Americas Migration Brief - April 13, 2026
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Table of Contents
Integration and Development
🇵🇪 Peru
An INEI survey of a probabilistic, representative sample of 3,680 Venezuelan migrant households across 8 Peruvian cities reveals that 16.5% of Venezuelans were in an irregular migratory status at the time of the study in 2024. Other findings include that over 36% of Venezuelan adults had some degree of higher education, 60.5% had at least one account with a financial institution, and nearly 89% of those working were doing so informally. (technical report, El Pitazo coverage)
🇨🇱 Chile
Felipe González Morales, former UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants, writes at El Mostrador that the Kast administration’s proposed law to restrict access to benefits and public services for irregular migrants—recently passed in the Senate (see AMB 3/30/26)—“presents a series of very problematic aspects from the point of view of International Law and the guarantee of human rights.”
Asylum, Protection, and Human Rights
🌎 Regional
An IMUMI and UC Berkeley Human Rights Clinic report examines “how the climate crisis is driving forced displacement from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua, with a disproportionate impact on women and marginalized communities.” Recommendations include calling for the Mexican state to “guarantee the regular delivery of the Visitor Card for Humanitarian Reasons (TVRH) to people affected by the adverse effects of climate change.” (press release)
🇲🇽 Mexico
“In Mexico, more than 300,000 people have been displaced in recent years. Although violence associated with organized crime captures public attention, the lack of guarantees for the rights of LGBTIQ+ people is also generating internal displacement that remains insufficiently documented and addressed,” highlights ZonaDocs.
🇧🇷 Brazil
A HUMANVISA project report, based out of University of Sheffield, maps Brazil’s humanitarian visa policy and relevant actors, noting that these visas are simultaneously “A safe pathway for access to international protection” and “Policies that follow a logic of austerity and the outsourcing of responsibilities to civil society organisations.” They find humanitarian visas to be both a mechanism for protection and an instrument of migration control. Recommendations include “Treating humanitarian visas as complementary to asylum, allowing persons to apply for asylum and residence authorisation for humanitarian reception concomitantly to enjoy both types of protection,” and “Improving family reunification visa procedures so that they are clear, facilitated, rapid, and with the possibility of appeals in case of refusals, so that humanitarian visas need not be used as an alternative mechanism to reunite families in Brazil.” (see also related piece at MigraMundo)
🇧🇿 Belize
Belize is looking to facilitate easier access to the asylum system, working to “establish a referral system especially with immigration officers and police officers who are more likely to come across asylum seekers in Belize… If they are informed on what to look out for to identify asylum seekers then they can refer these persons to (the Refugees Department),” per an official quoted by 7News.
🇭🇹🇩🇴 Dominican Republic and Haiti
“The Collectif Défenseurs Plus, a human rights organization, denounces the silence of the Haitian government in the face of the acceleration of repatriations and deportations of Haitians, carried out by the Dominican authorities in conditions deemed inhumane,” reports AlterPresse.
🇺🇸 United States
“3-year-old immigrant was sexually abused in federal custody, lawsuit alleges: The girl was separated from her mother at the border and kept in foster care for months even though her father, a legal permanent resident, had been seeking her release.” (NBC)
“ICE Agents Shoot Into a Car, Injuring a Suspect in Northern California: A federal official said the agents were pursuing a wanted gang member who tried to run one of them over. Dash cam video complicates the account.” (New York Times)
“ICE Reports 15th Detained Death of 2026 at Miami Correctional Center in Indiana” -- this continues the consistent trend of one death in ICE custody every 6.0 days, notes Austin Kocher at his Substack.
Relatedly, a San Francisco Chronicle investigation reveals that “at least 17 people in ICE custody died after medical staff delayed or failed to provide critical care that might have saved their lives.”
“A federal judge in Massachusetts blocked, for now, the end of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Ethiopians in the United States, reports Nate Raymond of Reuters. The judge wrote that the administration did not follow the lawful process for ending TPS and that “armed conflict and natural disasters continue to create dangerous conditions” in Ethiopia.” (via National Immigration Forum’s The Forum Daily)
“DHS is using powerful spyware cyber weapon Graphite to surveil suspected migrants, journalists, activists, and critics, according to an official DHS response to members of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform after they requested information on surveillance by ICE. Graphite is a more modern and powerful version of Pegasus, which is banned in the United States,” explains Pirate Wire Services.
