On Thursday, Mexico denied the landing of a US military plane with deportees on board, as reported this Friday (01/24/2025) by the NBC News channel.
According to the media, which cites two officials from the US Department of Defense and a third person familiar with the event, two Air Force C-17 planes, each with about 80 people on board, left the Thursday night from the United States to Guatemala, a third flight bound for Mexico never took off.
NBC News reported that a White House official said that in the case of the plane bound for Mexico it was “an administrative issue and was resolved quickly.”
The truth is that after the inauguration last Monday of the president of the United States, Donald Trump, relations between this country and Mexico have been strained, especially since the Republican threatened to impose a general tariff of 25% on the Latin American country. in retaliation for the crisis at the border.
This same Friday, according to sources from the Guatemalan Migration Institute (IGM), two military planes landed in the capital of the Central American country with dozens of migrants deported from El Paso (Texas) and Tucson (Arizona).
In addition to those two military aircraft, a third commercial aircraft also arrived today in Guatemala City. The three planes transported a total of 264 nationals of this country, according to IGM.
President Trump’s Government published images of military aircraft on social media today to send a tough message on immigration policy, as White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt implied.
5,400 people in CBP custody will be deported
According to what a Department of Defense official informed EFE, on Thursday night and early Friday morning, US authorities used military planes for two repatriation flights to Guatemala.
On Friday, the White House indicated that deportations of migrants had “begun,” in reference to Trump’s main campaign promise to carry out the largest mass expulsion operation of foreigners in US history.
However, deportation flights from the US are not something new and were carried out constantly during the Administration of Democrat Joe Biden (2021-2025).
More than 860 repatriation flights took place between June and December 2024 alone, according to data provided last week by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). On these trips, more than 271,000 individuals from some 160 countries were expelled.
The Pentagon confirmed today in a statement that they began using military aircraft to carry out these deportation flights, which are normally carried out on civilian aircraft.
According to specialized media, the plan is to continue using C-130 and C-17 aircraft to transport troops and personnel to deport 5,400 people currently in the custody of the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency.
In this regard, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE) of Mexico assured this Friday that it will always accept the arrival of Mexican men and women to the country, even in the case of repatriations.
“When it comes to repatriations, we will always accept the arrival of Mexican men and women to our territory with open arms. “Mexico embraces you,” the Foreign Ministry published in a brief message on social networks.
In the publication, the Foreign Ministry stated that Mexico “has a very good relationship” with the United States government “and we cooperate with respect for our sovereignties on a wide range of issues, including migration.”
mg (efe, reuters, Aristegui Noticias)
