Americas Migration Brief - January 19, 2026
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Table of Contents
Integration and Development
🇹🇹 Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago’s recently announced regularization program (see AMB 1/5/26) was set to begin this week but is reportedly now postponed, sparking uncertainty and concerns due to a lack of information surrounding procedures. (Guardian)
“Venezuelan advocates say nearly 20 Venezuelan migrants have been issued deportation orders for illegal entry since December, after approaching Immigration offices for information on the Government’s proposed migrant registration programme. The deportation orders have triggered anxiety and fear among migrants surrounding the registration process,” reports Guardian.
🇦🇼 Aruba
“More than 7,000 migrants in Aruba have registered for the “Together for Progress” program, an initiative developed by the island’s government to regularize and facilitate the labor integration of foreigners,” reports Crónicas del Caribe, noting that the most applications have been submitted by (in order) Colombians, Venezuelans, Dutch, Dominicans, Haitians, and Ecuadorians. (see AMB 12/29/25)
🇨🇷 Costa Rica
“An investigation led by the NGO Popol Na revealed that Nicaraguans naturalized as Costa Ricans in that country believe that most presidential candidates have exclusionary positions towards migrants… Of the 20 political parties that will compete for the presidency on February 1 in Costa Rica, 12 have proposals focused on migration, but 5 of them address it with an exclusionary focus and another 6 with a repressive approach or ‘with xenophobic positions,’” reports La Prensa. (see also last week’s AMB on candidates’ approaches to migration)
🇨🇱 Chile
Centro de Políticas Migratorias published a Migratory Tensions Index, a tool to measure social tensions and public opinion surrounding migration in Chile. The first study, looking at metro Santiago, finds that 17% of the region’s population lives in a situation of high migratory tension, notes Emol.
🇨🇦 Canada
“Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) has launched a temporary measure making it easier for Ukrainian nationals and their family members to extend their temporary resident status in Canada, allowing them to obtain work permits and study permits for which they otherwise would not normally be eligible,” reports CIC News.
Asylum, Protection, and Human Rights
🌎 Regional
“In a new report, the Mixed Migration Centre identified three possible outcomes for “Venezuela after Maduro”: mass returns following stabilisation, political opening, and economic opportunity; partial returns driven by economic incentives despite limited political change; and a rapid and significant displacement caused by more violence and power struggles,” reports The New Humanitarian, detailing the humanitarian situation on the ground in Venezuela currently. (see MMC report here; see also last week’s AMB)
Temporary protection remains the dominant response from regional governments to displaced Venezuelans, notes Alessandra Enrico Headrington for Oxford, adding, “Voluntary return is likely to remain limited rather than widespread, shaped by continued uncertainty in Venezuela and occurring alongside ongoing mobility, including new departures by groups that had previously stayed in the country, some of whom supported Nicolás Maduro.”
Dalton Price highlights at La Silla Vacía questions among Venezuelans about “when, for whom, and under what conditions it would be possible to return, stay, or leave.”
🇨🇴 Colombia
“Twelve months after the armed conflict in Catatumbo escalated sharply on the 16th January 2025, the violent territorial dispute shows no sign of abating in this volatile region bordering Venezuela. Ongoing clashes continue to claim new civilian victims and force people to flee their homes. It is estimated that 100,000 people were displaced by the violence since the escalation,” says NRC, noting, “This emergency is shattering both the lives of Colombians, as well as vulnerable Venezuelan refugees and migrants in the region.”
🇧🇷 Brazil
Brazil’s new regulations on humanitarian visas (see last week’s AMB) tie access to “the capacity to receive migrants through community sponsorship – where a civil society entity takes charge of receiving and assisting the migrant upon arrival in Brazilian territory,” reports MigraMundo, noting that currently “only Afghans have civil society institutions authorized to receive them.”
🇧🇴 Bolivia
The Guardian highlights how drought has displaced many in an Indigenous Bolivian community and placed its people “at risk of extinction.”
