5 migration trends in the Americas to watch in 2025
Reviewing trends from 2024 and looking ahead to what to watch in the new year
Se puede acceder aquí a una versión en español traducida por inteligencia artificial.
Consulte aqui uma versão em português do boletim traduzida por inteligência artificial.
Migration continues to be among the most salient and controversial topics across the Americas, dominating news coverage and influencing political messaging and policy across the hemisphere. As I warned in last year’s 5 migration trends in the Americas to watch in 2024, migration was a key issue in elections in multiple countries this past year.
Let us begin with the obvious: Donald Trump won and is promising mass deportations from the US (more on that below). Further south, in Panama, José Raúl Mulino came to power promising to close the Darien Gap. While his rhetoric was not particularly important at the polls, he did strengthen cooperation with the US, culminating in a new memorandum of understanding to fund increased deportations from the Darien Gap.
In the Dominican Republic, for its part, incumbent president Luis Abinader used migration and anti-Haitian sentiment as an instrument to boost his successful re-election campaign. In the months since, the country has launched a mass deportation campaign that has seen over 55,000 forcibly repatriated in the span of just 45 days. Haiti’s crisis has remained just as dire—arguably worsening—with over 700,000 currently displaced by violence, more than double the figure from December 2023. This has led many to take to the sea, as news of maritime apprehensions or disappearances, particularly from Haiti and Cuba, remain a sadly frequent occurrence. Missing Migrants Project data from IOM reveals that at least 296 migrants died or disappeared in the Caribbean from January to October 2024, already surpassing 2023’s year end total.
Climate change has also continued to be a crucial concern in the hemisphere, with Hurricane Beryl wreaking havoc in the Caribbean, heavy rains and floods displacing nearly 600,000 in southern Brazil, and most recently Tropical Storm Sara lashing northern Central America, among other climate-related incidents. Ever-warming temperatures are becoming increasingly fatal for migrants in transit, too, including in the deserts along the US-Mexico border and Chile’s northern border.
Finally, integration has remained a vital task for countries across the Americas. The global anti-immigration turn has continued in 2024, and the Western Hemisphere has not been immune to xenophobia and ensuing restrictionist policy choices. Multiple countries have considered or implemented policies to limit access to services for some migrants, as seen in Chile and Peru. At the same time, though, other countries have implemented new regularization programs, as seen in Argentina, Colombia, and Ecuador—but advocates have expressed concern about short time horizons and inclusivity in certain cases. Investment and political will continue to come at a premium for immigrant integration, and efforts to (or impeding) that end should be closely followed.
Many of these same issues I had highlighted last year remain highly relevant, but in the spirit of putting forth new ideas and identifying those most salient for the current moment, the following is a non-exhaustive list of some some of the trends I am watching and believe will be key to follow to understand the migration landscape across the Western Hemisphere in the new year:
Trump’s “mass deportation” plans will have a ripple effect
The future of the LA Declaration is unclear
Interest in labor migration is growing
Peru faces a trio of pressures
Push factors for Cuban, Haitian, Nicaraguan, and Venezuelan migration persist
Trump’s “mass deportation” plans will ripple across the hemisphere. Implementation of Trump’s promises from the campaign trail will face a logistical and financial nightmare, not to mention lawsuits and battles in court undoubtedly to come. Many have written about this already, though, and so I will not belabor the point other than to highlight the challenge of getting Venezuela to accept deportation flights. This sort of diplomatic issue will become a key point of tension for Trump’s Latin America policy more broadly.
It is not yet clear to what magnitude the promised deportations will reach, but what is clear is that they will have a profound impact on the Americas. For countries set to likely receive a large number of deportees in a short period of time—particularly Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador—reception and reintegration will be an enormous challenge. If these migrants do not receive support and find opportunities upon return, they are vulnerable to attempting re-emigration or to organized crime recruitment (whether voluntary or involuntary). To the north, meanwhile, Canada is already bolstering its own border enforcement efforts, expressing concern that irregular migrants in the US may head their way to escape Trump’s presidency.
