Americas Migration Brief - July 27, 2026
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Table of Contents
Integration and Development
🌎 Regional
Ipsos polling across 29 countries globally—including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru—finds Brazil as one of the most welcoming countries to refugees across the sample, highlights MigraMundo.
🇨🇴 Colombia
A World Bank working paper employing a fuzzy regression discontinuity design examines the impact of Colombia’s 2018 PEP regularization for Venezuelan migrants, finding that in the medium term, migrants eligible for regularization felt greater belonging, had more friendships with Colombians and greater community participation and attachment. “Economic gains, by contrast, arose immediately and largely persisted. Eligible migrants earned 69 percent higher monthly labor income, scored 2.6 standard deviations higher on a service access index, and made substantial investments in housing, with housing quality increasing from 0.60 to 1.27 standard deviations between survey waves. The implied fiscal savings to Colombia also increased over time.”
🇦🇷 Argentina
Although Argentina has historically adopted a relatively welcoming approach to immigration, the Milei government has taken a more restrictive stance inspired by Donald Trump in the US, says El País.
🇨🇦 Canada
A Canadian government report “provides a comprehensive overview of the diverse characteristics of Latin American populations in Canada. It examines key aspects, such as place of residence, age distribution, language, immigration characteristics, religious affiliation, educational attainment, employment and occupation, income levels and experiences of social inclusion. Many of these dimensions are further analyzed by country of birth, offering deeper insight into the varied trajectories and outcomes within Latin American communities.” (news release)
🇺🇸 United States
“Stepped-up immigration enforcement last year cost Los Angeles businesses millions of dollars, Brittny Mejia of the Los Angeles Times reports. Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a nonprofit in the city studied businesses within half a mile of nine sites of enforcement actions. In just the two weeks following those actions, customer visits were down by 46,000 and businesses lost an estimated $3.16 million. Almost a year later, 95% said they were still stressed financially, Mejia reports… The new research doesn’t stand alone. In the Houston Chronicle, columnist Chris Tomlinson points to multiple studies showing that immigration restrictions are hurting economies and costing jobs for people born here, too,” explains National Immigration Forum’s The Forum Daily.
“The Department of Homeland Security is correcting regulations released earlier this year to reinstate a 30-day processing time frame for asylum seekers’ initial work permit applications,” reports Bloomberg, explaining, “An interim final rule issued April 29 silently dropped a longstanding regulatory requirement for making decisions on asylum employment authorization applications.” (see AMB 7/13/26)
Asylum, Protection, and Human Rights
🌎 Regional
“Governments across (Latin America and the Caribbean) have experimented with a variety of tools to manage large-scale migration and displacement in a pragmatic way. These have ranged from regularisation programmes and integration initiatives to—more recently—refugee labour pathways and referral networks connecting displaced individuals to opportunities elsewhere,” explains an MPI policy brief issuing recommendations for Europe on the basis of experiences from the Americas in labor mobility and complementary pathways for protection.
🇻🇪 Venezuela
Following a pair of devastating earthquakes in Venezuela last month, “Nearly 23,100 people are currently in temporary camps across La Guaira, the Capital District, Miranda and Aragua,” notes UNICEF.
🇵🇦 Panama
“A 30-year-old Venezuelan man died in Panama after the bus he was traveling in with nine other migrants, who were part of a voluntary repatriation program, crashed, the Panamanian government reported Thursday,” reports EFE, explaining that as part of the program, migrants are bussed to the Darien Gap and then either take a US-funded flight or a boat to Colombia.
🇵🇪 Peru
“A 5.5-magnitude earthquake shook the Andes region of Peru, killing at least six people, authorities said yesterday. More than 30 people were injured and 300 have been displaced, reports the Guardian.” (via Latin America Daily Briefing)
🇩🇴 Dominican Republic
Video of Dominican immigration agents transporting a handcuffed Haitian migrant horizontally and precariously on motorcycle has gone viral, provoking outrage, according to France-Antilles.
🇺🇸 United States
More than 300,000 Haitian immigrants in the US are set to lose TPS today, July 27th. ICE is making plans for “a potential arrest and deportation blitz,” per CBS. “U.S. officials have warned the Haitian government that… they should expect at least two weekly flights returning a total of 250 people,” reports Miami Herald. Many are concerned about protection for Haitian deportees; see, for example, an opinion piece at The New Humanitarian and Miami Herald on criticisms from Congress.
An ACLU report “documents widespread civil rights violations carried out by immigration agents during the first year of President Trump’s second term.”
Chicago Sun-Times reports on the status of the city of Chicago’s efforts to hold US immigration agents accountable for abuses; “Police officials said the department had finalized internal procedures to implement the order, nearly five months after the mayor’s 30-day deadline. However, they wouldn’t say why it took so long.”
A Human Rights Watch and ACLU report documents abuses in an immigration detention center located on a military base in Texas.
Democrat-run cities and states rebuffing immigration detention may be counterproductive for their interests as migrants are instead relocated to Republican-run spaces, according to The Atlantic: “In addition to being more distant from family members, immigration courts in Texas and Louisiana have judges who reject asylum claims at some of the highest rates in the country, federal data show. And sanctuary cities such as New York and Chicago generally have more legal-aid organizations that can help ICE detainees get out of custody and fight deportation.”
“The Trump administration’s removal of more than 100 immigration judges is undermining the independence of the courts and the U.S. justice system, a panel of independent experts appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council said on Thursday.” (Reuters)
“Nearly two decades ago, Congress made a promise to unaccompanied immigrant children: if you come to the United States, your case will be heard in a court of law and you will have access to a lawyer. That commitment led to the creation of the Unaccompanied Children Program, with bipartisan support in Congress… Since President Trump returned to office, his administration has made a coordinated effort to weaken and disassemble longstanding legal aid programs for immigrant children while accelerating deportation proceedings,” per Securing America’s Promise.
