Donald Trump Deporting Fewer Mexican Citizens Than Joe Biden—Official

The United States is deporting fewer people back to Mexico than at the same time in 2024, it was reported Thursday.

The director of Baja California's Migrant Affairs Office in Mexico said that 32,537 Mexican nationals were returned during the first three months of the year, compared to 47,659 during the same time last year, per Border Report.

"The numbers predicted by President Donald Trump are well below what we are seeing in terms of deportations," Adriana Minerva Espinoza Nolazco told reporters this week.

Newsweek reached out to the Baja California state government and Mexico's National Institute of Migration for comment via email Friday morning.

A senior U.S. Department of Homeland Security official told Newsweek that the 142,000 deportations carried out since January 20 were "just the beginning."

Why It Matters

President Donald Trump promised mass deportations of illegal immigrants as part of his 2024 campaign, but the program has faced logistical and legal challenges. Reports have indicated a slight rise in deportations overall, but not a rapidly rising number.

What To Know

According to Border Report, Espinoza Nolazco said that about 4,200 people had been taken to a shelter meant for deportees since it opened on January 27. It was designed to temporarily house 500 people per day.

The shelter was set up to offer a place to sleep, along with food and basic services to aid migrants on their journey back home from the U.S., but only about 37 people per day have arrived.

There has also been an ease in the flow of migrants trying to reach the U.S., Espinoza Nolazco said, with between 50 percent and 60 percent fewer new arrivals in Tijuana.

The border city had been one of the main stopping points for immigrants awaiting appointments with U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) during the Biden administration, but the majority of immigrants are now barred from making such bids for entry.

After Trump's first 100 days in office in April, the White House said that more than 100,000 people had been deported, but as Newsweek previously reported, accessing public data on removals has become difficult since former President Joe Biden left office.

Illegal border crossings from Mexico into the U.S. have dropped significantly, but leaders south of the border are remaining prepared for another influx, from the south or north.

What People Are Saying

Adriana Minerva Espinoza Nolazco, director of Baja California's Migrant Affairs Office in Mexico, told reporters this week: "We have to remain ready for an influx that could happen at any moment, we can't afford to rest and be caught unprepared."

A senior DHS official, in a statement to Newsweek: "President Trump and Secretary Noem have jumpstarted an agency that was vilified and barred from doings its job for the last four years. In the face of a historic number of injunctions from activist judges, ICE, CBP, and the U.S. Coast Guard have made historic progress to carryout President Trump's promise of arresting and deporting aliens who have invaded our country.

"Additionally, illegal aliens are hearing our message to leave now or face the consequence. Thousands are using the CBP Home App to self-deport. Migrants are now even turning back before they reach our borders—migration through Panama's Darien Gap is down 99.99%."

Migration Policy Institute, in a brief on the U.S.-Mexico relationship this month: "No country is more critical for U.S. migration management than Mexico. The former administrations of U.S. President Joe Biden and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador worked together toward a system in which migrants who reach their countries' shared border would do so through lawful means.

"Their efforts led to dramatic and sustained downturns in unauthorized crossings of the U.S.-Mexico border in 2024. The future of U.S.-Mexico migration cooperation, and to some extent broader regional efforts, now rests on negotiations between the Trump administration and the administration of Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum."

What Happens Next

Mexico appears ready to welcome more deportees from the U.S., while Trump's budget, currently sitting in Congress, is designed to empower ICE to increase removals.