ICE Flight Monitor’s July Report Reveals Alarming Increases in Forced Third Country Removals & Domestic Transfers Amidst the Trump Administration's Cruel Mass Deportation Campaign

Washington, D.C. — Today, ICE Flight Monitor, housed at Human Rights First, released its latest monthly report, which reveals that the Trump administration conducted at least 329 removal flights to 37 countries in July, up 14% from the previous month – an increase that is largely driven by a spike in removal flights to Mexico, making up nearly 40% (128 flights) of July’s removal flight total. These flights are separating families across the country, making it harder for people to secure legal counsel, and many are taking place in violation of the individuals being removed, some of whom are in ongoing immigration proceedings.

Throughout the same period, IFM noted an alarming increase in third country deportation flights, as part of the Trump administration's cruel and lawless mass deportation campaign. In July, forced third country transfers reached an alarming record of 18 flights tracked to 10 countries, with first-time flights to Belize and Dominica, and repeated flights to CAR, Costa Rica, Equatorial Guinea , Eswatini, Ghana, Panama, Paraguay and Sierra Leone. These flights forcibly transfer people—many of whom were already granted protections by U.S. immigration judges —to places where they have no connection and they are at risk of persecution, harm, and even refoulement to the very places they escaped.

On August 3, ICE Flight Monitor tracked the first deportation flight to Venezuela since June 24, when an ICE Air flight removed Venezuelan nationals just hours before the devastating earthquakes struck the country. On August 12, another ICE Air flight arrived in Barcelona, Venezuela, marking the second deportation flight to Venezuela since June 24.

“Little more than a month after the devastating earthquakes in Venezuela, the Trump administration sent two flights back to the country. Even before these earthquakes, conditions there were extremely perilous. This is a reflection of the cruelty of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign,” said Savi Arvey, Director of Research and Analysis, Refugee and Immigrant Rights at Human Rights First. “This cruelty is also clear in the conditions to which people are subjected on removal flights; in July, people aboard a removal flight to Laos, Bangladesh, and Vietnam spent 34 hours on board in shackles. ICE Flight Monitor shines a light on these abuses, in order to seek accountability for these due process violations.”

Key Findings from July Include:

• As part of the Trump administration’s cruel and lawless mass deportation campaign, the administration conducted at least 329 removal flights, up 14% from the previous month and 59% from July 2025. This increase was largely driven by another surge in removal flights to Mexico as land border deportations of Mexican nationals remain nearly paused. Notably, July saw a record 22 removal flights in a single day on July 30 since flight tracking started in 2020.
• July also saw a sharp rise in the number of removal flights to Guatemala, reaching a monthly record of 63 flights, an increase of 58% (up 22 flights) from the previous month. Guatemala and Honduras continue to receive large numbers of removal flights, together accounting for roughly 33% of July’s total.
• Notably, July also saw first-time removal flights to Hungary, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
• Forced third country transfers reached an alarming record of 18 flights tracked to 10 countries, with first-time flights to Belize and Dominica, and repeated flights to CAR, Costa Rica, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini, Ghana, Panama, Paraguay and Sierra Leone. In July, the Trump administration also conducted forced third country transfer flights to Eswatini for the fourth time and Equatorial Guinea for the fifth time. To learn more about third country deportations, visit Banished by Bargain: Third Country Deportation Watch, a joint project from Human Rights First and Refugees International.
• Domestic transfer (“shuffle”) flights peaked in July, reaching an alarming monthly record of 1,363 flights that carried individuals across 61 U.S. cities. July saw the highest number of domestic shuffle flights since at least 2020 when independent tracking began.
• Deportation flights on U.S. military aircraft resumed in June 2026, with at least 25 removal flights to Honduras by the end of July. June saw at least 12 such flights—with at least three carrying third country nationals—and July saw 13 U.S. military deportation flights. Despite the shift to military aircraft for nearly a third of deportations to Honduras, July’s total number of flights to Honduras decreased by 17% compared to July 2025. U.S. military planes are significantly more expensive to use for immigration enforcement than charter planes.

Read the July 2026 report and explore the dashboard here.

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About ICE Flight Monitor: ICE Flight Monitor uses publicly available aviation data to track U.S. immigration enforcement flights operated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and partner agencies. Founded on the methodology pioneered by researcher Tom Cartwright, the project provides transparent, data-driven reporting to strengthen accountability and inform the public about the human and democratic costs of mass deportation policies. Our new public interactive ICE Flight Monitor Dashboard enables users to visualize common routes and patterns, track historical deportation flight trends, and look up recent deportation flights to specific countries.