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🟧Week of April 14: I’m off on Thursday and Friday; before that I’m in Washington with a few meetings and a need to finish a Border Update a day early. I’ll try to be reachable, but could be delayed.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s Case and Nayib Bukele’s Washington visit; The Alien Enemies Act; The Roosevelt Reservation and other military developments; March migration data show further declines; Mass deportation and the coming “reconciliation” funding bill
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s Case and Nayib Bukele’s Washington visit: A high-stakes legal battle continues between the federal courts and the Trump administration over the case of a Salvadoran man who was wrongly deported and sent to a notorious mega-prison in his home country. During an Oval Office visit, the country’s authoritarian-trending president struck a defiant tone alongside President Trump, calling into question the administration’s compliance with a Supreme Court requirement that it “facilitate” the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Maryland) met Abrego Garcia briefly during a visit to El Salvador.
The Alien Enemies Act: Evidence continues to show that most of the 238 Venezuelan men sent to the Salvadoran mega-prison on March 15 faced no allegations of criminal activity or gang ties. A judge who had sought to stop their removal is now considering whether to hold Trump administration officials in contempt of court.
The Roosevelt Reservation and other military developments: The White House has declared that a 20-yard fringe of territory along the border in California, Arizona, and New Mexico is now the equivalent of a “military installation.” This raises important questions about the role of the U.S. military on U.S. soil. As is widely expected, these questions will deepen if the administration invokes the Insurrection Act of 1807.
March migration data show further declines: With 7,181 Border Patrol apprehensions, March 2025 was one of the quietest months at the U.S.-Mexico border since the 1960s. The main reason is the Trump administration’s shutdown of asylum access at the border. The ratio of uniformed personnel at the border to March migrant apprehensions is now about 4.6 to 1.
Mass deportation and the coming “reconciliation” funding bill: Congress is edging closer to considering a massive budget bill that would multiply the U.S. government’s ability to deport undocumented migrants on an enormous scale. The Trump administration’s unstated goal appears to be 1 million deportations during its first year, which seems unlikely. Meanwhile, the administration is rapidly undoing documented statuses granted by the Biden administration.
El Salvador renditions reach the Supreme Court; Evidence points to little criminality among those rushed to El Salvador’s mega-prison; A $45 billion bill for migrant detention foreseen as budget bill moves slowly through Congress; New measures to undo legal pathways and punish the undocumented; A woman dies by suicide in Border Patrol custody as internal oversight is decimated; Notes on the impact in Mexico
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
El Salvador renditions reach the Supreme Court: The Supreme Court made two rulings related to the Trump administration’s practice of sending migrants to a mega-prison in El Salvador. The first requires that people subjected to rapid expulsion under the Alien Enemies Act have a reasonable chance to defend themselves. The second upholds, though softens, a lower-court judge’s requirement that the administration seek the release and return of a wrongfully expelled Salvadoran man. The President of El Salvador is to visit Washington on April 14.
A $45 billion bill for migrant detention foreseen as budget bill moves slowly through Congress: A request for proposals issued to contractors foresees ramping up migrant detention spending sixfold, to $45 billion over two years. That would be paid for by a giant one-time appropriation slowly working through the Republican-majority Congress, which cleared an important initial hurdle this week.
New measures to undo legal pathways and punish the undocumented: This week saw CBP One app recipients receive an order to self-deport, a proposal to fine migrants up to $998 per day if they stay after receiving removal orders, movement toward a registry of undocumented migrants, and a continued legal fight over Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Venezuelans.
A woman dies by suicide in Border Patrol custody as internal oversight is decimated: A female citizen of China died by suicide in a California Border Patrol station. This and other recent incidents raise questions about oversight at a time when the Trump administration has effectively closed down the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) internal investigative agencies.
Notes on the impact in Mexico: Media reports covered the situation of migrants stranded in Mexico by the Trump administration’s revocation of asylum access at the border, including Venezuelans requesting repatriation flights and Haitians who are especially vulnerable to harm.
The Alien Enemies Act invocation and El Salvador renditions have days in court, Notes about deportation flights, Budget resolution to move in Senate, Notes on the U.S. military’s border and migration role, Low border numbers in March, Noem’s travel to Latin America
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
The Alien Enemies Act invocation and El Salvador renditions have days in court: The Trump administration sent 17 more detained people—10 Salvadorans and 7 Venezuelans—from Guantánamo to El Salvador’s Center for Containment of Terrorism (CECOT) prison. Federal courts are probing violations of a restraining order against the use of the Alien Enemies Act, as we continue to learn about people removed to the Salvadoran prison despite a lack of criminal background. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recognized that at least one man, Kilmar Ábrego García, was removed in error, but the administration is not asking El Salvador to release him.
Notes about deportation flights: A Boston federal judge barred the Trump administration from deporting migrants to third countries without allowing them to argue that they might be harmed. Deportation flights to Venezuela have resumed. Reports highlight unsafe conditions and abuse aboard ICE’s deportation flights with little accountability or transparency.
Budget resolution to move in Senate: The Senate is preparing to vote on a budget resolution that sets the stage for a larger spending bill advancing President Trump’s “mass deportation” and border-hardening agenda. The forthcoming “reconciliation” bill could allocate $90–175 billion over 10 years for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Passed by a simple majority, it would bypass the filibuster and exclude Democrats.
