US Immigration Policies and Migration in Transit Countries

By enacting restrictionist policies, the U.S. has considerably limited access to legal immigration pathways and left those with pending appointments in limbo.

Broad US Immigration Policy Shifts

U.S. immigration policy shifts under the second Trump administration have significantly reshaped migration dynamics across the Americas. These changes extend beyond individual policy adjustments and reflect a broader effort to reduce migration from Latin America to the United States.

Upon taking office in January 2025, President Donald Trump implemented a series of policies aimed at reducing migrant arrivals at the U.S.-Mexico border as well as the number of migrants in the country.  Among the most significant changes were the intensification of deportation efforts, removal of the legal status of some migrants already present in the United States, and near elimination of asylum processing.

The right to seek asylum at the border, which had already been tightened under the Biden administration, has effectively become nonexistent. As a result, thousands of migrants now have no legal avenue to seek protection from instability in their countries of origin. With asylum at the border largely foreclosed, migrant encounters have declined significantly. According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data, fewer than 9,000 encounters occurred in December 2025, compared with a record high of nearly 250,000 encounters in December 2023.

This policy effectively ending asylum processing has been accompanied by a sweeping mass deportation campaign and efforts to encourage self-deportation through financial incentives, government-organized flights, and public messaging aimed at prompting voluntary departures. At the same time, the Trump administration revoked the legal status of numerous migrants in the U.S., including those with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) and humanitarian parole.

Since the beginning of the second Trump administration, over 900,000 migrants have lost their legal status, leaving them vulnerable to deportation. The result of such actions is already evident. In early 2026, The New York Times, based on U.S. Census data from 2025, reported that U.S. population growth has slowed sharply as immigration numbers have declined.

Impacts on Transit Countries

While public debate has primarily focused on migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border and within the United States, far less attention has been paid to the hundreds of thousands of migrants who were still in transit at the time of the border closure in January 2025, including approximately 270,000 in Mexico.

This policy brief examines how U.S. immigration measures have affected transit countries, such as Mexico and the Northern Triangle countries of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, which are receiving large numbers of returnees and facing limited capacity to provide reintegration support.

The analysis focuses on four key areas: 

• U.S. border closure and asylum suspension.
• Changes in migration patterns and “reverse flow.”
• Deportations and voluntary returns.
• Impacts on countries of origin and transit.

US Border Closure and Asylum Suspension

Before taking office in 2025, Trump promised to restrict immigration and reverse numerous Biden-era policies. In his first year, the administration implemented more than 500 actions on immigration, including 38 executive orders. On his first day in office, Trump issued an executive order (EO), titled “Securing Our Borders,” that terminated the use of the CBP One app and ended the humanitarian parole program. This EO represented the administration’s first large push to dismantle regular migration pathways, as these programs had allowed 529,000 individuals from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela to enter the country legally under the prior administration.

The CBP One app was used by the Biden administration to allow asylum seekers to schedule appointments and be screened at ports of entry (POE), becoming the primary method for accessing an asylum appointment at the border. The elimination of the app meant that 30,000 existing appointments held by migrants waiting to access POEs were immediately cancelled.

Published alongside the “Securing Our Borders” measure, the EO, “Protecting the American People Against Invasion,” declared — what the directive characterizes as — an “unprecedented flood of illegal immigration” at the southern border and ordered the suspension of migrants’ and asylum seekers’ entry into the U.S. until said “invasion” had ceased. These measures left hundreds of thousands of migrants stranded in Mexico, many of them without options to return home safely or to go elsewhere.

From the Trump administration’s perspective, these policies have been effective, significantly reducing the number of people arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border. Compared with previous years, the decline is substantial. According to CBP data, fiscal years (FY) 2023 and 2024 saw border encounters between 2.1 and 2.5 million, while FY2025 dropped to 443,671 encounters. By enacting restrictionist policies, the U.S. has considerably limited access to legal immigration pathways and left those with pending appointments in limbo.

Changes in Migration Patterns and ‘Reverse Flow’

As expert scrutiny and public disapproval of the Trump administration’s restrictive policies have grown, the traditional south-north immigration landscape in the Americas has shifted. As a result, hundreds of thousands of migrants halted plans to resettle in the United States.