“Temporary Protected Status protects families while also boosting the U.S. economy: Newly updated analysis finds that TPS helps protect hundreds of thousands of families while also filling worker gaps in the U.S. workforce.” (Fwd.us)
“Dozens of US and international human rights organizations are decrying the Trump administration’s plans to establish a migrant “camp” for fleeing Cubans at the Guantánamo Bay military base if the island nation’s crisis worsens under pressure from the US, according to a letter to members of Congress on Friday,” notes The Guardian.
🇨🇦 Canada
Following the passing of Bill C-12 (see AMB 3/30/26), the Canadian government has sent letters to some 30,000 asylum applicants telling them they may not be eligible for asylum. (CBC)
“Artificial intelligence is being used to bolster immigration and asylum cases in Canada by generating fake narratives, including references to fabricated court decisions. Both the federal department, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), and the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB), an independent tribunal that rules on asylum applications, say they have detected the use of AI in applications containing fake or inaccurate information,” reports The Globe and Mail.
Migratory Institutions and Regional and Bilateral Cooperation
🌎🇺🇸 United States and Regional
“Costa Rica received 25 foreign nationals deported by the United States on Saturday afternoon, as part of the memorandum of understanding signed at the end of March… The migrants are from Albania, Cameroon, China, Guatemala, Honduras, India, Kenya, and Morocco,” reports La Nación, noting, “The IOM offered its cooperation to migrants so that, free of charge, they receive lodging, food and humanitarian assistance during the first seven days of their stay in the country, starting from their entry… Those who, during the first seven days after their arrival, express their desire to remain in Costa Rica may do so legally. A temporary immigration regularization program will be authorized for humanitarian reasons. The DGME added that migrants may, at any time, apply for the special refugee category, complying with the ordinary procedures established in the legislation.” Diario Extra adds that the temporary regularization would be for a one-year period. This comes after Costa Rican officials previously asserted that the country would not accept any Latin American deportees and would specifically try to accept nationalities uninterested in remaining in the country. (see last week’s AMB)
“Preparations may already be underway for Belize to receive an initial group of migrants under the Safe Third Country Agreement with the United States, with indications that international support has been mobilized to assist in the process. Sources within government have indicated that (UNHCR) has reportedly secured funding from the United States to support the accommodation of a first round of transferees,” reports LoveFM. However, “Minister of Foreign Affairs Francis Fonseca pushed back against the reports, stating that Belize has not yet reached the stage of receiving migrants under the agreement.”
“Last year the U.S. Trump administration struck a deal with El Salvador’s government to deport hundreds of immigrants — mostly Venezuelan — to an infamous maximum security prison built by President Nayib Bukele. The benefits for the Trump administration’s migration crackdown were evident. Bukele’s goals, beyond currying favor with Donald Trump, were less evident; he obtained the repatriation of gang leaders detained in the U.S. who could provide incriminating evidence regarding past negotiations with MS-13. A new documentary by Frontline and El Faro delves into the “deal within a deal”,” explains Jordana Timerman at the Latin America Daily Briefing.
“Ultimately, Bukele was not pleased with the outcome of the CECOT deal with the Trump administration, according to James Bosworth. “His government expected gang members, but instead received many innocent Venezuelan migrants who had no criminal record or ties to Tren de Aragua. While Bukele has no problems detaining innocent Salvadorans, the high level of attention and backlash on the Venezuela issue caused him some reputation damage both in his country and the region. Bukele blames the Trump administration for not sending the right people, whether they maliciously lied or simply didn’t care. That dispute is the reason that additional transfers of migrants have not occurred.” (Latin America Risk Report)”
“The United States is negotiating with three countries to take over the nearly one thousand Afghans who have been stuck in (a) camp located at a former U.S. military base in Qatar, report Robbie Gramer and Michelle Hackman of The Wall Street Journal. After the halt of visa processing and relocations for Afghan nationals in November, people in the camp are in legal limbo. Initially, the Trump administration set March 31 as deadline to shut down the camp, but after missing the deadline, it’s looking for alternatives including some economic incentives for people to move back to Afghanistan, the Journal reports.” (via The Forum Daily)
The new foreign minister of Mexico, Roberto Velasco, discussed migration and security issues over the phone with his US counterpart, Marco Rubio. (El Economista)
Labor Migration
🇨🇦 Canada
“More than 400 US-trained doctors, nurses, and other healthcare workers have made the move to British Columbia (B.C.) in the past year — thanks to new rules that make it faster and easier to get licensed and start working,” reports CIC News.
