Americas Migration Brief - June 2, 2025
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Table of Contents
Integration and Development
🌎 Regional
“Latin America and the Caribbean face growing challenges in labor migration and human mobility. The lack of recognition of the labor skills of migrants and refugees hinders their integration into decent work and undermines their productive potential in host economies,” per an ILO technical note exploring opportunities for regional mutual recognition of labor competency certifications.
🇲🇽 Mexico
“Roughly seven in ten migrants who failed to cross into the U.S. after President Donald Trump was sworn in on January 20 are now choosing to remain in Mexico rather than return to their countries of origin, according to IOM.” (Latin Times)
“Obstacles to integration include lack of legal documents and economic hardship. In response, IOM has been organizing consular fairs to help migrants from countries like El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala obtain the identification necessary for work permits and school enrollment.”
“Mexico built a large shelter near the U.S. border in anticipation of mass deportations promised by President Trump, but the deportations have not occurred at the expected levels… While the shelter remains largely empty, the Mexican government has no plans to reduce its capacity” as it looks to remain prepared to reintegrate deportees. (El Paso Times)
🇦🇷 Argentina
The Milei administration has published the previously reported decree that adopts a more restrictionist approach to migration, notes Buenos Aires Herald. (see AMB 5/19/25)
“Constitutional lawyer Juan Sola questioned the legality and approach of the National Government's decree tightening immigration policy and warned of its authoritarian nature,” reports Perfil, highlighting Sola’s argument that immigration policy should be constructed through democratic and legislative debate, not executive action.
🇨🇱 Chile
“Carolina Tohá proposed a "cautious regularization" to address irregular migration in Chile. She indicated that 180,000 registered immigrants could be regularized immediately, having been held back by political pressure,” reports El Mostrador, adding, “Tohá also acknowledged that there would remain a group of migrants who did not register out of fear, which will require additional measures.”
🇹🇹 Trinidad and Tobago
“Calls for a migrant policy that effectively assesses and addresses the population of Venezuelan migrants living and working in Trinidad and Tobago have been renewed by local stakeholders, who say they are unsure of how the recently elected United National Congress (UNC) Government will address the issue,” including the previous migrant regularization program that has been annually renewed but not redesignated. New prime minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar has previously indicated plans “to take aggressive action against all illegal Venezuelan migrants,” per Daily Express.
🇯🇲 Jamaica
Jamaica is “launching a national technical working group aimed at managing the reintegration of both voluntary and involuntary returnees,” reports CNW.
🇪🇨 Ecuador
An open access book chapter explores narratives of Venezuelan migrants as “victims and threats” in Ecuador. (via Forced Migration Current Awareness)
Asylum, Protection, and Human Rights
🌎 Regional
“Police in St. Vincent and the Grenadines said they found a boat beached on the shore of Canouan island carrying the remains of what they believed to be 11 people who may be from Mali, reports Reuters.” (via Latin America Daily Briefing)
An Universidad Iberoamericana report details attacks faced by advocates and migrants’ rights defenders, particularly in Mexico.
🇨🇱 Chile
“Venezuelan migrant found dead after trying to cross the border between Bolivia and Chile” (Red Uno)
🇨🇴 Colombia
“Separated from their families, plunged into uncertainty, depression, and fear. This is how a group of Venezuelans who sought refuge in Colombia survive after the post-election repression of July 28, 2024. Without the support of their host country, victims of labor exploitation and under the constant threat of persecution by national security forces, they survive amidst multiple hardships,” says Runrunes.
🇵🇦 Panama
A UNHCR report looks at the situation of refugees and asylum seekers living in Panama in 2024. Among those surveyed, “most of their monthly expenses go to housing costs, food and essentials, and little remains as disposable income.”