Notes on the U.S. military’s border and migration role: The U.S. military presence at the border has grown to over 6,700 active-duty troops, expected to grow to 10,000. Roles and equipment are expanding, and the price tag since January 20 is now $376 million since January 20. The Guantánamo base now holds about 85 migrants at a very high cost. Senators visiting the base criticized it as a wasteful, likely illegal attempt to bypass due process.
Low border numbers in March: Border Patrol recorded 7,180 migrant apprehensions in March, the lowest monthly total in decades, amid a near-total shutdown of asylum access. Shelters are empty, aid groups are scaling back, and migrant injuries from wall falls have declined. In Panama, migration through the Darién Gap plummeted to less than 200 in March.
Noem’s travel to Latin America: Homeland Security Secretary Kristie Noem visited El Salvador, Colombia, and Mexico. Her appearance at El Salvador’s CECOT, shooting a video using jailed people as a backdrop, drew criticism. In Colombia, Noem signed a biometric data-sharing agreement. In Mexico, she claimed some progress toward a similar deal.
Border Patrol migrant apprehensions at the U.S.-Mexico border were low in March 2025 -- but not "the lowest in history" as CBP oddly claims.
“The month of March recorded the lowest southwest border crossings in history,” reads a release put out by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) yesterday, adding, “In March, the Border Patrol data shows that around 7,180 southwest border crossings were recorded.”
7,180 Border Patrol apprehensions is very few. It is the fewest since Border Patrol (part of CBP) started reporting monthly data. But Border Patrol only started doing that in 2000.
If you look back further, to Border Patrol’s founding in 1925, you have to get monthly numbers by taking annual totals and dividing them by 12. Those averages show that March 2025 was not, in fact, the “lowest in history.”
There were fewer migrants in the 1950s-1960s and before World War II. And those low numbers were sustained over 12 months.
There's a lot of border, migration, and other Latin America human rights-related litigation going on. I'm keeping a running list of links to the Courtlistener pages hosting court documents from those cases.
There’s a lot of border, migration, and other Latin America human rights-related litigation going on in U.S. federal courts. I’m keeping a running list of links to the Courtlistener pages hosting court documents from those cases.
Here’s what’s on that page right now, but I’ll keep updating it. Add links in the comments if I’m missing any big ones.
Join me virtually this coming Monday evening for the National Immigrant Solidarity Rally and screening of the excellent documentary Borderland: the Line Within, which is viewable online today and through the weekend.
At WOLA we'd published criticisms of DHS Civil Rights/Civil Liberties for slowness, unresponsiveness, and a lack of "teeth" to improve abusive behavior. But as bad encounters with DHS personnel grow more likely, we're all going to miss DHS CRCL when it is gone.
The New York Times was the first to report yesterday that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is firing nearly all staff at, or shuttering, three internal oversight agencies: its Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL), its Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman, and its Immigration Detention Ombudsman (OIDO).
It shouldn’t be this easy for one of the world’s largest law enforcement agencies, DHS, to obliterate its internal oversight. In fact, it isn’t, at least in the case of CRCL, read a March 13 letter from the ranking Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security and Judiciary Committees, Sen. Gary Peters (D-Michigan) and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois):
The DHS Civil Rights and Civil Liberties (CRCL) Office is fulfilling statutorily- required missions, and the CRCL Officer is a statutorily-required position that the Secretary must fully support with sufficient personnel and resources.
It appears that the Trump DHS is trying to get around this by keeping the position of the CRCL officer, but eliminating that officer’s staff and reassigning duties to less-empowered individuals elsewhere in the Department.
At WOLA we’d published criticisms of DHS Civil Rights/Civil Liberties for slowness, unresponsiveness, and a lack of “teeth” to improve abusive behavior. But as bad encounters with DHS personnel grow more likely, we’re all going to miss DHS CRCL when it is gone.
New York Times and other coverage of the mass firings, meanwhile, includes this chilling quote from Tricia McLaughlin, DHS’s new assistant secretary for public affairs, who is a regular source of chilling quotes.
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Homeland Security Department, said the decision was meant to “streamline oversight to remove roadblocks to enforcement.”
“These offices have obstructed immigration enforcement by adding bureaucratic hurdles and undermining D.H.S.’s mission,” Ms. McLaughlin said. “Rather than supporting law enforcement efforts, they often function as internal adversaries that slow down operations.”
In Latin America we’ve often seen quotes like this one from autocratic leaders and security forces. Defining basic oversight as adversarial or aligned with enemies.
This was constant In Colombia, where I worked a lot in the 90s and 00s. Álvaro Uribe even called human rights defenders “spokespeople for terrorism” while military-aligned paramilitaries were massacring communities and military “false positive” killings were worsening. Today, Colombians are still counting the dead.
Invocation of Alien Enemies Act raises due process, democracy, and foreign relations concerns; U.S. military presence at the border continues to expand; Travel ban appears imminent; Border wall construction resuming; Notes on Congress
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updateshere.
Note: next week’s Border Update may be delayed by possible (still unconfirmed) staff congressional testimony.