🇺🇸 United States
The New York Times highlights the impact of the Trump administration’s changes to the H-1B skilled worker program: “The effects have been uneven across employers, with the burdens falling most heavily on smaller firms, nonprofits and rural hospitals that are having a harder time gaining access to the program because they cannot cover the costs anymore.”
The Trump administration has “systematically (restricted) many of the visa pathways that admit workers and family members to the United States, dramatically slowing the legal immigration system,” says MPI, breaking down “Step by Step, Unprecedented Efforts to Slow Legal Immigration.”
However: “While these actions have stymied many forms of legal immigration, the administration is facilitating entry through selected streams at the high- and low-income ends. Applications are open for the Trump “gold card,” which offers permanent residence for those who pledge to contribute $1 million to the government upon approval. The administration also has worked to facilitate seasonal immigration of generally low-wage temporary workers on H-2A agricultural worker visas and H-2B nonagricultural visas. It lowered the wage levels required for H-2A workers, tried to streamline the application process, and restored waivers of in-person interviews for H-2A visa renewals. It also opted to maximize use of a congressional option to expand H-2B visas, nearly doubling the number available.”
Migrants in Transit
🌎Regional
A Georgetown ISIM and CLAS report “examines the impact of changes in US policies on the transit countries with particular attention to the cuts in US assistance, the closing of the US border, deportations and the likely taxation of remittances sent home by migrants.” The report covers all countries along the transit migration path from Colombia north to the US.
UNHCR surveyed a non-representative sample of Venezuelan migrants residing in several South American countries and Guatemala, finding that “35% expressed an inclination to return to Venezuela: 9% with immediate intent (within 12 months), 10% considering the move, and 16% expressing a general preference for repatriation. Family reunification drives return aspirations, but most respondents indicate that return would require major economic and political stabilization in Venezuela.”
On a similar note, The New York Times highlights challenges some Venezuelans in the US face should they want to return home: “Many Venezuelans… had their passports confiscated when entering the United States, under a longstanding federal policy to speed up deportation should they be denied asylum — leaving them unable to fly home. Venezuelan officials require a valid passport or a government-issued travel permit for entry by airplane. This document is available only in Caracas, Venezuela’s capital, or in select consulates in Latin America, which have been overwhelmed by such requests.”
🇧🇷 Brazil
Oiapoque, a small city in the Brazilian Amazon, is receiving an influx of internal migrants looking for work in newly licensed offshore drilling efforts. (AP)
🇰🇾 Cayman Islands
Cayman Compass highlights the story of one Cuban’s maritime journey en route to the Caymans.
Borders and Enforcement
🇵🇪 Peru
The Peruvian government has declared a 60-day state of emergency along the country’s border with Chile, aiming to “restore internal order through strict territorial control to combat organized crime, irregular migration, and illicit trafficking,” per RPP. Efforts to combat migration and other concerns include the use of drones, thermal cameras, and light armored vehicles, as well as “the implementation of a physical blockade and armed surveillance of all informal entry points identified by intelligence. Likewise, the decree mentions that foreign citizens attempting to enter the national territory through unauthorized locations will be immediately returned, while the National Police and the Armed Forces will conduct permanent and continuous motorized patrols along the entire border line.” (see also BioBioChile)
🇹🇹 Trinidad and Tobago
A group of 13 Venezuelan migrants were apprehended off the coast of Trinidad and Tobago, reports Daily Express.
🇺🇸 United States
“A federal judge on Friday declined to block the Trump administration from rushing deportations of Somali migrants, despite finding the administration had most likely singled out the community for quicker removal hearings,” notes New York Times.
“Detention numbers have declined considerably to about the levels at the end of FY 2025 in September 2025—so the lowest in six months…. even with the decline, these numbers are at historical levels and that it’s not unusual for detention numbers to fluctuate. Still, this is quite a decline,” writes Austin Kocher at his Substack, explaining, “the decline in detention numbers comes from some combination of fewer immigrants without criminal histories are being arrested and possibly more are being released.”
“For the first time I can recall, for as long as I’ve been looking at detention data, the total number of people with criminal convictions is now the smallest of the three groups [the other two groups being those with pending criminal charges and “other immigration violators”]. It’s not by much, but if you’re looking for another data point that contradicts the administration’s wild claims about “the worst of the worst”, there you have it. Remember that these are ICE arrests only; I do not include CBP arrests in this data.”
“New Data Reveals ICE Has Set Aside $257 Million to Pay Local and State Law Enforcement” -- as part of the 287(g) program (Fwd.us)
“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested more than 800 people following tips shared by federal airport security officials from the start of Donald Trump’s presidency through February 2026,” reports Reuters.