Beyond Borders, Beyond Rights? The U.S. “Staging Expulsion” Policy and the Future of Externalization

[Dr Lena Riemer is an Assistant Professor of Law at Central European University working on migration related topics]

In early 2025, hundreds of migrants from Iran, Afghanistan, Russia, and beyond found themselves confined in a hotel in Panama City. Desperate notes scrawled on scraps of paper and pressed against windows pleaded for help. These individuals had been removed from the United States, not to their home countries, but to a third country which then has to organize their onward removal to their countries of origin. This marks the beginning of the “staging” expulsion policy, an unprecedented shift in U.S. migration enforcement, implemented for the first time in the first months of 2025.

This blog post tries to unpack the legal, political, and human rights implications of this policy, which relies on secretive “handshake” agreements to send migrants to countries like Panama, Costa Rica or Honduras and seemingly most recently also Rwanda. These transfers bypass traditional asylum channels, raise profound ethical questions, and signal a broader trend in the externalization of migration control. What does this mean for international refugee protection, human rights and due process standards? And to want extent will the European Union follow suit with its suggested “return hubs”?

What is the “Staging Expulsion” Policy?

The policy refers to the forcible transfer of foreigners from the U.S. to third countries with which they have no prior connection. It goes far beyond the traditional notion of Safe Third Country Agreements as under this new model, expelled individuals are not given access to asylum procedures at all but are merely forced to remain there until the receiving country finds any form of “solution” for their onward movement to their country of origin or any other state willing to take them in. The implementation of this policy in the past months however has quickly revealed that this concept is built to fail and led to expelled non-citizens being stranded in these “staging” states without government support and in a difficult legal limbo situation. This new policy is built on bilateral “handshake” arrangements kept largely out of public view and the expulsions based on the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), particularly 8 U.S.C. §1231(b)(2)(C), which allows the U.S. to remove individuals to any country that agrees to accept them when return to their home country is “impracticable”. Within this policy framework, there seemingly are two distinct variants that have unraveled so far. In both variants, the U.S. bears the costs for the expulsion flights and associated costs for the stay of those expelled in the receiving country. 

The first variant represents perhaps the most transitory form. Under this model, individuals expelled from the U.S. are temporarily held in a third country for a matter of hours before being transported again, typically to their country of origin. These brief transit periods serve primarily as procedural waypoints and do not include any meaningful opportunities for case assessment. The second variant involves a longer duration of stay in the receiving state and a more formalized process regarding their onward move to their country of origin. Deportees are held in facilities in countries such as Costa Rica and Panama while local authorities, often with logistical support from international organizations, such as the International Organization for Migration, work to arrange their eventual return. This approach essentially outsources the legal and practical hurdles of returning non-citizens to their country of origin to third countries while completely disregarding binding due process standards under domestic and international law as those affected were not given any opportunity to bring forward their claims for protection and against expulsion neither in the U.S. nor in the receiving state. Those foreigners expelled exist in a protracted legal limbo, neither allowed to integrate locally nor can they return to their place of origin due to fear for their life. These evolving extraterritorial control mechanisms raise profound questions about the circumvention of established protection frameworks that have traditionally governed asylum policy.

A Continuum of Externalization

To understand the significance of this new “staging expulsion” model in the U.S., we must place it within a broader trend in migration governance: the externalization of migration control. Externalization refers to policies by which countries like the U.S., Australia or EU countries shift their migration enforcement responsibilities onto third countries – often in exchange for financial support, visa waivers or based on coercion and pressure. This process is not new but follows a long history of shifting migration control outside U.S. territory and increasing regional cooperation with the aim to bring down the numbers of arrivals. 

As early as the 1980s, the U.S. pressured Mexico to act as a buffer zone and reduce the numbers of arrivals. The 1990s saw offshore asylum processing in Guantanamo Bay. In more recent history, both Democratic Presidents such as Obama and Biden, as well as Republican President Trump, have implemented strict immigration policies targeting migrants at the southern border. Under the first Trump presidency, programs like the “Remain in Mexico Policy” and bilateral agreements with Central American states intensified this trend. President Biden continued the logic through funding deportations from Panama to prevent onward movement and rapid removals with little to no due process and the abrogation of asylum at the southern border. At the same time, since 2019, the U.S. has continuously expelled non-citizens from certain Latin American countries to Mexico based on a bilateral agreement. The current “staging expulsion” model is to a certain degree a continuation thereof but what makes this policy distinct is the scope of cooperation between the U.S. and seemingly any state willing to receive any third country nationals. What is also new is the goal of cooperation with “staging” countries to solve the return of those non-citizens to their home country, not to conduct their asylum application and not to detain them indefinitely. Within this framework, non-citizens are removed not only from U.S. territory but from the legal frameworks designed to protect them to a country with which they had no prior connection.

From Law to Lawlessness: Legal and Human Rights Concerns

The controversial staging policy has drawn significant criticism from legal and human rights perspectives. It faces serious challenges on multiple fronts, including potential violations of the customary law non-refoulement principles by expelling individuals to countries where they may face further removal or persecution without any assessment of their protection needs. Additionally, the policy has been criticized for denying due process, as many expulsions occur without access to legal counsel, hearings, or asylum procedures. Human Rights Organizations  have documented concerning patterns of prolonged arbitrary detention, systemic lack of transparency, and what some describe as deliberate cruelty in these arrangements. These measures appear to serve dual purposes: as Juan F. Perea observed already in 2020 regarding the U.S. immigration policies under Trump’s first term, “immigrants are being expelled and vilified to reassure a significant segment of the population that the whiteness of the nation is being defended” (see here, p.12), while simultaneously functioning as a deterrence mechanism against future migration attempts and a tactic to scare those who may be in the U.S. on an irregular status.

A Model for the EU?

Disturbingly, at the very same time, the EU is exploring similar concepts on removal cooperation. The idea of “return hubs” presented last month in non-EU countries echoes the logic of the U.S. staging expulsion model. This model, outlined in the European Commission’s 2025 proposal, seeks to streamline returns by allowing EU member states to deport migrants not only to their country of origin but also to third states that have signed return agreements. This concept suggests a move beyond traditional readmission agreements, creating a system where deportees may be transferred to countries with no prior connection to their migration journey as a temporary stop before being returned to their country of origin. As Izabella Majcher highlights, such hubs, if adopted, would “raise human rights concerns, particularly regarding detention and onward return.”

Conclusion: A Dangerous Precedent

The emergence of the “staging-expulsion” policy represents a troubling evolution in migration control strategies that prioritizes deterrence, performative cruelty and political expediency, including white supremacist ideology over human rights and legal obligations. As the United States implements these controversial measures and the European Union contemplates similar approaches, we stand at a critical juncture in the global refugee protection regime.

These externalization practices fundamentally reshape asylum landscapes by creating legal black holes where vulnerable individuals exist without recourse to established protection mechanisms. The consequences extend far beyond individual cases, potentially unraveling international refugee law and human rights frameworks.

As we move forward, policymakers, legal experts, and civil society must urgently address this shift towards ever-escalating migration control mechanisms, in the U.S. and beyond. The challenge before us is to uphold the fundamental principles of due process, transparency and protection that lie at the heart of refugee law. 

Author’s note: This blog post draws on the working paper “The U.S. “Bridge” Expulsion Model: A New Precedent in the Externalization of Migration Control?” by Lena Riemer (2025).