Invocation of Alien Enemies Act raises due process, democracy, and foreign relations concerns: The Trump administration has employed a 227-year-old law to expel hundreds of Venezuelan men to El Salvador’s feared prison system without due process and in likely defiance of a judicial order to divert the aircraft carrying them. As officials resist supplying a federal court with basic information about the incident, legal analysts warn of a constitutional crisis.
U.S. military presence at the border continues to expand: The administration may be planning to declare a 60-foot buffer zone along much of the border to be a “military installation,” allowing soldiers to “hold” migrants there. A Navy destroyer is to carry out a mission where the border meets the Gulf of Mexico.
Travel ban appears imminent: In a much larger version of a “travel ban” implemented during Donald Trump’s first term, his administration may soon ban the arrival of 43 countries’ citizens to the United States, dividing them into three tiers of prohibition.
Border wall construction resuming: The administration is using funds appropriated in 2021 to build seven miles of border wall in south Texas, potentially including a segment running through a private butterfly reserve. “Gap-filling” projects are getting underway near Nogales, Arizona, and San Diego, California.
Notes on Congress: Congressional Democrats issued letters protesting the administration’s renewed use of family detention and termination of Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelans. ICE is warning Congress of a $2 billion budget shortfall for fiscal 2025.
You can't tell the arresting officer is a Border Patrol agent because he's wearing a sweatshirt featuring a gothic font popular with Salvadoran gangs. You'll also be surprised that he's a Border Patrol agent because the arrest happened in southeast Washington DC, far from an international border.
This video obtained by the Washington Post shows a Border Patrol agent arresting a Venezuelan father whose only crime was improperly crossing the border in October 2022 when he, his wife, and kids turned themselves in to ask for asylum.
You can’t tell the arresting officer is a Border Patrol agent because he’s wearing a sweatshirt featuring a gothic font popular with Salvadoran gangs. You’ll also be surprised that he’s a Border Patrol agent because the arrest happened in southeast Washington DC, far from an international border. (Because Washington is within 100 miles of a U.S. coastline, it is still an area where Border Patrol is allowed to operate.)
It’s also nearly unprecedented to see a Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holder arrested for “improper entry” more than two years ago. We’re in a new and scary era.
The arrested father and mother are currently free, thanks to the quick and aggressive action of attorneys and mutual aid networks.
With the USS Gravely, a destroyer, parked near the border in the Gulf of Mexico, migrants can forget about landing their tank battalions, Normandy-style, on Texas beaches.
U.S. Northern Command announced that the Navy has sent an Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer—which “can carry 96 missiles, including Tomahawk Land Attack cruise missiles”—to the point where the US-Mexico border hits the Gulf of Mexico.
At Stars and Stripes (which shamefully called the body of water the “Gulf of America”), Adm. Daryl Caudle, commander of U.S. Fleet Forces, very diplomatically said that it’s not really clear what the U.S.S. Gravely—a ship that until recently was shooting down Houthi missiles and drones in Yemen—might end up doing along the border.
“It is a bit unique to deploy a capability of this level for this mission set, but I think it goes to the commitment the Navy has to the president and the secretary of defense to support the southern border operations,” Caudle said.
One thing is for sure. For now at least, migrants can forget about landing their tank battalions, Normandy-style, on Texas beaches.
CBP publishes February border data; “Mass deportation” updates; Active-duty deployment nears 9,600 soldiers; Guantánamo base is currently empty; The impact in Panama and elsewhere; Congressional opponents grow more vocal
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updateshere.
CBP publishes February border data: As the Trump administration shut down asylum access at the border and canceled the CBP One program, the number of people entering CBP custody at the border has plummeted. There are now at least four uniformed security personnel for every apprehended migrant. Migration is also way down in the Darién Gap. Fentanyl seizures are also very low.
“Mass deportation” updates: ICE arrested 32,809 people in the U.S. interior during the first 50 days of the Trump administration. Congress is considering budget measures to make deportations truly “massive.” ICE is increasingly targeting families as it reopens family detention facilities.
Guantánamo base is currently empty: The entire population of 40 detainees at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Station has been returned to the United States. The operation’s cost so far has averaged $55,000 per detainee.
The impact in Panama and elsewhere: On short-term visas, Panama’s government released 112 Asian, African, and European migrants whom the Trump administration had sent there despite their fears of return. It isn’t clear what their next steps are.
Congressional opponents grow more vocal: Letters and statements from congressional Democrats voiced more alarm and outrage about Trump administration anti-immigration measures, even as a CNN poll showed respondents narrowly approving of Trump’s performance on migration policy.
Citing cross-border fentanyl trafficking, Trump again imposes and then withdraws tariffs on Mexico; Vance brings cabinet members to Eagle Pass; February saw the fewest Border Patrol migrant apprehensions this century, and perhaps since the 1960s; The U.S. military presence grows at the border; “Mass deportation” slows a bit, pending new money from Congress; Notes on the impact in Mexico and further south
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
Citing cross-border fentanyl trafficking, Trump again imposes and then withdraws tariffs on Mexico: President Trump followed up on a threat to impose 25 percent tariffs on all goods from Mexico and Canada. The main reason cited was production and trafficking of fentanyl, which has been declining, though it seems apparent that the President’s disdain for trade agreements is a larger factor. Trump later lifted tariffs on most goods for another month.