Impacts on Transit Countries’ Local Economies

The Darién Gap, a treacherous stretch of the migration route connecting South and Central America, has seen a substantial decrease in irregular crossings. In FY2024, the number of irregular crossings totaled 302,203; in FY2025, that number fell to 2,982, with reported lows of just seven individual crossings in July and August.

Transit communities across the Americas have been affected by this sharp decline. Historically, they have benefitted from migration movements, as migrants generate economic activity in areas that would otherwise see less commerce. With fewer and fewer migrants passing through these would-be hubs, local economies — including those of Indigenous communities — have experienced negative impacts.

The few migrants who have decided to continue their journey northward through the Darién Gap have also been affected by the decrease in migrant crossings. As fewer migrants are requesting their services, human smugglers are beginning to increase the price for their transportation services, with some charging upward of $18,000 U.S. dollars per migrant.

Importantly, Mexico and Panama have cooperated with U.S. demands in stemming these migration flows. Mexico has prevented migrants from reaching the border by increasing enforcement, busing migrants further south, and other measures. Panama has taken steps to close the Darién Gap. Both countries have done so largely in response to pressure, including threats of imposing tariffs and seizing territory, from the Trump administration.

Recent Trend of ‘Reverse Flow’

Migrants who began their journey to the U.S. before the border closure in January 2025 were stranded, forced to choose between remaining in transit countries — such as Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, Panama, and Costa Rica — or returning to their countries of origin. Whereas some migrants chose to stay in transit countries with the hope that future U.S. entry would be possible, others face limited options due to increased regional securitization and a lack of resources to continue their journey. Those stranded remain vulnerable to insecurity, abuse, and exploitation, compounded by limited legal documentation and restricted access to opportunities and services.

Those who reversed their journeys, or sought to remain in the country they currently occupied, were primarily motivated by the suspension of migration pathways to the U.S. as well as the perception that U.S. entry would no longer be a viable option. Although permanent changes in migration dynamics across the Americas are too early to fully assess, north-south return — also known as “reverse flow” — increased substantially in 2025.

Since the start of the second Trump administration, 14,000 migrants have crossed southward through the Darién Gap. A recent study from the Mixed Migration Centre found that migrants moving south were headed mostly to South American countries, with 59% of respondents returning to their countries of origin and 41% planning to move to a different country. This latter group is largely comprised of Venezuelan nationals seeking to settle in Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, and Chile.

For those who remain in transit countries or attempt to settle in third countries, integration will likely be challenging. While anti-immigration sentiments have steadily grown in Latin America over the last decade, the staunch anti-immigration position enacted by the Trump administration has influenced migration policies further south, contributing to increased tensions in receiving communities. For example, Venezuelans, who had generally been embraced by governments in the region — particularly Colombia — now encounter more restrictive border policies, prejudice, and limited opportunities.

Deportations and Voluntary Returns

North-south migration does not originate solely in transit countries. According to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), almost 3 million unauthorized migrants have left the United States, including 2.2 million self-deportations and over 675,000 formal deportations as of January 2026.

These self-deportations have been further encouraged by a new federal incentive program offering travel assistance and a $1,000 so-called “exit bonus” — recently raised to $2,600 — to migrants who agree to depart the United States voluntarily, increasing the number of returns beyond formal removals. In order to receive financial assistance, migrants must register through the CBP Home app and inform CBP of their intent to leave the country.

At the same time, intensified interior enforcement operations by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) now exceed border removals and have expanded beyond individuals with criminal records. Self-deportation may also be a consequence of the more difficult conditions faced by undocumented migrants due to the Trump administration’s policies. This pressure is particularly evident in key locations of concentrated ICE activity, such as Los Angeles, Chicago, and more recently, Minneapolis.

The termination of key legal protections and programs, including TPS and humanitarian parole for multiple nationalities, has instantly revoked the legal status of hundreds of thousands of migrants and put them at risk of deportation. The end of TPS for Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Hondurans, and others in 2025 left more than 850,000 people without status, increasing the pool of individuals potentially targeted by enforcement.

