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Fact check: How do 2025 deportation figures compare to 2023 and 2024 for Cuban, Venezuelan, and Haitian nationals?
Executive Summary
The available reporting shows clearly higher deportation numbers for Haitians and relatively low official returns for Cubans in 2024, while authoritative, comparable figures for 2023 and through 2025 remain incomplete; DHS policy changes in early 2025 removed legal protections for roughly 532,000 people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela, creating strong downward pressure on remaining protections and an increased likelihood of higher removals in 2025 [1] [2]. Concrete, directly comparable year-by-year removal totals for Cuban, Venezuelan and Haitian nationals across 2023–2025 are not fully present in the assembled sources; what exists is a mix of specific 2024 counts, broader enforcement statistics, and policy announcements that point to likely increases in 2025 removals if enforcement follows through [3] [4] [1] [5].
1. What the 2024 tallies actually tell us — Haitians surged, Cubans returned in small numbers
Reporting establishes that nearly 200,000 Haitians were deported to Haiti in 2024, a large, explicit figure that dominates the set of available numeric data and signals heavy enforcement or mass repatriations for Haitian nationals that year [1]. By contrast, publicly reported returns of Cubans to Cuba in 2024 total 1,384, of which 978 were deported from the United States, a small fraction relative to both Haitian returns and the much larger cohort of Cubans with final removal orders [3] [4]. These two data points present a stark contrast: Haitians faced mass returns in 2024 while formal deportations to Cuba remained limited, possibly reflecting differences in repatriation logistics, bilateral cooperation, and policy priorities [3] [1].
2. Why the numbers diverge — policy, diplomacy and record-keeping explain gaps
The divergence between low Cuban deportation counts and high Haitian returns reflects operational and diplomatic barriers: Cuba is described as a “recalcitrant” state that often resists regular acceptance of returned citizens, which drives down formal deportations despite large numbers of migrants reaching U.S. territory [4]. For Haiti, bilateral acceptance and different operational pipelines produced far larger recorded returns in 2024 [1]. The sources also point to incomplete or delayed reporting from enforcement agencies; monthly ICE and DHS tables lag and do not always offer fully reconciled, comparable year-to-year totals, limiting direct 2023–2025 comparisons [6] [5].
3. The 2025 policy shift that could change the trajectory — protections revoked, removals likely to rise
In March 2025 DHS revoked legal protections covering roughly 532,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, a decisive administrative move that removes legal barriers to removal and makes an uptick in deportations during 2025 plausible if enforcement capacity and diplomatic acceptance align [2]. Multiple reporting threads emphasize that this policy change places large populations “on the table” for removals but do not supply the specific removal counts for 2025; the announcement is a structural predictor rather than a numeric confirmation of 2025 outcomes [2].
4. Gaps in 2023 data and the problem of comparability — what we cannot conclude
The assembled sources do not provide