The United States of America has deported an unknown number of undocumented immigrants from India, Reuters reported on February 4. Various Indian media outlets say that around 205 Indians are aboard a C-17 US military aircraft bound for India. The Reuters report is based on comments by an anonymous source in US President Donald Trump’s administration. However, no official statements have been made either by India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) or the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
The reported crackdown appears to be a part of Trump’s campaign promise of “the largest deportation programme of criminals”. The US president is known for racist rhetoric and conflating non-white immigrants with crime.
While little else is officially known at the moment, reports in January said that the Trump administration has identified 18,000 undocumented Indians whom the Indian government has agreed to take back in order to avoid a trade war with the US.
A CNN report in 2024 elaborated the long and dangerous ‘donkey’ route from India to the US-Mexican border that millions of undocumented immigrants attempt to cross to enter the US. The term donkey route is a distortion of the Punjabi word ‘dunki’, meaning to hop from place to place, CNN said.
According to a 2022 Pew Research Center report, Indians form the third largest number of undocumented immigrants in the US. The report estimates that 7,25,000 of undocumented immigrants were Indian, compared to 69 lakh Mexicans and 7, 50,000 El Salvadoran.
The DHS terms inadmissible and non-citizen individuals processed for expulsion under various US immigration laws as ‘encounters’. In 2022, data from the DHS showed a sharp uptick of such encounters, touching 97,917 Indians compared to the previous year’s 63,927. This dropped marginally to 90,415 in 2024.
On January 26 this year, the DHS released the press statement “Promises made, promises kept: President Trump is already securing our border and deporting criminal aliens.” It is a collection of media reports on various Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids across the US targeting Haitian, Mexican, and Venezuelan undocumented immigrants, among others.
On February 4, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem rescinded the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) of 3,48,000 Venezuelans. TPS is granted to people from countries that are unsafe for them to return to. This includes situations like civil wars, environmental disasters, epidemics, or other extraordinary crises.
During former US president Joe Biden’s term, people from 17 countries including Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Venezuela, Haiti, Lebanon, Nepal, Sudan, Syria, and Ukraine were granted TPS — a move that was opposed by the Republican Party. Trump’s move to deport 3,48,000 Venezuelans comes at a time when the US has refused to recognise Nicolás Maduro’s presidency in Venezuela, calling it an “illegal attempt to seize power”.