Costa Rica strikes deal to accept third country deportees from US

## Summary
Photograph: Anna Moneymaker/Pool via AP Costa Rica strikes deal to accept third country deportees from US Central American country to receive up to 25 migrants a day expelled as part of Trump’s immigration crackdown Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox The Costa Rican government has agreed to receive up to 25 deported migrants a week from the United States, the latest deal in the Trump administration’s unprecedented efforts to deport scores of people to “third countries”. With the new agreement, Costa Rica seeks a closer alliance with Donald Trump’s government, which has been securing cooperation from other Central American countries in accepting deportees from other nations who have been detained by US immigration agents. “Costa Rica feels obligated to reciprocate at a time when the United States and its immigration services need the humanitarian cooperation of Costa Rican authorities,” the minister of public security, Mario Zamora, said in a video statement to the Guardian. “With financial support from the United States, they will be provided with housing and food on Costa Rican soil. Costa Rican immigration authorities will collaborate with US immigration authorities to carry out all the necessary immigration logistics to guarantee the return of these individuals to their countries.” ‘They threw us out like baggage’: Russian family deported from US to Costa Rica still in limbo Read more Zamora said the agreement was voluntary, maintaining that the Costa Rican government had the discretion to decide the number of deportees it will accept, as well as their nationality. The Costa Rican ministry of public security said last week that the country would only receive deported migrants who do not hail from Latin America or any nation that refuses to take back their citizens, according to local reports .

## Article Content
Costa Rica’s President Rodrigo Chaves, center, welcomes Kristi Noem, the then US homeland security secretary, in San José on 25 June 2025.
Photograph: Anna Moneymaker/Pool via AP
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Costa Rica’s President Rodrigo Chaves, center, welcomes Kristi Noem, the then US homeland security secretary, in San José on 25 June 2025.
Photograph: Anna Moneymaker/Pool via AP
Costa Rica strikes deal to accept third country deportees from US
Central American country to receive up to 25 migrants a day expelled as part of Trump’s immigration crackdown
Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox
The Costa Rican government has agreed to receive up to 25 deported migrants a week from the United States, the latest deal in the Trump administration’s unprecedented efforts to deport scores of people to “third countries”.
With the new agreement, Costa Rica seeks a closer alliance with Donald Trump’s government, which has been securing
cooperation from other Central American countries
in accepting deportees from other nations who have been detained by US immigration agents.
“Costa Rica feels obligated to reciprocate at a time when the United States and its immigration services need the humanitarian cooperation of Costa Rican authorities,” the minister of public security, Mario Zamora, said in a video statement to the Guardian.
“With financial support from the United States, they will be provided with housing and food on Costa Rican soil. Costa Rican immigration authorities will collaborate with
US immigration
authorities to carry out all the necessary immigration logistics to guarantee the return of these individuals to their countries.”
‘They threw us out like baggage’: Russian family deported from US to Costa Rica still in limbo
Read more
Zamora said the agreement was voluntary, maintaining that the Costa Rican government had the discretion to decide the number of deportees it will accept, as well as their nationality.
The Costa Rican ministry of public security said last week that the country would only receive deported migrants who do not hail from Latin America or any nation that refuses to take back their citizens,
according to local reports
. Zamora noted Costa Rica will only receive migrants without criminal records.
According to the agreement shared with the Guardian, the US government will provide information about the individuals it intends to deport to Costa Rica 48 hours before a deportation flight. Upon their arrival, the Costa Rican government will give them a limited legal status on humanitarian grounds.
The accord was signed during a visit by Kristi Noem, the recently departed homeland security secretary who is now overseeing the “Shield of the Americas” initiative, which the Trump administration says is designed to eradicate criminal cartels in the western hemisphere.
Any US deportations to Costa Rica would be carried out by the Department of Homeland Security. The department did not respond to requests from the Guardian for details about how the removals would work.
In a statement, the US Department of State said “implementing the Trump Administration’s immigration policies is a top priority for the Department of State. As Secretary [Marco] Rubio has said, we remain unwavering in our commitment to end illegal and mass immigration and bolster America’s border security.”
The International Organization for
Migration
(IOM), an agency within the United Nations, is expected to provide assistance to deportees upon their arrival. A spokesperson for the organization said in a statement: “Where engaged, our support focuses on providing basic services and helping individuals navigate a limited set of options, including whether to remain, return to their country of origin, or pursue other available pathways.”
The Costa Rican government is expected to meet with US authorities and IOM officials this week to determine where the deportees will be transferred once they arrive on Costa Rican soil, Zamora said.
Trump’s expanding use of “third country” deportations has come under intensifying scrutiny by Democratic lawmakers in Congress. In February, Democrats on the Senate foreign relations committee
published a report
detailing “how the Trump Administration’s secret deportation deals are undermining US interests and coming at great cost to taxpayers”.
Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat from New Hampshire who commissioned the report,
said
, “through its third country deportation deals, the Trump Administration is putting millions of taxpayer dollars into the hands of foreign governments, while turning a blind eye to the human costs and potentially undermining our diplomatic relationships. For an Administration that claims to be reining in fraud, waste and abuse, this policy is the epitome of all three.”
The Trump administration has spent
at least $40m
to deport migrants to countries that are not their own, the report found. A congressional aide involved in the report said the state

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## Expert Analysis

### Merits
N/A

### Areas for Consideration
- The Guardian spoke with Monserrat Ruiz Guevara, whose term as a member of the Costa Rican legislative assembly ends next month. “In the face of a government transition, there is a well-founded concern regarding possible external pressure from the US, the normalization of agreements of this nature without due national debate, and the risk of the country assuming responsibilities that do not belong to us,” said Ruiz Guevara, who visited Catem shortly after the 200 migrants arrived in Costa Rica last year. “Our country has built a historical tradition of respect for human dignity, but this tradition demands concrete and verifiable actions.

### Implications
- With the new agreement, Costa Rica seeks a closer alliance with Donald Trump’s government, which has been securing cooperation from other Central American countries in accepting deportees from other nations who have been detained by US immigration agents. “Costa Rica feels obligated to reciprocate at a time when the United States and its immigration services need the humanitarian cooperation of Costa Rican authorities,” the minister of public security, Mario Zamora, said in a video statement to the Guardian. “With financial support from the United States, they will be provided with housing and food on Costa Rican soil.
- Costa Rican immigration authorities will collaborate with US immigration authorities to carry out all the necessary immigration logistics to guarantee the return of these individuals to their countries.” ‘They threw us out like baggage’: Russian family deported from US to Costa Rica still in limbo Read more Zamora said the agreement was voluntary, maintaining that the Costa Rican government had the discretion to decide the number of deportees it will accept, as well as their nationality.
- Zamora noted Costa Rica will only receive migrants without criminal records.
- According to the agreement shared with the Guardian, the US government will provide information about the individuals it intends to deport to Costa Rica 48 hours before a deportation flight.

### Expert Commentary
This article covers costa, rica, country topics. Areas of concern are also raised. Readability: Flesch-Kincaid grade 0.0. Word count: 1302.