Overview

Deportations to Third Countries via Third-Party Agreements

Over the course of its second term, the Trump administration dramatically expanded the use of third-country deportations, transforming a narrow and rarely used practice into a standing system of global removals. Through a growing web of bilateral arrangements, the United States has been convincing foreign governments to take in people with no connection to their country, largely through financial payments or pressure.

The Trump administration has signed deportation agreements with 27 countries, with outreach planned to dozens of others, to help facilitate its mass deportations agenda. Under the agreements, countries agree—often for money, political favor, or both—to accept immigrants from the U.S. who are not citizens of those countries. The geographic sweep of participating nations is striking: nearly a dozen countries—including Costa Rica, El Salvador, Eswatini, Mexico, Panama, Rwanda, South Sudan, and Uganda—have agreed to receive U.S. deportees with no existing ties to their nations.

The earliest and most visible instance was El Salvador. In March 2025, the U.S.—invoking a wartime authority under the 18th-century Alien Enemies Act—began deporting hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador, where they were locked up in that country's notorious maximum-security CECOT prison. Under the Trump administration, nearly a dozen countries have reportedly agreed to receive deportees with no existing ties to their nations. The United States paid El Salvador about $6 million to host 238 alleged members of gangs including Tren de Aragua. El Salvador's willingness to serve as a receiving country for migrants who are not its own citizens gave the administration its clearest early precedent for the broader network it would build.

DHS published an agreement between the United States and Guatemala relating to the transfer of nationals of Central American countries to Guatemala, effected by exchange of diplomatic notes in June 2025. The agreement states that "the Parties intend to ensure the dignified, safe, and timely transfer of nationals of Central American countries to Guatemala." Later in 2025, the Trump administration entered an agreement with Ghana for third-country removals. A March 2026 agreement with Costa Rica provides for regular transfers of 25 people per week.

In terms of scale, the numbers are significant but not dominant within the overall deportation picture. As of May 5, 2026, the Trump administration had used these deals to send roughly 22,000 third-country nationals to at least 26 countries. The vast majority of removals of third-country nationals—approximately 19,000 people—have been to Mexico, since January 20, 2025. Aside from Mexico, other countries have accepted, at most, a few hundred deportees—such as El Salvador, Panama, Costa Rica, and Uzbekistan.

Significance and Impact

The strategic logic behind the agreements is straightforward: they give the administration leverage over a category of migrants that previously had few removal options. A safe third country agreement could be a significant breakthrough for the Trump administration's aggressive immigration plans, allowing it to deport migrants from different countries, including Venezuela, that limit or outright reject U.S. deportations of their citizens. Yet these third-country deportation arrangements account for a fraction of overall deportations—suggesting this policy is more about creating a climate of fear than facilitating large numbers of removals, according to the Migration Policy Institute.

A February 2026 minority report from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee offered a sharply critical assessment of the program's costs and effectiveness. The administration justifies these deals as necessary because home countries refuse to accept their nationals, but the report found that evidence contradicts these claims. In practice, critics identified expensive and ineffective operations, with the administration spending tens of millions of dollars to move a relatively small number of migrants to third countries, in some cases paying more than one million dollars per person, with little measurable impact on its deportation agenda. In some cases, the administration has sent migrants thousands of miles only for them to later be returned to their home country at additional taxpayer expense.

The program has also raised concerns about secrecy. The Central American nation of Costa Rica joins a growing number of countries across Africa and the Americas that have signed contentious, often secretive agreements with the U.S. to accept deportees from other countries. Many of the agreement texts have not been made public, limiting Congressional oversight and public scrutiny of the terms under which deportees are being transferred and held.

Reactions and Debate

The legal landscape surrounding third-country deportations has been persistently contested. There are several lawsuits challenging U.S. third-country deportation practices, with at least one court finding the policy illegal, although that ruling is paused pending appeal. On June 23, 2025, the Supreme Court suspended a lower court order that had blocked forcible removals of foreign nationals to countries not their own, due to concerns that they had been implemented without adequate human rights safeguards.

Cases involving migrants sent to conflict-affected or rights-restricted countries have drawn particular attention. "Third-country" deportations have been controversial because many immigrants are being sent to countries such as South Sudan and Libya, where they say they fear torture or death. Since January 20, 2025, DHS has removed, or attempted to remove, noncitizens to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador, as well as to war-torn countries such as Libya and South Sudan, to countries that have imprisoned them such as Eswatini and South Sudan, and to countries that have engaged in chain refoulement such as Ghana, Equatorial Guinea, and Mexico.

One case became a cause célèbre. Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran, was deported to CECOT in El Salvador even though an immigration judge had previously granted him withholding of removal as to El Salvador. After months of litigation, the Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration to "facilitate" his return to the United States, but the administration continued to delay as he was subjected to severe conditions in CECOT.

A February 2025 ICE memo outlined the administration's new policy toward people on the "non-detained docket"—people with pending immigration cases or final orders who were not in immigration detention. The memo specifically highlighted people who had been granted withholding of removal and protection under the Convention Against Torture as potential candidates for detention, because they had final removal orders and could potentially be deported to third countries.

The UN Refugee Convention and Protocol, as well as the UN Convention Against Torture, impose upon states a duty to prevent refoulement —the return of a person to a place where they face persecution or serious harm. Critics argue that many of the third-country transfers violate these obligations. Between January 2025 and May 2026, approximately 17,500 people have been removed from the U.S. to third countries, including those with ongoing asylum claims—and even some who had already been granted legal protections under the Convention Against Torture and had been residing in the U.S.

The administration has defended the program robustly. The White House stated that "the Trump Administration is using all the tools in our toolbox to carry out the largest, lawful deportation operation of criminal illegal aliens in history." Supporters argue that the agreements are a necessary response to countries that deliberately obstruct the deportation of their own nationals, and that the legal authorities involved are well-grounded in the INA.

Outlook

The expansion of third-country deportations is tied directly to several 2025–2026 executive actions that broadened the definition of "safe third countries" and created new agreements with Central American and Caribbean nations. Courts have issued conflicting rulings on the legality of these removals, creating urgent legal uncertainty. The Supreme Court's June 2025 decision to allow deportations to proceed pending appeal gave the administration significant operational latitude, but the underlying legal questions—particularly regarding the rights of migrants who hold existing protections—remain unresolved in the lower courts.

The program's diplomatic dimensions are also still unfolding. Senior White House adviser Stephen Miller has led multiagency calls focused on why countries are not accepting more deportees from the United States, signaling continued pressure on prospective partner nations. The administration's outreach to additional countries suggests the network of bilateral deals is likely to expand further, though the practical capacity of small or unstable receiving countries to absorb deportees at scale remains a structural constraint.

Whether the policy achieves its stated goal of large-scale removals, or functions primarily as a deterrent, is a question the available evidence has not yet settled. What is clear is that the administration has fundamentally altered the architecture of U.S. deportation policy—extending it across continents, complicating the legal status of thousands of people, and raising questions about treaty obligations and due process that will likely occupy courts for years. The Abrego Garcia case and others like it illustrate that individual outcomes in this system can hinge on decisions made with little notice and reviewed only after the fact, if at all.