🇪🇨 Ecuador
A UNHCR report explores challenges faced by the forcibly displaced amid a context of crime and violence in Ecuador. (see last week’s AMB on internal displacement)
🇺🇸 United States
“In late February, U.S. District Judge Jamal Whitehead ordered the Trump administration to resume accepting refugees cleared under the federal refugee admissions program, which President Donald Trump froze by executive order on the first day of his second term… Three months later, the administration has not begun to admit the estimated 128,000 refugees already approved to enter the U.S., roughly 12,000 of whom had travel plans booked before Jan. 20, when Trump issued his order,” reports RNS.
“The faith groups say the administration has claimed in court it cannot resettle refugees, but the groups point out that 59 white Afrikaners from South Africa, who had not previously been approved, were fast-tracked to refugee status in mere months and resettled in May.”
“After Whitehead’s initial ruling, attorneys for the Trump administration quickly filed an appeal and abruptly terminated agreements with faith-based refugee resettlement agencies that had joined the suit, which the plaintiffs called a “blatant violation” of the court’s order.”
“Trump Makes America’s Refugee Program a Tool of White Racial Grievance: The President’s interest in the plight of Afrikaners seems to have begun with—what else?—segments on Fox News.” (The New Yorker; see also AMB 5/12/25)
“The Trump administration has admitted that it improperly deported another immigrant in violation of a court order — the fourth known case in which the administration deported someone erroneously or in breach of specific legal requirements,” reports Politico.
“The Supreme Court has given the Trump administration the go-ahead to begin deporting about a half-million immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela who entered the U.S. legally under “humanitarian parole” programs implemented during the Biden administration,” reports Politico.
Some are considering moving to Canada, reports New York Times.
“‘Returning to Haiti is suicide’: Migrants face harrowing choice after Supreme Court ruling” (Miami Herald)
An IRAP and Las Americas report based on interviews at the US-Mexico border “demonstrates that environmental disasters both contribute to initial displacement and exacerbate vulnerabilities along migration routes. Restrictive immigration policies worsen this crisis by pushing vulnerable populations into perilous migration routes, where climate-exacerbated hazards pose even greater risks to their safety and survival.” (press release)
“Immigration Enforcement at All Costs: How the Trump Administration is Endangering Unaccompanied Immigrant Children” (Women’s Refugee Commission and partners)
Migratory Institutions and Regional and Bilateral Cooperation
🌎 Regional
“Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino called Friday for the creation of a "common migration agenda" for the Greater Caribbean that balances "citizen security and solidarity" with displaced persons, speaking at the 10th Summit of Heads of State of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS).” (EFE)
🌎🇺🇸 United States and Regional
CGD estimated the impacts of the proposed 3.5% remittances tax under discussion in the US Senate after passing in the House of Representatives. In El Salvador and Honduras both, for example, the tax could reduce GNI by around 1% total. (see last week’s AMB)
Meanwhile, Inter-American Dialogue “examines the role of family remittances in Central America, analyzing two dimensions of the flows—macroeconomic and household—identifying the links between these flows and development through finance, and offering recommendations to leverage these flows to mitigate shortcomings in the region’s economic growth.”
Guatemala, for its part, is considering “the creation of a migrant bank… to allow for joint and cooperative investments, transforming the current model of bilateral remittances into a system of sustainable family economic development,” per Vtv. Guatemala’s president has asserted that it would stymie efforts to halt migration, notes Tv Azteca Guate.
“A Maryland congressman said on Monday he was unable to meet one of his constituents, [Kilmar Abrego Garcia,] a Salvadoran man wrongly deported from the United States to a prison in El Salvador,” reports Reuters.
“Panama’s President José Raúl Mulino denied on Saturday that he requested U.S. military support to curb the migration crisis in the remote Darién jungle before Donald Trump returned to the White House, as claimed by… John Bolton, a former advisor during Trump’s first administration,” reports AFP.
🇸🇻🇲🇽 Mexico and El Salvador
Officials from the Mexican state of Tamaulipas’ DIF system met with Salvadoran authorities to “strengthen the ties and care provided to Salvadoran people in migration situations, particularly children and adolescents,” per Hoy Tamaulipas.