Vance brings cabinet members to Eagle Pass: Vice President Vance went to the border with the Homeland Security and Defense secretaries. His remarks focused mainly on organized crime in Mexico, not migration.
February saw the fewest Border Patrol migrant apprehensions this century, and perhaps since the 1960s: Donald Trump revealed that Border Patrol apprehended 8,326 migrants along the border in February, which would be the fewest since at least 2000, the earliest year for which public data are available. Monthly averages were lower than that from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s and during and before World War II. As occurred during the first months of Trump’s first term, migrants and smugglers are pausing their decisions to try to enter the country.
The U.S. military presence grows at the border: With the deployment of a Stryker brigade combat team and general support aviation battalion, the number of active-duty military personnel at the border will soon reach 9,000. The overall number of uniformed personnel could be over four times the number of monthly migrant apprehensions.
“Mass deportation” slows a bit, pending new money from Congress: Deportation flights increased modestly in February, and costly military flights have nearly halted since February 21. The Guantánamo Bay naval base is receiving fewer detainees amid cost concerns and interagency coordination issues. The White House is disappointed by its slow start, but a giant spending measure moving haltingly through Congress could remove its funding bottlenecks. Policy changes underway range from easing the firing of immigration judges to expanding expedited removal throughout the country to reopening family detention facilities.
Notes on the impact in Mexico and further south: Asylum applications are way up in Mexico even as migrant shelters empty. Numbers of migrants giving up and returning to South America have grown to the point that Costa Rica and Panama are facilitating southbound transportation.
The Trump administration is encouraging militaries to act like glorified migration agents at the U.S.-Mexico border, in the U.S. interior and even Guantánamo, and also in Mexico and Guatemala.
Here’s a new analysis at WOLA’s website about one of the many ways in which the Trump administration is playing with fire: sending combat-trained soldiers to act as glorified migration agents, potentially confronting civilians while carrying out a politicized mission. We see it happening at the U.S.-Mexico border, in the U.S. interior and even Guantánamo as so-called “mass deportation” ramps up, and also in Mexico and Guatemala in response to U.S. pressure.
The U.S. military—which prides itself on being apolitical—is being forced to lend itself to the current administration’s domestic political priorities. This threatens a historic break with more than a century of restraint in the United States’ democratic civil-military relations.
Reports of southbound migration as people abandon hope of seeking protection in the United States; Another Guantánamo flight arrives, as released detainees reveal horrific conditions; “Mass deportation” updates; “Bridge deportations” continue; The impact on Mexico; Update on CBP’s border drug seizures
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
Reports of southbound migration as people abandon hope of seeking protection in the United States: As Trump administration measures shut off the possibility of seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border, some people who had migrated to Mexico to do that are turning around. Several dozen per day have been boarding boats through dangerous currents to avoid traveling southbound through the Darién Gap.
Another Guantánamo flight arrives, as released detainees reveal horrific conditions: The Trump administration sent 17 more undocumented migrants to the Guantánamo Bay Naval Station, just 3 days after removing to Venezuela all who had been at the base for up to 16 days. Those released from the facility told of horrific and abusive conditions.
“Mass deportation” updates: The House passed a budget resolution that, like a Senate measure passed a week earlier, could provide a gigantic amount of funding for the administration’s mass deportation plans. These plans appear to include widespread use of military bases and invocation of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.
“Bridge deportations” continue: The Trump administration sent to Costa Rica a second plane with migrants aboard from Asia, eastern Europe, and Africa. In Panama, 112 of 299 migrants whom the administration flew there are in a jungle camp, cut off from access to attorneys, as they voice fear of return to their countries of origin.
The impact on Mexico: President Trump appears determined to levy tariffs on Mexican goods on March 4, citing continued flows of fentanyl. U.S. deportation flights to Mexico are now taking people as far south as possible, near the Guatemala border.
Update on CBP’s border drug seizures: Despite Donald Trump’s tariff threats, CBP is finding less fentanyl at the border. Seizures dropped 21 percent from 2023 to 2024, and another 22 percent in the first four months of fiscal 2025, compared to the same period a year earlier. All drugs except marijuana—which continues a sharp decline in seizures—continue to be overwhelmingly encountered at ports of entry.
A topical index of border security, migration, and related human rights issues covered in WOLA's Weekly Border Updates.
Like me, you’re probably having a hard time keeping up with all of the (usually abusive) border and immigration policies that the Trump administration has been throwing at us. As they “flood the zone,” it’s like we need a big bulletin board to pin up every alarming development, so that we can at least keep it on our radar and not let it go forgotten.
Here’s my bulletin board. I’ve just indexed every topic mentioned in 2025’s weekly WOLA Border Updates. There are 70 so far.
Each topic has links to the exact sections of the Border Updates where I covered it.
I’ll keep this up to date all year. I hope you find it as useful as I have so far. (Even though I wrote this stuff, I don’t always remember where it is.)
