Bittersweet Empire: Billionaire Sugar Barons and the Ghosts of Slavery

For well over a century, deep-pocketed sugar barons have accumulated billions of dollars in wealth. Meanwhile, their offshore cane cutters live in ramshackle villages, become deeply indebted seeking medical care for injuries they incur on the job, and are considered lucky if they earn more than four dollars a day. In Florida, toxic smoke rises from the cane fields and endangers the health of the local populace during annual controlled burnings, while discharges of polluted water threaten coastal communities and the survival of the Everglades.

Of the families that have profited the most from the historically brutal sugar industry, none is more prosperous or notorious than the Fanjul family. Their epic history blazes a path of environmental destruction and social upheaval, through the Cuban Revolution, exile and resettlement in sparkling Palm Beach, and the acquisition of more than four hundred thousand acres of sugarcane fields from the Everglades to the Dominican Republic. Through millions of dollars in campaign contributions and lobbying both Democrats and Republicans, their influence stretches all the way to the White House—no matter who occupies it.

Drawing on more than five years of on-the-ground reporting, Sandy Tolan juxtaposes the family’s immense fortune with the lives of the people and communities that made it possible. His reporting, alongside Dominican-Haitian journalist Euclides Cordero Nuel, helped prompt the U.S. Department of Labor to block sugar imports from the Fanjuls’ Dominican operations over findings of forced labor.
Eye-opening and meticulously reported, Bittersweet Empire shines a light on the most influential family you’ve likely never heard of, giving a critical voice to those whose stories have been silenced across generations.