🇪🇸🇺🇾 Uruguay and Spain
Uruguayan and Spanish authorities met to discuss pensions and migration, including conversation about the roughly 75,000 Spaniards residing in Uruguay, reports Montevideo Portal.
Labor Migration
🇨🇦 Canada
“The number of temporary foreign workers applying for open work permits to escape abusive employers has jumped more than 800 per cent year over year in Ontario,” reports Toronto Star, noting, “despite clear and documented evidence of abuse presented in applications for vulnerable worker open work permits, many of the same employers continue to operate and hire migrant workers.”
🇺🇸 United States
“A bipartisan group in Congress reintroduced the Farm Workforce Modernization Act, a comprehensive immigration and labor bill that seeks to keep farms operating by offering a path to legal status for undocumented farmworkers and modernizing the H-2A guestworker visa program,” reports Migrant Insider.
“The Act introduces a Portable Agricultural Worker (PAW) pilot program—allowing 10,000 H-2A workers to move freely between registered employers. Advocates say this will reduce bottlenecks and give workers more flexibility.”
Migrants in Transit
🌎 Regional
“More than 10,000 people — virtually all from Venezuela — have taken boats from Panama to Colombia since January, according to Panamanian officials, who say that more are setting out each week,” reports New York Times.
“Colombian authorities have raised the alarm over the emergence of new “reverse migration” routes, with migrants returning from Central America to Colombia via the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean after failing to reach the United States… These reverse flows have been detected in Capurganá on the Caribbean coast, Juradó and Bahía Solano along the Pacific coast, three towns in the remote and heavily forested Chocó department, which borders Panama. According to the Ombudsman’s Office, migrants, many of whom arrive undocumented, are being moved by human smuggling networks in boats from these Pacific towns to the port city of Buenaventura, Colombia’s main port on the Pacific coast.” (EFE)
El País highlights Colombian emigration, noting increased interest in Spain and South American countries as destinations.
An El Barómetro report explores TikTok and YouTube narratives about migration through the Darien Gap.
Borders and Enforcement
🇺🇸 United States
“The Department of Homeland Security is putting more than 500 “sanctuary jurisdictions” across the country on notice that the Trump administration views them as obstructing immigration enforcement as it attempts to increase pressure on communities it believes are standing in the way of the president’s mass deportations agenda,” reports AP. Even Trump allies have been caught up in the list, per New York Times.
At the same time, collaboration between local law enforcement and ICE is expanding: “ICE had 135 active 287(g) agreements across 21 states at the end of 2024. As of May 2025, it increased to over 588 agreements in 40 states, with 83 more pending,” reports Migrant Insider.
“Trump administration planning to send hundreds of border agents to support ICE arrests in U.S. interior” (CBS)
ICE has begun targeting immigrants outside immigration courts. (New York Times)
“A judge blocked a Florida immigration law on the likelihood it’s not constitutional. Then Florida police arrested 25 people under the law, report Hannah Critchfield and Ashley Borja of the Tampa Bay Times. The law in question makes entering the state while undocumented a crime. On the federal level, Stephen Miller and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem are pushing for 3,000 daily immigration arrests — a huge increase — report Brittany Gibson and Stef W. Kight of Axios.” (via The Forum Daily)
🇸🇽 Sint Maarten
The Dutch territory of Sint Maarten has agreed to strengthen collaboration with the Dutch Caribbean Coast Guard, including on countering irregular migration and smuggling. (Curaçao)
More on Migration
🇺🇸 United States
“The Trump administration is weighing requiring all foreign students applying to study in the United States to undergo social media vetting — a significant expansion of previous such efforts,” reports Politico.
“U.S. Will ‘Aggressively’ Revoke Visas of Chinese Students, Rubio Says” (New York Times)
🇦🇷 Argentina
Argentina is planning a citizenship by investment program. (IMI)