As of January, 2025 about 7.8 million Venezuelans were displaced outside their country.  At that time, 6.1 million Syrians were outside Syria, and about 6.5 million Ukrainians.  With the overthrow of the Assad regime and change in immigration policy by the Trump administration, what has and is happening to these populations? I will focus on a few key population segments, in sum: Regime change in Syria and decapitation of Venezuelan leadership has not materially affected any reverse migration — and may not for some time

Venezuelans in the United States

At the start of the Trump administration there were on the order of one million Venezuelans in the United States.  Roughly 600,000 were here on Temporary Protected Status, about 115,000–120,000 as humanitarian parolees, and about 300,000 with pending asylum applications.  These large numbers were largely the result of Biden administration policy of pro-active or permissive nature. In January 2021 there were no Venezuelans in humanitarian parole, about 300,000 in TPS, and about 150,000 with asylum applications.

The Trump administration has closed down, or sought to close down with issues still before the courts, the entire humanitarian parole and TPS population of Venezuelans. It is seeking to speed up asylum application decisions.  By eliminating substantially all of these populations, there will remain several hundred thousand Venezuelan-born persons who immigrated, largely before the Biden administration, and enjoy permanent status.  How will the Trump administration account for this population decline? Possibly as a roughly one million person reduction in total “illegal” population. The administration does not use consistently one estimate of those it considers “illegal.”

By removing these one million +/- persons who had some form on legal protection, if this takes place this will be the largest nation-specific forced migration from an advanced country possibly since World War II, noting the massive move of some 6 million Germans from Eastern Europe at the end of that war.

The Trump administration has not taken any public steps to resolve the refugee program throughout Latin America – specially in Columbia – after its capture of Maduro.

Syrians in Europe

Between 2015 and the end of the Assad regime, about 1.4 million Syrians sought and were granted protection in EU countries, more than half in Germany, with large numbers in Sweden, the Netherlands, Austria and Norway.

​The EU’s first act to stem this flow was the EU–Turkey Statement of March 2016, under which “irregular migrants” crossing from Turkey to the Greek islands would be stemmed. At this juncture, Syrians fleeing their country pretty much had to settle in countries neighboring Syria.

In the first six months alone after the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024, UNHCR estimated that about 600,000 Syrians returned to Syria, the great majority of them from neighboring countries rather than from the EU. Reverse migration from the EU has been minimal. Some countries offer financial incentives. But forced out-migration such as the Trump policy for Venezuelans have not happened for several reasons: (1) refugee status is permanently granted, (2) inter-group conflicts  in Syria remain high, and (3) the EU is aware of the literal and figurative cost of violating “non-refoulement,” or the provision in the 1951 refugee agreement banning the return of refugees from their country of origin. (4) some sections of the refugee population are valued members of the EU workforce.

Germany has been the most visibly successful in integrating Syrian refugees into its workforce. One 1 – 2 % of practicing doctors are Syrian.

Ukrainians in the U.S.

Currently, roughly 250,000 Ukrainians have entered the U.S. in some form of formal recognition, Half of them came through Uniting for Ukraine (U4U), a government / private sector partnership whereby sponsors in the U.S. vouch for the immigrant. The Biden administration applied this model for some Venezuelans as will. The Trump administration has shut down this program for Venezuelans but not U4U.