The Trump administration has expanded its use of third-country deportations, sending migrants including Venezuelans, Afghans, and others to nations such as El Salvador and Eswatini where they have no prior ties. A Deportation Project investigation involving 24 media organizations and 72 journalists, working with Human Rights First, Refugees International, and UC Berkeley's Human Rights Center, tracked more than 25,000 such removals between 2025 and 2026, compiling data from flight monitoring, freedom of information requests, lawyers, and local reporting since the government rarely announces the deportations publicly. A follow-up report from UC Berkeley's Human Rights Center Investigations Lab, "Architecture of Cruelty," identified nearly three dozen agreements covering 35 countries and found more than 21,000 immigrants and refugees removed, many of whom were in the U.S. legally with no criminal record; the administration has paid some countries tens of millions of dollars to accept deportees and threatened others with loss of aid. The report also documents people falsely labeled as gang members or criminals and imprisoned, others sent back to home countries despite risk of persecution or death, and more than 130 immigration judges, including Jeremiah Johnson, fired as the policy accelerated.