The Associated Press described a case that begins with a U.S. immigration judge’s order and ends, according to the refugee and a lawyer, with renewed detention in Equatorial Guinea—an authoritarian oil state the report said has become a transit hub for people removed from the United States under “third-country” arrangements.
In the AP’s account, a 28-year-old refugee from East Africa was overjoyed when a judge told him he could leave California detention after 13 months, even though the judge denied his asylum request. The refugee said the judge ruled he could not be deported to his home country because his life would be in danger, and he told the AP that the judge effectively told him, “Welcome to the U.S.,” and that he was “now protected by the U.S. law” and could leave the center, work, and stay in the country.
Instead, the AP reported that the refugee was later handcuffed and put on a flight to Equatorial Guinea, where he said he remains held because there is no asylum policy. He requested anonymity for fear of repercussions, telling the AP that he fled after being beaten, persecuted, and imprisoned because of his ethnicity. The report said he is among 29 people deported to Equatorial Guinea, a number raised by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who called it “one of the most corrupt governments in the world,” according to the AP.
The report also described how other judges’ protections may not translate into safety on the ground in Equatorial Guinea, where detainees say they face pressure to abandon claims. In a phone interview, the refugee told the AP that authorities pressured him to return home even though he lodged an asylum application there, adding, “They told us there is no any asylum or any protection in this country for us,” and that “the best option is to leave the country as soon as possible.” He said returning to a country ravaged by ethnic conflict was “not an option.”
The AP said Meredyth Yoon, litigation director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice, characterized the strategy as an effort by the U.S. to use third countries to avoid limits that bar removal to places where a person’s life or freedom would be threatened. Yoon told the AP, “The U.S. is deporting people to third countries ‘to circumvent laws that forbid sending a person to a country where their life or freedom would be threatened,’” and she said she verified significant parts of the refugee’s account. She also told the AP that once people are deported, they face “impossible alternatives,” including indefinite detention without access to counsel or forced deportation to the same countries they fled.
According to the AP, the refugee’s path to Equatorial Guinea included additional detention stages before the final departure. The refugee said that after immigration and customs enforcement agents pressed him to sign a document saying he wanted to return voluntarily and he refused, he was transferred to Arizona for about five months in a windowless room with others and that he had difficulty getting medical attention. He said one man in his room “became crazy and started shouting and hitting himself because he wanted to go home.” After transfers to California, Texas, and Louisiana, the refugee said he was handcuffed, driven to an airport late at night, and boarded a charter flight operated by Omni Air International.
When the plane landed, the refugee told the AP that the group discovered they were in Equatorial Guinea. When asked about his case, the AP reported that a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said ICE officers “did NOT beat, coerce, or use racial slurs” and described him as an “illegal alien” who “was processed as an expedited removal and was removed to Equatorial Guinea.” The spokesperson also said, the AP reported, that deportees “received due process” and had a final order of removal.
The AP said the 29 deportees were held in Malabo, the former capital, and reported the conditions as described by the refugee and documents seen by AP. The refugee said he was detained in what he described as an “old closed hotel” with no other customers, and he told the AP that many detainees were sick because of the food and that he was hospitalized for two days, with malaria affecting some others. The AP also reported that Yoon said 17 detainees had been returned to home countries after authorities told them there was no other option due to the lack of an asylum system in Equatorial Guinea; she said that after some people left detention, “Many of them are in hiding.”
In addition to the individual account, the AP connected the deportations to a broader political and financial context involving opaque deals with African governments. The report said a February account by Democratic staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee found the Trump administration spent at least $40 million to deport about 300 migrants to countries other than their own, and that Equatorial Guinea received $7.5 million according to Shaheen. The AP reported that in a letter obtained by AP, Shaheen described the payment as “highly unusual” and raised concerns about the use of taxpayer dollars, saying it exceeded U.S. foreign assistance to Equatorial Guinea over the previous eight years.
The Associated Press said U.N. refugee agency officials would not comment on individual cases but that UNHCR’s regional head of external engagement, Larissa Schlotterbeck, said Equatorial Guinea was working on establishing an asylum system and that UNHCR was helping identify people who might need protection until then. The AP reported that the refugee himself remains in “limbo” and called it the worst part of his ordeal, saying: “Before, we were immigrants with hope,” but “here, there is no more hope.”