Menéndez: Trump Surreptitiously Deports Venezuelans Through Third Countries

The Donald Trump administration has been surreptitiously deporting Venezuelans through third countries even as US law prohibits refugees from being returned to places where their lives or freedoms are threatened, Senator Bob Menendez said Friday. The Democratic senator from the state of New Jersey urged the administration to provide Congress with details on the undisclosed deportations of refugees transferred to Trinidad and Tobago, including the number of innocent Venezuelans who were forced to return to the bloody dictatorship of Nicolás Mature and if the practice continues.

Menéndez wrote in a letter addressed to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, New documents submitted to my office confirm that US deportations of Venezuelans continued through third countries until at least March 2020, while the Trump administration has offered few guarantees that it will not continue to forcibly return Venezuelans to a regime that the United Nations recently declared that he has committed crimes against humanity.

The letter also addressed to Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and Department of Homeland Security Under Secretary for Strategies and Policies and Plans, Chad Wolf - expresses additional concern at signs that flights continued for months after the Federal Administration de Aviación prohibited in May 2019 the air transport of passengers to and from Venezuelan airports.

Earlier this year, Copa Airlines was fined for operating similar flights between the United States and Venezuela using Panama as a stopover point.