Migration dropped in January in anticipation of Trump asylum shutoff; Darién Gap migration declines sharply; Deportation flights send third countries’ citizens to Panama and Costa Rica; Guantánamo detainees sent back to Venezuela via Honduras; Congress readies a massive border and deportation spending package; “Mass deportation” updates; Notes on the impact in Mexico
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
The many actions and changes following Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration force a change in this week’s Border Update format. Instead of narratives organized under three or four topics, this Update organizes brief points under the following headings:
Migration dropped in January in anticipation of Trump asylum shutoff: Customs and Border Protection reported a 36 percent drop in migrant encounters at the border from December to January, deepening a 13-month-long decline in migration. Restrictive Trump policies are the main cause for the new drop. Border Patrol apprehensions are now averaging 285 per day.
Darién Gap migration declines sharply: Migration through the treacherous jungle route from Colombia to Panama dropped to 72 people per day in January, the fewest since February 2021.
Deportation flights send third countries’ citizens to Panama and Costa Rica: In what is being called “bridge deportations,” the Trump administration sent 299 migrants from mostly Asian countries to Panama and 135 to Costa Rica. Both countries are keeping people in remote camps pending their repatriation. The situation of those with protection needs is uncertain.
Guantánamo detainees sent back to Venezuela via Honduras: The Trump administration sent all but one of 178 Venezuelan migrants whom it had been holding at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Station in Cuba to Honduras, where a Venezuelan government plane retrieved them and brought them to Caracas.
Congress readies a massive border and deportation spending package: The Senate passed a framework bill that could pave the way for $175 billion in new border hardening and “mass deportation” spending, which could pass without a single Democratic vote. The timetable is uncertain, though, as House and Senate Republican leaders disagree on the way forward.
“Mass deportation” updates: Top Trump administration officials are dissatisfied with the “flagging” pace of Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportations so far. The administration plans to cancel Temporary Protected Status for Haitians.
Notes on the impact in Mexico: Mexico has still not seen a big increase in cross-border deportations from the United States. For now at least, migrant shelters in Mexico are emptying while smugglers raise their prices.
In south Texas, we're witnessing a historic change in soldiers’ ability to confront civilians on U.S. soil, without an emergency to justify it. The Border Patrol sector where 300 troops just got deputized has only 50 migrant apprehensions per day.
In the United States, on U.S. soil, we rarely give combat-trained soldiers—which includes National Guard personnel—the ability to confront or arrest civilians. It only happens during emergencies.
In south Texas, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) just did that. It deputized 300 Texas National Guard personnel, operating under the authority of Texas’s state government, to apprehend migrants and enforce federal U.S. immigration law.
“History in the making” indeed.
They’ll be doing that in Border Patrol’s Rio Grande Valley Sector, which covers the borderlands between Falcon Lake and the Gulf of Mexico.
If you’re using soldiers in such a drastic capacity, risking long-term distortions in U.S. civil-military relations, there must be a real emergency going on in the Rio Grande Valley Sector, right?
Wrong. The Sector’s chief says that they’re only apprehending 50 migrants per day right now.
In 2020, the last year before CBP decided to stop publicizing staffing strength, Border Patrol had 3,119 agents in the Rio Grande Valley Sector. Let’s say it’s 3,000 now. Add 300 soldiers and you’re at 3,300 agents or soldiers.
50 migrant apprehensions per day ÷ 3,300 agents/soldiers =
Each agent or soldier is apprehending an average of 0.015 migrants per day.
No emergency. A historic change in soldiers’ ability to confront civilians on U.S. soil—but no emergency.
Migration plummeting along the U.S.-bound route as the new U.S. administration leads people to pause; Guantánamo: as planes keep bringing migrants, some are not “the worst of the worst”; “Mass deportations”: as Trump blasts their pace, Congress begins work on a giant spending measure; Venezuela sends two planes to pick up deportees; Updates about the U.S. military border deployment; Eight Latin American criminal groups to be added to the U.S. terrorist list; U.S. aid freeze affects programs designed to integrate migrants and receive deported people
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
The many actions and changes following Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration force a change in this week’s Border Update format. Instead of narratives organized under three or four topics, this Update organizes brief points under the following headings:
Venezuela sends two planes to pick up deportees: Following a friendly meeting between a Trump administration representative and Nicolás Maduro, the Venezuelan regime sent two planes to Texas to retrieve deported Venezuelan citizens.
Updates about the U.S. military border deployment: The number of active-duty troops and National Guard (state and federal) deployed to the border may now exceed 10,000. Air Force personnel running deportation flights are removing name tape and unit insignias from their uniforms. Those flights cost about three times as much as civilian deportation flights.
Eight Latin American criminal groups to be added to the U.S. terrorist list: The Trump administration is adding eight criminal groups from four countries to the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations. This will affect the asylum cases of people threatened by these groups, strengthening some cases and devastating others.
I had a great conversation with Greg Sargent at the New Republic for his popular “Daily Blast” podcast, which he released on February 6. The audio is here and a transcript is here. We talked about migration through Mexico and the futility of blowing up a multifaceted bilateral relationship by threatening tariffs over it.
The introductory text for the podcast reads:
Stephen Miller privately worried about imposing overly aggressive tariffs on Mexico because it could imperil Mexico’s effort to apprehend migrants traveling north to our southern border, reportsTheWall Street Journal. That revelation is striking. Understood correctly, it’s an acknowledgment that Mexico had already been cracking down on migration, due to an arrangement secured by President Biden. That badly undermines Trump’s scam that his threat of tariffs forced Mexico to do his bidding on the border. We talked to Adam Isacson, an expert on Latin America, who explains what Mexico has actually been doing on immigration, and why it undercuts Trump’s biggest claims about immigration, tariffs, Mexico, and more. Listen to this episode here. A transcript is here.
