The United States has sent five immigrants it claims to be “dangerous” to the small African nation of Eswatini, according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
This is part of the Trump administration's third-country deportation program. Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said the five men from Vietnam, Jamaica, Cuba, Yemen , and Laos were all convicted criminals.
“This flight took individuals so uniquely barbaric that their home countries refused to take them back,” she posted to X.
“These depraved monsters have been terrorising American communities, but thanks to @POTUS Trump @Sec_Noem they are off of American soil.”
A spokesperson for the Eswatini government confirmed that the men had entered the country after “months of robust high-level engagements”.
"The Nation is assured that these inmates pose no threat to the country or its citizens,” spokesperson Thabile Mdluli said.
“The five prisoners are in the country and are housed in Correctional facilities within isolated units, "where similar offenders are kept."
The White House has argued that third-country deportations are needed for individuals whose home countries won’t take them back. This includes eight men who were deported to South Sudan weeks ago and were also described as violent criminals.
This is also part of the Trump administration's mission of mass deportation.
Immigration enforcement was a major part of Trump’s recent “big beautiful bill”, with US$168 billion set aside for it.
This includes US$75 billion in funding towards the expensing detention and deportation operations of ICE.
In March, the Trump administration also deported an estimated 200 Venezuelans to El Salvador, where their heads were shaved and they were arrested at the country’s Terrorism Confinement Centre (CEOT), a maximum security prison where punishments are comparable to torture.
It reportedly cost the Trump administration nearly US$6 million for El Salvador to imprison the men.
