Several nations have started accepting third-country deportees from the United States while some others are mulling an agreement.
President Donald Trump’s illegal immigrant deportation push has officials looking for new places to put illegal immigrants if their home nations won’t accept their citizens back.
Section 241(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act requires that Immigration and Customs Enforcement send deportees back to their nation of origin, or the country in which they boarded the transport that brought them to America.
However, if that fails, the section also allows for the agency to remove aliens to any country that will accept them.
Talks between the United States and countries such as Honduras, Panama, and Venezuela have resulted in the nations accepting illegal immigrants that the United States needs to remove.
Here is a list of some of the countries either in talks with Washington about assisting with deportation or that have already begun the process of accepting other nations’ citizens being deported by the United States.
| Mexico | Guatemala |
| El Salvador | Honduras |
| Venezuela | Panama |
| Costa Rica | India |
| Rwanda |
Mexico
Mexico is accepting non-Mexican illegal immigrants deported from the United States, even though there is no formal agreement between the nations.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum told reporters a few weeks ago that Mexico has already accepted 38,000 deported illegal immigrants from the United States, and 5,000 of those were non-Mexican nationals.
Early this year, Mexico began constructing temporary tent shelters near Ciudad Juarez to prepare for deportees from the United States.
Guatemala
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio came to an agreement with both El Salvador and Guatemala during an international trip earlier this year that they would accept U.S. deportees as “safe third countries.”
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo confirmed the agreement on Feb. 5, saying that they would accept not only Guatemalan deportees but those from other nations as well.
“We have agreed to increase by 40 percent the number of flights of deportees, both of our nationality as well as deportees from other nationalities,” Arévalo said during a news conference with Rubio.
Guatemala cooperates with the United States in receiving both military and civilian deportation flights.