A tariff threat and a Mexican military deployment; Reduced migration, and almost no asylum access, as groups file suit; The U.S. military at the border and in the deportation effort; First detainees taken to Guantánamo; Administration cancels TPS for Venezuelans; “Migration diplomacy” in Venezuela and Central America; Mass deportation proceeds as Congress prepares a big funding bill; Texas seeks reimbursement for “Operation Lone Star”
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
The many actions and changes following Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration force a change in this week’s Border Update format. Instead of narratives organized under three or four topics, this Update organizes brief points under the following headings:
A tariff threat and a Mexican military deployment: after President Trump threatened to levy tariffs on Mexican imports, the Mexican government agreed to send 10,000 National Guard personnel to the U.S. border zone.
The U.S. military at the border and in the deportation effort: the new administration has now sent about 2,100 active-duty troops to the border as the new defense secretary paid a visit and military deportation flights—including one to India—continue.
First detainees taken to Guantánamo: two military planes have taken less than two dozen detained migrants, apparently people with ties to a Venezuelan organized crime group, to the notorious terrorist detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
Administration cancels TPS for Venezuelans: nearly 350,000 Venezuelans will lose their ability to live and work in the United States in April as the Trump administration reverses an extension that the Biden administration had granted in January. A similar number of Venezuelans face the same fate in September.
“Migration diplomacy” in Venezuela and Central America: a Trump administration envoy met with Venezuela’s dictator and appears to have secured a deal to allow deportation flights. The new secretary of state visited Central America and secured increased cooperation against migration, including a deal to send prisoners to El Salvador’s growing jails.
Texas seeks reimbursement for “Operation Lone Star”: Texas’s governor, a Trump ally, is offering the federal government use of facilities built with state funds while asking for reimbursement of $11 billion spent on its border crackdown. Texas National Guard troops may now arrest migrants for CBP.
An already quiet border gets quieter; Mass deportation; The U.S. military role; Controversies about military deportation flights to the Americas; The impact on Mexico; El Salvador may receive deported migrants from other countries; Incidents reported along the border
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
This Update is the product of interviews and the review of over 270,000 words of source documents since January 23. Your donation to WOLA is crucial to keeping these paywall-free and ad-free Updates going.Please contribute now and support our work.
THIS WEEK IN BRIEF:
The many actions and changes following Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration force a change in this week’s Border Update format. Instead of narratives organized under three or four topics, this Update organizes brief points under the following headings:
CBP One appointments canceled. Shutdown of processing migrants and asylum seekers. “Remain in Mexico” restarts. Humanitarian parole programs end. Declaring that the United States is under “invasion”. Domestic use of the U.S. armed forces. Placing criminal groups on the “terrorist list”. Foreign relations. Other provisions. Reactions in Mexico and elsewhere. Initial analyses.
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updates here.
This Update is the product of interviews and the review of over 210,000 words of source documents since January 18. Your donation to WOLA is crucial to keeping these paywall-free and ad-free Updates going. Please contribute now and support our work.
THIS WEEK IN BRIEF:
The many actions and changes following Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration force a change in the format of this week’s Border Update. Instead of narratives organized under three or four topics, this Update organizes brief points under the following headings:
The Incoming Administration’s Likely Initial Actions. Mass Deportation. “Laken Riley” Bill Nears Passage. Migration continued to decline in December.
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updateshere.
This update is later than usual because of staff travel and congressionaltestimony in recent days. It reflects events as of the end of January 17, making it slightly out of date. Weekly publication will resume on time on Friday, January 24.
Media are reporting that about 100 executive orders will follow Donald Trump’s inauguration, many related to the border and migration. We can expect an end to the CBP One mobile phone app and humanitarian parole programs for Cubans, Haitians, Nicarguans, and Venezuelans. We can expect a push to renew “Remain in Mexico,” possibly Title 42 and “safe third country” agreements: programs that require the cooperation of Mexico and other nations. A gigantic piece of spending legislation to fund this, plus a mass deportation plan, may soon move in Congress.
The Wall Street Journal reported that ICE may begin raids seeking to detain undocumented migrants in Chicago immediately after Inauguration Day. Near Bakersfield, California, Border Patrol agents spread fear among farmworkers by carrying out a large-scale operation of their own. Officials like “Border Czar” Tom Homan are promising conflict with so-called “sanctuary cities” as they call for more detention and deportation capacity, while Mexico prepares to receive large numbers of people.
Enough Democratic senators voted “yes” to break a filibuster and permit likely passage of the Laken Riley Act. The Republican-led bill, named for a woman murdered by a Venezuelan migrant, would allow migrants with pending immigration cases to be detained even if just arrested and charged with a petty crime, and would empower state attorneys-general to challenge aspects of U.S. immigration law in court. The Senate’s cloture vote passed with the votes of 10 of 45 Democratic-aligned senators present, all of them from electorally competitive states.
December 2024 saw the fewest Border Patrol apprehensions per day of the entire Biden administration. The administration’s June rule barring most asylum access between ports of entry is the main reason. For the second time ever, more migrants were encountered at the official border crossings than apprehended by Border Patrol between them. Texas’s Rio Grande Valley Border Patrol Sector measured the most apprehensions, edging out San Diego, which had been number one since June 2024.
