ICE, Trump and Africa: Secret deals, broken lives

Cover image: Reporters: ICE, Trump and Africa: Secret deals, broken lives 

© Studio graphique FMM

44.03

Issued on: 21/09/2026 
44:07 min From the show

For this edition of Reporters+, Karina Chabour investigated the dark side of US President Donald Trump’s immigration policy: How ICE deports immigrants to so-called third countries in Africa, far from the United States and often far from their countries of origin.


Most of the people deported have been living in the US for decades. They worked, paid taxes and many even have families who were left behind. Without notice, they were arrested, detained and then deported to Ghana and Eswatini: countries they don’t know and where they have no relatives, no income and no legal status.

Our reporter met individuals who now live in limbo: without papers and sometimes detained, at risk of being sent back to the very country they fled, many fearing for their lives.

Cover image: Sofia Alvarez Jurado, Forbidden Stories, Paris, September 21, 2026. © Screengrab
09:59

The Deportation Project: behind the investigation on Trump administration’s mass deportations

As part of a consortium of 26 media outlets coordinated by Forbidden Stories, RFI and FRANCE 24 spent six months investigating the secret deals struck between the administration of US President Donald Trump and several African countries. These “third countries” have agreed to host undocumented migrants detained by ICE and deported from the US.

From Ghana to Cameroon and Eswatini, our journalists spoke to the people deported to countries utterly unfamiliar to them.

Lives in limbo and US pressure on African states

Behind the broken lives of the deported, the film reveals a dark system put in place by Washington. To secure agreements with African states, the US piles on the pressure: political and financial deals, discreet bargaining, or trade and tariff incentives.

READ MORE‘Waiting for us to crack’: In Cameroon, the victims of Trump’s deportations face uncertain fates

“ICE, Trump and Africa – Secret deals, broken lives” reveals how the US is relocating deportations: how secret deals are being carried out by the Trump administration, using human lives as a negotiating tool.

With the collaboration of Caroline Dumay, Olivia Bizot, Simon Martin and Marine Pradel.

The Deportation Project: our full coverage


Deported to Africa: An international investigation into Trump’s migrant policy

‘Waiting for us to crack’: In Cameroon, the victims of Trump’s deportations face uncertain fates

Reporters +: 'ICE, Trump and Africa - Secret deals, broken lives'

Interactive map: Third-country removals - Trump’s deportation policy by the numbers

Scrollytelling: Flight to Ghana - Expelled From the US to a Country They’d Never Been to (coming soon)

‘I had never heard of Eswatini’: Deported to a country that rejects them (coming soon)
BY:

Karina CHABOUR