“Kalshi Wants You to Bet on How Many People ICE Abducts Today: A CFTC filing obtained by Migrant Insider shows the exchange quietly built a market that lets traders wager on ICE’s daily arrest count with three confidential appendices the public never saw.” (Migrant Insider)
Migratory Institutions and Regional and Bilateral Cooperation
🇨🇷🇺🇸 United States and Costa Rica
Of 207 total third country deportees sent to Costa Rica by the US between March 2026 and July 2nd, 90 remain in the Central American country, reports La Nación, investigating the situation; “the individuals are staying at two hotels in San José… Costa Rica has not allocated any of its own resources for the lodging or upkeep of the relocated individuals… difficulties persist with language barriers and the recognition of immigration documents received by those who choose to remain in Costa Rica.” Only 6 of the deportees have reportedly applied for asylum in Costa Rica.
“One of the main criticisms is directed at the Assisted Voluntary Return program, administered by the IOM. According to an anonymous source, many people agree to return without fully understanding other protection options, such as the possibility of seeking asylum in Costa Rica.”
🇩🇴🇨🇱 Chile and Dominican Republic
Chile and Dominican Republic are establishing a joint investigation team against human trafficking and migrant smuggling, among other offenses. (El Caribe)
🇨🇷🇵🇦 Panama and Costa Rica
“The governments of Panama and Costa Rica have agreed to create a health card for the Panamanian Ngäbe Buglé indigenous people, who often migrate seasonally to (Costa Rica) to work in the coffee harvest, in order to share medical data and avoid duplicating vaccination schedules for minors,” notes EFE, adding, “beneficiaries will be able to present the document at Costa Rican health services to receive medical care with the support of their health history.”
🇨🇷🇪🇸 Spain and Costa Rica
Spain resettled 41 Nicaraguan refugees from Costa Rica. (EFE)
Labor Migration
🇨🇷 Costa Rica
“A pilot labour mobility initiative between Costa Rica and El Salvador facilitated the recruitment of 12 Salvadoran bus drivers with IOM’s technical support — a model that could be scaled up to help address an estimated shortage of more than 1,500 drivers in Costa Rica, while expanding regular labour mobility opportunities across the region, including for Costa Ricans seeking employment abroad,” notes IOM, adding that in Costa Rica, “Between 2025 and 2026, more than 15,000 agricultural migrant workers obtained temporary work permits through the Migrant Labour Traceability System (SITLAM), developed by IOM, and more than 500 companies received support to recruit migrant workers through labor inclusion programs.”
🇺🇸 United States
A paper by IFP’s Jeremy Neufeld “charts the alphabet soup of high-skilled immigration pathways—F-1/OPT, J-1, H-1B, O-1A, EB-1, EB-2, and EB-3—demonstrating how inflexible and outdated rules have undermined the scale, selectivity, and retention of global talent. It proposes reforms to make immigration a renewed national strength: expanding green cards, piloting a points-based system for permanent residency, and launching a government talent-scouting arm.”
A Fwd.us policy brief explains the elimination of Duration of Status for international students and others (see last week’s AMB), noting that the new policy will make it harder for employers to recruit US-educated international workers given disruptions to OPT.
Migrants in Transit
🌎 Regional
An IOM brief explores Cuban migration dynamics in Latin America and the Caribbean in 2026, highlighting growing arrivals to Brazil and Uruguay.
🇸🇻 El Salvador
“A total of 513 foreigners may reside permanently in El Salvador after receiving permanent residency in the first half of 2026…. The figure marks a significant difference compared to last year, when only 70 people obtained that permit,” says Infobae, adding, “Access to temporary residency also increased considerably. 1,509 foreigners received this status, far exceeding the 407 cases of the previous year.”
🇨🇼 Curaçao
“Curaçao gained over 2,400 inhabitants through migration in 2025. Approximately 5,900 people settled on the island, while nearly 3,500 left… Of the people who settled in Curaçao in 2025, nearly half came from the Netherlands. Venezuela ranked second with almost eighteen percent,” per official statistics consulted by Curaçao.nu.
🇵🇪 Peru
A UNFPA technical note examines internal and international migration in Peru with an emphasis on demographic trends.
Borders and Enforcement
🇧🇷 Brazil
Brazil’s Federal Police launched Operation Trapaceiros to investigate a network facilitating irregular Cuban migration to Brazil via Guyana (Globo; relatedly, see AMB 6/15/26)
🇺🇸 United States
“The Trump Administration is seeking construction companies to build additional immigration detention units in as many as 14 different locations in the United States, documents show—including the Virgin Islands and Guantanamo Bay,” reports Time
After months of not publishing data, ICE reports that “as of July 11, the agency currently holds 65,765 people in custody across the country—up from 60,311 on April 4 but is below the record high of 70,766 on January 24 of this year,” per Austin Kocher at his Substack.
“More than 100,000 people have received letters from the Homeland Security Department informing them that they owe $998 for each day that they have stayed in the United States after an immigration judge has ruled they have no legal right to remain in the country,” reports New York Times, noting, “Fines for failing to heed a “removal” order have been permitted since the passage of immigration legislation in 1996. Until President Trump, however, no commander in chief had imposed such penalties. The effort to do so in his first term ran into logistical obstacles and never gained traction.”
More on Migration
🇲🇽🇺🇸 United States and Mexico
A paper at World Development examines how border enforcement efforts impact development in countries of origin: the US Secure Communities program increased deportations of Mexican immigrants and made low-skill irregular migration less attractive in sending communities, in turn prompting increased school enrollment and attendance in affected Mexican municipalities.