I got in a shouting match with Sen. Josh Hawley in a hearing. Here's evidence backing up my arguments about "migrant crime" and the Laken Riley Act.
Another congressional hearing testimony, another nasty shouting match. These aren’t fun because you don’t have the floor, but you have to stand up to bullies.
If you don’t want to watch the video, here’s how the Fox News website covered it:
“Here’s Laken Riley,” said Hawley as her picture was posted behind him. “Her murder, her horrific murder at the hands of this illegal migrant who was also unlawfully paroled in the United States. [Is] her death not an actual issue?”
The activist, Adam Isacson, who works as director of defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America, responded by saying: “Of course it’s an issue, it’s a tragedy.”
“I didn’t say that Laken Riley’s death was not an actual issue, I said that migrant crime is not an actual issue,” said Isacson. “Migrant crime is much less of an issue than U.S. citizen-committed crime.”
To which Hawley answered, “[Riley] is dead because of migrant crime.”
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) was citing these two sentences from a March 1, 2024 “Border Update” video. (It took me a while even to find it, because things said in videos don’t show up in online searches. That’s good opposition research.)
The horrific murder of a nursing student in Georgia has a lot of people on the right talking about ‘migrant crime’ like it’s an actual issue. But the data, in fact, show that migrants commit fewer crimes than US citizens.
Of course I stand by that. I’m telling the truth. Evidence shows that migrants—undocumented, asylum-seeking, and otherwise—commit crimes at lower rates than U.S. citizens. If you’re governing a community and want to make sure it’s protected from crime, you’re doing it wrong if you divert law enforcement resources to targeting immigrants, who (with tragic exceptions because all humans commit crimes) break laws less often.
Here are some of the sources I was drawing from at the time:
“More recently, there’s been an explosion of research in this area because of public perception and interest. And what’s pretty amazing is, across all this research, by and large, we find that immigrants do not engage in more crime than native-born counterparts, and immigration actually can cause crime to go down, rather than up, so quite contrary to public perception.” — Charis Kurbin of UC Irvine, author of the book Immigration and Crime: Taking Stock, on PBS Newshour.
“The repetition of the phrase ‘migrant crime’ is a tactic stolen from Victor Orban, who used to use ‘Gypsy crime’ in the same way.” — writerAnne Applebaum, author of a few books about democracy and authoritarianism, on Twitter.
In full smarm mode, Sen. Hawley feigned shock that a witness invited by the Democrats might oppose the Laken Riley Act, a bad bill. In fact, more than three-quarters of Senate Democrats voted against it on Friday: it avoided a U.S. Senate filibuster due to just 10 Democratic senators’ votes.
This bill is almost certainly unconstitutional and could harm innocent people, some of them people seeking protection in the United States:
It will require that migrants be detained—including those with documented status like DACA and TPS recipients, and people with pending asylum cases—until an immigration judge resolves their cases, which could take a year or more, if they’re accused of minor crimes like shoplifting. And I mean “accused”: the text of the law reads “is charged with, is arrested for.” They don’t have to be found guilty in court: all it takes is a false accusation that leads to an arrest, even for allegedly stealing a candy bar from a CVS. “Innocent until proven guilty” goes out the window. The potential for abuse is tremendous.
It gives state attorneys-general superpowers to sue to block aspects of U.S. immigration law, disfiguring the federal government’s ability to carry out immigration policies for the greater good. As the New Republic’s Greg Sargent pointed out, this could even cause a schism within MAGA. Trump backers who oppose legal immigration, like Steve Bannon, have been in a public fight with Trump’s tech-sector backers, like Elon Musk, over visas for skilled overseas workers. Bannon will need only enlist an attorney-general like Texas’s Ken Paxton to sue to block migrants from countries like India, from where companies like Musk’s hire many immigrants.
The hearing episode got me a wave of insults on social media and in my comms accounts from people who hate migrants or think I somehow don’t care about a tragic murder. Most of the insults are lame and probably written by people in Belarus, but some of them (like “beta-male f*ckstick”) are sheer poetry and I plan to use them.
Overview of my testimony before the Senate Homeland Security Committee on the "Remain in Mexico" program.
It was fun—at times—to engage with senators on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee this morning on Republican-led proposals to revive the “Remain in Mexico” policy. There’s a lot to say about it and I’ll post more later. For now:
Chairman Paul, Ranking Member Peters, members of the Committee, thank you for inviting me to testify today.
I did a lot of fieldwork and data work along the U.S.-Mexico border when Remain in Mexico—MPP—was first implemented. The evidence I saw is clear: Remain in Mexico enriched cartels. It failed to meaningfully deter migration. And it soured relations with a key ally. Pursuing it again would harm U.S. interests.
Instead, I urge this Committee to focus on fixing our asylum system. That system saves tens of thousands of lives each year, but we need it to be both fair and efficient. No one supports the idea of five-year waits for asylum decisions: the backlogs create a pull factor of their own. But this is an administrative challenge, and the U.S. government is good at handling administrative challenges. It’s just a question of processing, case management, and adjudication.
