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The Rwandan government announced Tuesday that it has reached an agreement with the United States to accept up to 250 migrants deported by the U.S. as part of President Donald Trump’s administration’s tougher immigration policies. The agreement, signed in June in Kigali, was confirmed by Rwandan government spokeswoman Yolande Makolo and a senior official who spoke on condition of anonymity. According to the sources, Washington has already sent an initial list of 10 people for verification by Rwandan authorities.
“Rwanda has agreed with the United States to accept up to 250 migrants, in part because almost every Rwandan family has experienced the hardships of displacement, and our social values are based on reintegration and rehabilitation,” Makolo said.
She added that approved migrants will receive job training, health care and housing support to integrate into Rwanda's economy, one of Africa's fastest-growing economies over the past decade. The agreement stipulates that Rwanda will have the right to approve any individual proposed for resettlement. Rwandan officials have stressed that only those who have completed their sentences in the United States or have no outstanding criminal cases will be accepted, and that criminals convicted of serious offenses, such as child sexual abuse, will not be accepted.
The deportees will be free to leave Rwanda at any time, as they wish. The U.S. will pay Rwanda in the form of a grant, the financial details of which have not been made public. The deal comes at a time when the Trump administration is pushing to deport millions of illegal immigrants and has been negotiating with other countries, including El Salvador, South Sudan and Eswatini, to accept deportees. In March, the U.S. deported more than 200 Venezuelans accused of being members of criminal gangs to El Salvador, where they were imprisoned until a recent prisoner exchange. However, the deal has raised concerns among human rights groups, which criticize Rwanda for its poor human rights record and accusations of supporting rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo, charges that President Paul Kagame has denied.
Critics, such as journalist Michela Wrong, consider the timing of the deal questionable, linking it to US efforts to broker peace between Rwanda and Congo, where the two countries signed a US-brokered peace deal in June. The US deal is not the first of its kind for Rwanda. In 2022, Kigali signed a similar deal with the United Kingdom to accept thousands of asylum seekers, but the plan was scrapped by Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s new Labour government due to legal challenges and criticism of human rights abuses.
Britain reportedly spent around $900 million on the failed plan, including $300 million in payments to Rwanda, which the Rwandan government has said it is not obligated to return. Meanwhile, the legality of deportations to third countries has been called into question in the US, with a federal lawsuit in Boston challenging a June Supreme Court ruling that allowed the Trump administration to send migrants to third countries without giving them the opportunity to prove a risk of harm. Analysts such as Gonzaga Muganwa suggest that the deal strengthens Rwanda’s strategic position vis-à-vis the Trump administration, as Rwanda continues to position itself as a destination for migrants that Western countries seek to remove.
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