of the Iran war, which he has long forecast but which has not yet happened.

In May, Trump and Rubio raised the specter of U.S. military intervention in Cuba, a renewed threat that took on greater weight after the administration announced criminal charges against the island’s former leader, Raúl Castro. Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump said previous U.S. presidents had considered intervening in Cuba for decades, but that “it looks I’ll be the one that does it.” U.S. administrations have grappled with Havana since the early 1960s, when Washington severed diplomatic ties and imposed the economic embargo that remains in place today, with the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961 and the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 standing as defining episodes of that standoff. President Barack Obama restored diplomatic relations in 2015, though subsequent administrations scaled back parts of that opening.

Rubio told reporters separately that Cuba has been a national security threat for years because of its ties to U.S. adversaries, and that Trump is intent on addressing it. While saying the Trump administration wants to resolve differences with Cuba peacefully, Rubio voiced doubts that the United States could reach a diplomatic resolution with the island’s current government.

Moments after Trump spoke at the rally, Rubio posted on social media that “now is the time” for action on Cuba. Addressing his post “to those who seek to create positive change,” he urged them “to seize this opportunity to create the change you desire through a discrete partnership with the CIA.”

Rubio has not addressed Cuba in depth in public for several weeks. His most recent extensive comments came in a Sept. 29 interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity.

“The truth is Cuba has already fallen. It doesn’t have a functional economy and it’s governed by people who continue to preach about some revolution that has been dead for 20 years that’s never worked,” Rubio said in that interview, without alluding to any CIA operation.

“We are hopeful that Cuba will choose a different path. We are hopeful … that there will be some people in there that open their eyes to the reality of what they’re facing,” he said. “We’re never going to allow Cuba to become a base of operation against American interests or pose a threat to our national security. On that we are abundantly clear.”

Rubio and other top Trump aides have met with Cuban officials in recent months to explore possible improvements in relations. The U.S. side, however, has come away unimpressed from those talks, a dynamic that has led to additional sanctions imposed on the Cuban government.

During his address to the United Nations General Assembly last month, Trump said Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants who has long taken a hard line against Cuba’s socialist leadership, was “deep into negotiations with Cuba,” adding that Rubio would “not allow a haven for foreign adversaries to threaten America on our own doorstep.”

Days later, Trump told reporters he anticipated the two countries “will make a deal,” adding, “I don’t think we’ll need the military. Cuba is failing very badly.” Taken together, the administration’s public posture has combined diplomatic outreach, additional sanctions and open discussion of military options toward Havana.

Earlier this week, the two countries clashed at the United Nations as the Trump administration once again sought to build opposition to an upcoming annual vote condemning Washington’s decades-long economic embargo against Havana. The General Assembly has approved that resolution by overwhelming margins every year since it first voted on the measure in 1992.

Cuba has struggled since 2020 with an economic and energy crisis. Its gross domestic product has shrunk, and its 10 million residents have endured blackouts, food shortages and inflation. Waves of protests have swept the country, and hundreds of thousands of Cubans have migrated, many of them to the United States.

This story originally appeared on Fortune.