🇺🇸 United States
Amid a context of gross human rights violations by federal immigration enforcement officials (see, for example, last week’s AMB), the Trump administration is protecting officials from accountability for overreach and shifting towards “absolute immunity” in the words of the vice president. (The New York Times)
An immigrant’s death this month in custody is likely to be medically classified a homicide, reports Washington Post. And now, the Trump administration is moving to deport two witnesses, adds Washington Post.
“Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, denied in a televised interview on Sunday that her department had used pepper spray and similar tactics curtailed by a judicial order issued last week, then backtracked and blamed protesters after being confronted with a video of federal agents deploying such measures against crowds in Minnesota.” (Washington Post)
“We Found More Than 40 Cases of Immigration Agents Using Banned Chokeholds and Other Moves That Can Cut Off Breathing” (ProPublica)
A journalist at Slate was offered a job at ICE despite failing a drug test, not completing a background check, and several other irregularities: “By all appearances, the only thing ICE is screening for is a desire to work for ICE.” (see also Slate)
“Federal Agents Used a Battering Ram to Enter a Minneapolis Home Without Valid Warrant, Video Shows” (Reason)
Austin Kocher published at his Substack a “comprehensive resource library of KYR [know your rights] information for immigration enforcement encounters at home, work, school, healthcare facilities, and public spaces.”
“State and city officials in Minnesota and Illinois filed federal lawsuits against the Trump administration on Monday, claiming that the mass deployment of immigration agents to the Minneapolis and Chicago regions violated the U.S. Constitution and infringed on states’ rights,” reports New York Times.
The Trump administration is moving to end TPS for Somalia, affecting 1,082 current beneficiaries and a further 1,383 applicants. (CBS)
The Trump administration is shutting down the San Francisco Immigration Court, adding to already ballooning backlogs. (NPR)
“The number of ICE detention facility inspections dropped by 36.25% in 2025, even as detention rates — and deaths in ICE custody — surged across the nation,” reports POGO Investigates.
“Trump administration jails migrant teens in facility known for child abuse” (Washington Post)
Migratory Institutions and Regional and Bilateral Cooperation
🌎🇨🇱 Chile and Regional
Peruvian interim president José Jerí has rejected Chilean president-elect José Antonio Kast’s proposed “humanitarian corridor” to facilitate migrant returns, instead emphasizing that any new entries to or through Peru must be with full documentation. (El País, Diario UChile; see last week’s AMB, AMB 12/29/25)
The foreign ministers of Chile and Bolivia met to discuss migration, among other issues. (BioBioChile)
🌎🇺🇸 United States and Regional
“A plane carrying deported immigrants landed in Venezuela on Friday — the first removals from the United States since the Trump administration captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro,” reports Miami Herald.
“Secretary of State Marco Rubio told a federal judge he is unable to locate the more than 100 Venezuelans the Trump administration sent to be imprisoned in El Salvador, arguing against further hearings with the men as it would jeopardize “extraordinarily delicate” discussions with Venezuela’s new leadership,” reports The Hill.
The Trump administration announced that it would halt immigrant visa processing for citizens of 75 countries; “The suspension, which will begin Jan. 21, will not apply to applicants seeking non-immigrant visas, or temporary tourist or business visas, who make up the vast majority of visa seekers,” reports AP. Countries in the Americas affected by the new policy include Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Dominica, Grenada, Guatemala, Haiti, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Uruguay.
The move seems to have taken many regional governments by surprise. Local reporting by UOL in Brazil, for example, notes that no Brazilian officials—either in Brazil or Washington—were informed of the policy prior to the announcement.
A Cuban asylum seeker was deported by the US to Ecuador in the first such transfer under the two countries’ “safe third country” agreement. “Irma Ramirez, the attorney for Ramirez Gonzalez, argued he would face discrimination in Ecuador based on his identity as a member of the LGBTQ+ community,” reports Spectrum News.
