Costa Rica has now received four flights of migrants deported by the United States under the bilateral agreement signed in March, bringing the total number of arrivals in 2026 to roughly 95 people, according to the Dirección General de Migración y Extranjería. The latest group of 12 arrived at Juan Santamaría International Airport on the afternoon of Friday, May 15, prompting renewed scrutiny of how the country is housing, screening, and ultimately repatriating people sent here from third countries.
The four flights have arrived on April 11 (25 people), April 17 (30 people, including eight Costa Ricans), April 24 (28 people, including three Costa Ricans), and May 15 (12 people, three women and nine men). Deportees have included citizens of China, India, Honduras, Guatemala, Brazil, Albania, Morocco, Cameroon, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Russia, Romania, Vietnam, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Ireland, and Bolivia, in addition to Costa Ricans returning home.
The agreement between then-President Rodrigo Chaves and U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem during her visit to San José, authorizes Washington to send up to 25 deportees per week to Costa Rica while their immigration status is resolved. President Laura Fernández Delgado, who took office May 8, has confirmed she will continue the program, calling it part of a broader strategic alliance with the United States that includes joint security operations, maritime patrolling, and technological cooperation. Costa Rica retains the right to refuse individual cases and adjust the weekly cap.
Once on the ground, deportees are offered three options: voluntary assisted return to their home country, application for refugee status in Costa Rica, or enrollment in a temporary humanitarian regularization program. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) provides housing and meals, with the United States covering operating costs. As of the third flight, Migración reported that 18 of the 47 people who had arrived to that point were enrolled in the voluntary return program, including eight Guatemalans, two Brazilians, two Hondurans, two Indians, two Moroccans, one Albanian, and one Irish national.
The arrivals have drawn fresh attention from Costa Rica’s medical community. On Wednesday, the Colegio de Médicos y Cirujanos called for stronger sanitary surveillance at points of entry, warning that long, multi-stop migration routes can amplify infectious-disease risk if controls are not consistently applied.
The college pointed to recent measles outbreaks in several countries, including the United States, as one of the scenarios it is monitoring. Officials emphasized that the call was for institutional protocols grounded in science, not a rationale for discrimination against migrants, and that protections should apply both to the Costa Rican public and to deportees themselves, who they noted often arrive after long and stressful journeys.
The current program is the second time Costa Rica has acted as a deportation bridge for the United States. In February 2025, two flights brought roughly 200 mostly Asian migrants — including more than 80 children — to a facility near the Panamanian border called Catem, in the Corredores canton of Puntarenas.
That earlier round drew criticism from rights groups and ended only after the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court ordered the migrants’ release from the rural shelter, citing arbitrary detention and lack of access to legal counsel and education for minors. The 2026 framework differs in design — smaller, more frequent flights with formal temporary status — but opposition lawmakers including Monserrat Ruiz of Liberación Nacional and Rocío Alfaro of Frente Amplio have called for greater transparency and oversight mechanisms.
For now, the Fernández administration is treating the weekly flights as a fixed feature of the bilateral relationship. The next group is expected within days, and Migración has said it will continue publishing nationality breakdowns and program-status counts after each arrival.
