The Government of Eswatini has confirmed that the United States has sent five immigrants convicted of various crimes to the southern African nation in the latest example of the administration of President Donald Trump’s ramped up deportation efforts.
Posting on social media platform X, US Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said that five men – citizens of Vietnam, Jamaica, Yemen, Cuba and Laos – had been sent on a deportation flight to Eswatini after the Supreme Court cleared the way for the US Government to deport migrants to countries other than their own without offering them a chance to counter or dispute such actions.
A statement from the Eswatini Government said it acknowledged the widespread concern regarding these deportations.
Eswatini’s Government confirmed the deportation, adding that the five inmates were currently being housed in their correctional facilities in isolated units where similar offenders were kept, further seeking to assure the nation that the new inmates posed no threat to the country or its citizens.
Its acting spokesperson, Thabile Mdluli, says the deportations were a result of months of robust high-level engagements with the government of the United States.
McLaughlin posted pictures of the five deportees, who she said had been convicted of various crimes, from rape, robbery, murder, aggravated assault and battery.
McLaughin called them “depraved monsters” who had been terrorising American communities while welcoming the fact that they were now off American soil.
CITIZEN OF JAMAICA
• Convicted of murder; sentenced to 25 years confinement.
• Convicted of robbery; sentenced to 6 years confinement.
• Convicted of possession of weapon; sentenced to 6 months confinement. pic.twitter.com/H6L6dK44xW— Tricia McLaughlin (@TriciaOhio) July 16, 2025
CITIZEN OF CUBA
• Convicted of first-degree murder and aggravated battery.
• Convicted of aggravated battery of a police officer, grand theft-vehicle, aggravated flight-eluding law enforcement reckless driving; sentenced to 3 years confinement.
• Confirmed latin king street… pic.twitter.com/7nHVISVaYQ— Tricia McLaughlin (@TriciaOhio) July 16, 2025
CITIZEN OF YEMEN
• Convicted of second-degree homicide;
• Convicted of assault and battery;
• Convicted of resist and obstruct officer; sentenced to 17 days confinement.
• Convicted of cruelty to dependent adult;
• Convicted of assault with the intent to do great bodily harm… pic.twitter.com/R2dots7hrw— Tricia McLaughlin (@TriciaOhio) July 16, 2025
Earlier, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, addressed the broader issue of US migrant deportations.
In an unsigned order, the US Supreme Court allowed in late June for the Trump administration to resume deporting migrants to countries other than their own without offering them a chance to show harm they could face, handing Trump another victory in his aggressive pursuit of mass deportations.
The court’s conservative majority lifted an earlier judicial order that required the government to give migrants set for third country deportations a “meaningful opportunity” to contest their removal, a decision that saw all three liberal justices dissent calling it a gross abuse of the court’s discretion while the legal challenges to the administration’s actions play out in federal court.
US deports five immigrants to Eswatini: