A Washington Post-participated investigation report says that the Trump administration pledged at least $410 million to secure third-country deportation arrangements with 31 countries, mostly in Africa and Latin America. A State Department Office of Remigration, led by Christian Ehrhardt, runs the program. More than 25,000 people have been sent to at least 28 third countries. Nominally the program is for deportations of persons whose home countries refuse to accept. Most of the deportations have been to Latin American countries, many Mexico. Costa Rica accepted migrants from China, Russia, Iran, and Afghanistan.
The African countries which are or are currently negotiating to accept deportations are Democratic Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini, South Sudan, Central African Republic, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Uganda, Togo, Guinea-Bissau, and Gabon. One instance: Liberia received a deportation flight, but the six migrants refused to leave the aircraft and were rerouted to Equatorial Guinea.
The reporting team assembled the 25,000 figure from estimates, including few specific data sources (for instance, Human Rights Watch counted 12,977 third-country nationals sent to Mexico between January 2025 and March 2026).
The article mentions without going into much depth of detail how third party deportations to Africa are designed to frighten unauthorized persons into their self-deporting to their home country. The Abrego Garcia case (covered in other posts): His lawyers allege that prosecutors offered him a guilty plea followed by deportation to comparatively safer, Spanish-speaking Costa Rica, while threatening deportation to Uganda if he refused.
How the story was sourced.” The Washington Post writes it is part of a project involving “72 journalists, 26 news organizations, 15 countries: a global investigation into the Trump administration’s secret deals to expel people worldwide.”
The Migration Policy Institute in January 2026 published a study of “externalization,” which puts the administration’s third-party deportation policy in global context. Europe and Australia have externalization policies as well was the U.S. they include:
Preventing migrants from reaching destination countries, for example, EU cooperation with Libya and Tunisia and U.S. cooperation with Mexico.
Return hubs. Rejected asylum seekers are transferred to facilities in third countries while authorities arrange return, settlement or further movement. The EU authorized this approach in 2026.
External legal-pathway screening. The Biden administration’s Safe Mobility Offices in Latin America was this approach –killed by the Trump administration.