There are more updates on “safe third country” agreements between the US and Caribbean nations (see also last week’s AMB):
St. Lucia has signed onto an agreement. “The full text of the MOU has not been released publicly, and authorities have not announced a timeline for any potential implementation,” reports Antigua News.
St. Kitts and Nevis has signed onto an agreement that explicitly denies the US sending Haitian nationals. (WIC News)
In Barbados, the foreign minister “indicated that while Barbados has not yet been formally approached by the US government, the country remains open to discussions,” reports Carib News. (see also Barbados Today)
Observer reveals more details surrounding the diplomacy leading up to Antigua and Barbuda’s agreement with the US.
“Belize and the United States have launched a new border security initiative aimed at strengthening immigration controls, a move government officials describe as a milestone in bilateral cooperation but which has drawn criticism from (Belizean) Opposition legislators over transparency and data privacy,” reports CNW, noting that the agreement includes sharing biometric data at ports of entry.
Cuban-US cooperation is solely related to “technical contacts on the issue of migration,” reports Reuters.
Labor Migration
🇨🇦 Canada
“Canada’s overall foreign worker and student numbers drop for the first time in years” (CIC News)
Migrants in Transit
🇧🇷 Brazil
Across the first thirteen days of 2026, Venezuelan entries into Brazil by land via Roraima decreased by more than 50% in comparison to last year, per a government press release.
🇺🇾 Uruguay
More Venezuelans exited than entered Uruguay in 2025—the first year with such a trend since 2010, reports El Observador, noting that overall net migration to Uruguay was positive due to historic levels of Cuban arrivals
🇺🇸 United States
“For the first time in at least half a century, more immigrants left the United States than entered last year, according to new estimates released Tuesday by economists at the Brookings Institution,” reports Washington Post. (see Brookings research here)
Borders and Enforcement
🇩🇴 Dominican Republic
“The Dominican Republic deported more than 370,000 Haitians in 2025, 37.4% more than in 2024.” (EFE)
🇧🇸 The Bahamas
“The Royal Bahamas Defence Force apprehended 440 migrants in 2025, a steep drop from 2,019 in 2024, as interceptions fell sharply across Cuban, Haitian and mixed-nationality routes tied to the Bahamas–Florida corridor,” reports The Tribune.
🇺🇸 United States
“On December 19, the Department of Homeland Security announced that it had deported 622,000 people since the start of the Trump administration. If true, it would represent the largest forced relocation of immigrants since the institutionalization of U.S. immigration controls in the late 1800s… But something is off. Way off. The administration has not provided a shred of evidence for how it is producing this number,” explains Austin Kocher at his Substack, digging into the data.
“There is a third scenario that I’m starting to think is the most likely. It’s plausible that DHS has thrown out everything we know about removals and returns data and has come up with their own secret math to make deportations look really high. If this is true, it would completely undermine the administration’s integrity on immigration data.”
“US revokes more than 100,000 visas since Trump’s return to office: The US State Department says visa revocations have more than doubled as President Trump continues his immigration crackdown.” (Al Jazeera)
An American Immigration Council report “aims to document the historic expansion of detention under the Trump administration. It details not only the policy changes which have led to ICE detention reaching the highest level on record, but also their impact on the individuals who have found themselves locked into it… As this report reveals, rather than focusing on serious public safety threats and flight risks, the Trump administration is primarily using detention to pressure people into giving up their chance to remain in the United States. As of November 2025, for every one person released from ICE detention pending a hearing or after being granted relief, 14.3 people were deported directly from ICE custody, up from a ratio of 1.6 in December 2024.”
“‘ELITE’: The Palantir App ICE Uses to Find Neighborhoods to Raid” (404 Media)
“While some efforts have stalled or not yet met the White House’s lofty goals, the administration has dramatically reshaped the machinery of government to target unauthorized immigrants in the country, deter unauthorized border arrivals, make the status of many legally resident immigrants more tenuous, and impose obstacles for lawful entry of large swaths of international travelers and would-be immigrants,” says MPI in a wide-ranging article breaking down the first year of the second Trump administration.