Trump’s restrictionist approach will also have wide-ranging impacts as it relates to border externalization. Externalization has been a bipartisan tradition across multiple presidencies and has even intensified under the Biden administration this past year with Mexico ramping up enforcement to unprecedented levels and multiple countries, including Ecuador and Brazil, implementing new visa restrictions for extracontinental migrants. But Trump will take it to new heights and will rely much more heavily on sticks than carrots. Trump’s externalization, as already seen with tariff threats against Canada and Mexico, is one not based on diplomacy but rather on coercion. Nicaragua and the future of the CAFTA-DR free trade agreement may also come under threat over the Central American country’s role as a gateway en route to the US for Caribbean and extracontinental migrants. In addition to trade-related threats over enforcement support, some analysts have also expressed concern that Trump may use visa sanctions to punish “recalcitrant” countries that are not “cooperating” with the reception of deportees, a practice previously used with several African and Asian countries during the first Trump administration. And in the case of struggles over accepting deportations, incoming Trump administration officials have reportedly already attempted to reach out to potential third-party countries in Central America and the Caribbean to accept deportees. The geopolitics of migration are set to become even more complicated than usual.
The future of the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection and its new secretariat is unclear. The institutionalization of the Declaration through the establishment of a technical secretariat earlier this year is an important step forward, but its significance will be dependent on the political will of the signatories. The Biden administration’s leadership has been a crucial mobilizer over the last couple of years, and it is not yet clear if the coalition will hold up under the Trump administration. To be clear, Latin American and Caribbean nations have also been at the forefront of the Declaration and played important roles both publicly and behind the scenes, but amid a crowded environment of competing multilateral venues for discussing migration across the hemisphere, the LA Declaration has always been a US-led initiative.
Now, Colombia has assumed the chairmanship of the secretariat for the next year and will host the fifth LA Declaration Ministerial in 2025. Some have expressed concern, though, about the level of involvement Colombia may take up, and if the LA Declaration’s advances can be maintained or strengthened. The Petro administration has been critiqued for a less attentive migration policy in comparison to the previous government, and the country’s migration agency has recently shuffled leadership with a temporary director currently in place.
In addition to questions of political will and leadership, the financial sustainability of the LA Declaration hangs in the balance. This past summer, the US State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM) published a notice of funding opportunity for the Declaration’s technical secretariat, but the future of the grant and potential for renewal is unclear.
Interest in labor migration pathways is growing. While support for refugees and humanitarian pathways has suffered in recent years, the need for labor migration has remained a key concern for governments and businesses alike. Offering economic opportunities for migrants, bringing remittances for sending countries, and filling labor gaps for receiving countries, labor pathways are frequently looked at as a win-win-win—that is, so long as safe and rights-respecting working conditions are maintained. Moreover, labor migration can serve as an important mechanism for complementary protection outside of the refugee system for those with humanitarian needs.
Several countries across the Americas face dire labor needs and aging demographics, including Chile, Mexico, Uruguay, and much of the Caribbean, among others. There are already many bilateral and multilateral mechanisms used to facilitate labor migration to, from, and within the region, and there is a clear appetite for developing further opportunities. Indeed, USAID announced earlier this year a new “Labor Neighbors” initiative to support temporary labor migration across the hemisphere, although the future of the initiative under the Trump administration is not yet clear. Even still, if there is any category of migration that best stands a chance at preservation and promotion under the Trump administration, it would be the temporary labor migration pathways that many US sectors—particularly agriculture—rely upon heavily. Chile, for its part, is building a platform to list job opportunities for migrant labor through its National Employment Exchange (Bolsa Nacional de Empleo). By facilitating formalized labor migration through access to information and connecting businesses to migrants pre-arrival, this initiative could become an important model for the region.
Peru faces a trio of pressures. Dina Boluarte has surprised most observers with her ability to remain in power since assuming the presidency in December 2022, when she became the seventh president in as many years. Her approval ratings remain abysmal at a paltry 4%, but it appears she is likely to continue to steer the ship until Peru’s 2026 presidential elections. Amid this context, Peru faces three unique human mobility trends at the moment worth keeping an eye out for: (1) an increasingly anti-immigrant rhetoric and restrictionist policy approach affecting the estimated 1.5 million Venezuelans in the country, (2) concern over the potential of Bolivian immigration, and (3) a young population keen on emigrating.