Impacts on Countries of Origin and Transit

Deportee Programs

Countries across the region have had to rapidly develop mechanisms to absorb the increasing number of deportees from the U.S. Beginning in January 2025, Mexico opened additional return-reception centers, particularly in northern cities, to provide basic services to arriving deportees.

These centers complement the long-standing program México te abraza (“Mexico Embraces You”), operated by Mexico’s National Migration Institute, which provides deportees with temporary identification, transportation assistance, health screenings, and referrals for employment or social services. Conditions in Mexico, however, remain challenging for migrants. Many have chosen to return to their countries of origin or to settle in Mexican cities with less cartel activity. The government has also facilitated self-deportation measures to allow migrants to return to their countries of origin.

Guatemala and Honduras have also implemented returnee-assistance programs. In Honduras, the Hermano, vuelve a casa (“Brother, Come Home”) plan offers returning migrants a cash bonus of $100 U.S. dollars, food support, and a seed grant of $1,000 for entrepreneurship. In Guatemala, the Retorno al hogar (“Return Home”) plan provides deportees with humanitarian aid upon arrival, transport assistance (or aid to reach their home community), as well as connections to state-run employment, education, and housing programs as part of reintegration efforts.

However, these programs face persistent challenges, including limited sustained funding and constrained government capacity in the region to meet returnees’ needs. International and civil society organizations have historically filled gaps in reintegration services in Mexico and Central America, largely relying on U.S. funding. Recent reductions in U.S. foreign aid have further strained already under-resourced reception and reintegration programs.

In Honduras, the reduction of roughly $13.7 million in U.S. humanitarian aid forced the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) to cut approximately 75% of its staff on the ground. In Mexico, a 60% reduction in aid prompted the closure of multiple offices within the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

Third-Country Deportations

These pressures extend beyond countries of origin to transit countries as well. The United States has increased deportations of third-country nationals, using transit-country infrastructure as a stopgap to deport migrants who are not accepted by their countries of origin. As of February 2026, 15 countries have agreed to accept deportees from the U.S. — and 10 additional countries are close to signing agreements — in exchange for funding or diplomatic concessions. Countries such as Panama and Costa Rica have received hundreds of migrants deported from the U.S. with no ties to these countries, including individuals from Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa.

This outsourcing practice has drawn criticism for its potential to result in harmful treatment and serious human rights abuses, particularly because the U.S. relinquishes responsibility once deportees leave U.S. airspace. Third-country deportation actions have also faced legal scrutiny, with a federal judge ruling in February 2026 that the practice is “unlawful.”

Long-Term Effects of US Immigration Policy

The Trump administration unveiled a coherent set of policies early in its tenure to both curb migration to the United States and reduce the migrant population within the country. Both policy tracks have largely achieved their stated goals of limiting migration. Less examined, however, is how these policies directly affect transit countries and broader migrant populations, particularly individual’s ability to access asylum in the United States.

The Trump administration’s policies have pressured countries such as Mexico and Panama to cooperate with U.S. policy objectives, representing a clear outward projection of domestic and foreign policy priorities. South-north migration flows have also shifted, leaving hundreds of thousands of migrants unable to reach the United States without addressing the underlying drivers of migration.

The immigration policies implemented in 2025 are likely to have long-term consequences, not only for demographic trends in the United States but also for migrants who may face limited economic opportunities and security in their countries of origin or in the transit countries where they may decide to settle.

Acknowledgments

Parts of this policy brief are based on a conversation with Elizabeth Ferris, a research professor with the Institute for the Study of International Migration at Georgetown University and a nonresident fellow at the Baker Institute Edward P. Djerejian Center for the Middle East, as well as the preliminary findings of a report on transit migration published by Georgetown University.

This publication was produced by Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. Wherever feasible, the material was reviewed by outside experts prior to release. Any errors or omissions are solely the responsibility of the author(s).

This material may be quoted or reproduced without prior permission, provided appropriate credit is given to the author(s) and Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. The views expressed herein are those of the individual author(s) and do not necessarily represent the views of Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.