People truly did suffer while remaining in Mexico. I personally heard harrowing accounts of torture and abuse. Nearly all of that abuse was the work of organized crime groups, or cartels.
The cartels’ cruelty and sadism wasn’t just a human rights issue, though. These criminals aren’t barbaric just for its own sake. This is their economic model, and that makes it a national security issue.
Organized crime is trying to extract as much money out of migrants and their loved ones as it can while those migrants are present on the “turf” that they control. Cartels fight each other for this business.
“Remain in Mexico” kept migrants on cartels’ turf for very long periods of time: months or even years in Mexican border cities waiting for their hearings. MPP created a new market opportunity for cartels.
That’s a big difference from CBP One. The app also requires months-long waits to come to a U.S. port of entry, but it makes it easier to wait elsewhere, in parts of Mexico that are safer than its northern border zone, where states are under State Department travel warnings because of cartel crime and kidnapping.
When outsiders are waiting for months in Mexico’s border zone, they are sitting ducks for the cartels:
First, there was extortion: foreigners had to pay just to exist for that long in cartel-controlled neighborhoods. If you don’t pay, it’s not safe to go outside your shelter.
Second, if people wanted to give up on the long wait for MPP, cartels offered “coyote” services: the chance to cross the border and try to evade Border Patrol. They charge several thousand dollars for that.
Third was kidnapping for ransom: cartels held people in horrific conditions, raping and torturing them, as their relatives—frequently in the United States—had to wire thousands of dollars to free them.
The financial scale of this exploitation is staggering. Let’s consider it. Take a conservative estimate of $1,000 per migrant in extortions, ransoms, or coyote fees—I ran that figure by some border-area experts and they laughed at how low that estimated amount is. Multiply that by 71,000 people in MPP, and you get $71 million in cartel profits, an amount equal to the annual base salaries of 1,000 U.S. Border Patrol agents.
For all that, Remain in Mexico didn’t really do that much to reduce or control migration.
For more than 10 years now, there’s been a series of crackdowns on asylum seekers. My testimony maps them out in a graphic. These crackdowns follow the same pattern: you get an initial drop in migration numbers, it lasts a few months, and then there’s a rebound.
Title 42 and its expansions? A classic example. So was “Remain in Mexico.”
After it expanded in June 2019, Border Patrol’s apprehensions did fall for four months. Then the migration numbers plateaued—at the same level they were in mid-2018. In fact, at the same level as the Obama administration’s eight-year monthly average. And that’s where the numbers stayed.
And then in the first months of 2020, Border Patrol apprehensions started rising. They were on pace to grow by a double-digit percentage from February to March. But then COVID came, and all but ended March 10 days early.
Title 42 ended up eclipsing Remain in Mexico: no more hearing dates; asylum seekers got expelled. Remain in Mexico became irrelevant and the Trump administration rarely used it again.
MPP also strained relations with Mexico. The Mexican government at first resisted the program, agreeing to it only after very heavy diplomatic pressure. This complicated cooperation on other shared priorities.
There are a lot of those priorities, from trade to fentanyl. Mexico is one of the ten largest countries in the world, with the 14th-largest economy. The border is just one reason why the United States needs good relations with Mexico.
Compelling Mexico to agree to a new Remain in Mexico takes bandwidth away from those priorities. Why do all that for a policy that actually enriches drug cartels? Why do all that for a policy that doesn’t even have a clear and lasting effect on migration?
Tune in at 9:00 Eastern on Thursday when I testify in the Senate Homeland Security Committee in opposition to proposals to restart the "Remain in Mexico" program.
Tune in at 9:00 Eastern on Thursday when I testify in the Senate Homeland Security Committee in opposition to proposals to restart the “Remain in Mexico” program.
Remain in Mexico was a human rights travesty. It enriched Mexican organized crime. It complicated U.S.-Mexico relations. And in the end, it didn’t do much to deter migrants.
I look forward to making all of those points in a few days. Wish me luck—and I apologize if not much gets posted here over the next few days while I prepare testimony.
Republican-led Congress Accelerating Border and Migration Agenda; Bracing for Executive Orders and “Mass Deportation”; Migration Appears to be Declining Ahead of Inauguration
With this series of weekly updates, WOLA seeks to cover the most important developments at the U.S.-Mexico border. See past weekly updateshere.
November data showed migration levels at the border continuing to decline following Donald Trump’s election, to such an extent that, for the first time, port-of-entry arrivals exceeded Border Patrol apprehensions. Still, some reports from Texas point to an increase in mid-December as some people try to reach U.S. soil before Inauguration Day. Rumors sent some migrants to attempt to turn themselves in at a border wall gate in El Paso, where state forces repelled them violently. Caravans continue to form in southern Mexico, but none remain intact beyond Mexico’s southernmost states.
As Trump administration officials ramp up plans to deport undocumented migrants on a massive scale likely requiring the use of military aircraft, concern is sweeping throughout communities where many families are “blended”: citizens living with non-citizens. Fear is spreading in south Texas, while council members and law enforcement in San Diego disagree on cooperation.
Conservative media and Donald Trump complained bitterly about the Biden administration’s auctioning off of border wall parts left over when construction halted after Joe Biden’s January 2021 inauguration. In fact, the selloff was mandated by the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act.
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