Peru hosts the second-largest Venezuelan diaspora, and Lima hosts enough Venezuelans alone to rank as the fifth-largest city in Venezuela. While the country initially adopted a welcoming approach that facilitated extraordinary regularization, the response has soured with time, as has public opinion. Despite data showing otherwise, Peruvians express concern that immigrants bring crime, often invoking the infamous Tren de Aragua. In addition to rhetorically linking Venezuelan migrants to crime, this October, Boluarte announced a new policy to require Venezuelans to present formal work and housing contracts, a high bar in a country characterized by informality. R4V movement reports from the first three quarters of 2024 that account for both regular and irregular entries and exits reveal that more Venezuelans are consistently leaving than entering Peru (an estimated total of 31,000 net exits over the nine-month period). In the grand scheme of things, with a total Venezuelan immigrant population estimated around 1.5 million, these numbers do not mean much, but they are indicative of the challenges Venezuelans are facing in terms of integration. The question becomes, will this restrictionist trend continue in the new year, and is it at risk of potentially worsening? Campaigning for the Spring 2026 elections will begin in 2025, and although no politician has adopted the mantle thus far, there is a risk that an anti-immigrant populist may look to use the issue to distinguish themselves in a typically crowded candidate field.
Peruvian media have particularly expressed concern in recent months about potential Bolivian immigration, as the economic and political situation in their neighboring country has deteriorated significantly. Bolivians, too, are at risk of becoming a rhetorical cudgel. That said, this low-level media hysteria appears unwarranted: Bolivians themselves are not indicating Peru among their top destinations of interest in polls. Furthermore, less than 5% of the Bolivian diaspora lives in Peru, with roughly two-thirds instead living in neighboring Argentina, Chile, and Brazil. With more robust networks for potential emigrants elsewhere, there is not a lot of reason to believe that Bolivians are going to start emigrating en masse to Peru—or even necessarily to other countries, either.
While immigration is certainly a salient topic for Peru, the question of emigration by Peruvians themselves is also relevant. Earlier this year, over a third of Peruvians reported to Gallup that it was “very probable” they would emigrate “if they had the resources.” Peruvian migration to the US via Mexico had spiked earlier this year but reached new lows after Mexico imposed visa restrictions in April. While there is certainly interest in emigration, the situation in the country is not bad enough to inspire a multi-country trek through the Darien Gap and beyond en route to the US. However, with insecurity on the rise around Lima and an ever-tumultuous political climate, Peruvian emigration trends could well change in the new year and should be monitored.
Push factors for Cuban, Haitian, Nicaraguan, and Venezuelan migration persist. The situations in these countries are not only not getting better, they are arguably getting worse. Cuba’s dictatorship has struggled in recent weeks with repetitive blackouts amid the worst economic crisis in decades, Haiti’s rudderless interim government has done little to stop an ever-worsening security crisis, Nicaragua’s dictatorship continues to create new repressive “reforms” to consolidate its power and squash dissidents, and Venezuela’s dictatorship looks set to reinforce its position with an inauguration in January based on a stolen election. Indeed, the new year in Venezuela, in particular, looks primed to provoke a new wave of emigration after potential would-be migrants have spent the holidays with family.
Importantly, though, the highly successful CHNV humanitarian parole program for these nationalities to enter the US is surely set to end under the Trump administration, and other countries across the hemisphere have similarly been taking up more restrictionist stances against immigration. Haitians, for example, have faced a mass deportation campaign from the Dominican Republic and rejection from neighbors such as the Bahamas, Jamaica, and Turks and Caicos. But Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela each face (variations of) political, economic, and security crises severe enough to drive citizens to flee whether borders are perceived as “open” or “closed”—restrictive policies are an insufficient deterrence in practice, and we can expect this migration to continue, albeit just through more dangerous and exploitative pathways than ever before. Brazil could prove a new regional leader, though, and also is worth watching. The Portuguese-speaking country has adopted a consistently welcoming approach to Venezuelans across multiple governments, as well as allowing a limited number of Haitians to access protection through humanitarian visas.
While the advent of the Trump administration portends a more restrictionist approach from Washington, that does not dictate the policies adopted elsewhere in the Americas. Latin America and the Caribbean stepped up massively in response to Venezuelan exodus during the first Trump administration, and a restrictionist future for the hemisphere is not a done deal. Beyond national politics, too, local leaders are increasingly taking up innovative initiatives to respond to migration, and they will play a key role in the migration-related policies to be developed in the new year and beyond. Much has been said about what 2025 holds, but the future is yet to come and uncertainty remains the only certainty.