Guatemala has received its first deportation flight from the United States carrying not only Guatemalan citizens but also migrants from another country, as part of President Donald Trump’s
intensified crackdown on immigration.
The flight arrived in Guatemala City on Friday, according to the country’s migration authority (IGM). On board were 56 Guatemalan nationals and three Hondurans. The Honduran migrants were transferred to a migration centre before being sent back to their own country.
The Guatemalan government confirmed that it remains willing to receive deported citizens from neighboring Central American countries as part of its ongoing cooperation with the Trump administration.
Earlier this year, President Bernardo Arévalo’s administration agreed to expand the number of deportation flights Guatemala would accept. The deal came after a visit from U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, during which Arévalo also signaled openness to taking in some non-Guatemalan deportees from the U.S.
This marks a continuation of deportation operations that began earlier in Trump’s current term, with flights returning Guatemalan nationals since January.
Last month, a U.S. federal judge temporarily blocked the deportation of unaccompanied Guatemalan children who still have active immigration cases, allowing their asylum requests to be processed first. The children remain in federal custody.
President Arévalo criticized that ruling, saying he intends to move forward with a pilot program designed with the Trump administration to repatriate those minors.
Meanwhile, White House immigration adviser Stephen Miller denounced the court’s decision, insisting it undermines the government’s broader deportation strategy.
During the previous Biden administration, Guatemala received roughly 14 deportation flights per day. Reuters reports that nearly 66,000 Guatemalans were deported from the U.S. in fiscal year 2024 — the highest number in recent years.
Curbing migration has been one of Trump’s top priorities in his second term. His administration has urged Central American and Caribbean nations to cooperate with U.S. deportation policies.
In December, Trump approached several Caribbean governments — including the Bahamas, Grenada, and the Turks and Caicos Islands — asking them to accept migrants from third countries. Those nations declined.
Then in June, the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for Trump’s administration to resume deporting migrants to countries other than their homeland — even if they claim they could face danger there. Photo by Carlosmanuel232, Wikimedia commons.
