Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair
From the raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at U.S. airports to the approval of the controversial Return Regulation in the European Union, the world is witnessing an ‘ICE-ization‘ of migration policies. This ‘ICE-ization’ is characterized by the externalization of borders, prolonged detention, and the criminalization of undocumented individuals, which is generating an unprecedented human rights crisis that has already resulted in fatalities and complaints filed with international bodies.
Paradoxically, this crackdown is occurring at a time when migration is more vital than ever for global financial stability. While the global right-wing is erecting walls (both physical and legal), remittance flows to countries in the Global South reached $905 billion in 2024, far exceeding Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in many of these countries. We are facing a paradox: the economies of many nations depend on the efforts of migrants, yet global politics is bent on stripping them of their dignity.
Chile: The Setback Under José Antonio Kast
In Chile, President José Antonio Kast has fulfilled one of his most aggressive campaign promises: halting the regularization of 182,000 immigrants. This process, initiated by former President Boric, sought to integrate individuals who had already met state requirements, including the submission of biometric data and residential addresses. The Migrant Action Movement warns of the danger of this ‘failed registration’ policy, through which thousands of people are now fully identified and traceable by a government that has vowed to expel them. It also points out that, despite the new official narrative linking migration to chaos, economic reality contradicts this discourse: the migrant population contributes 10 percent of GDP to the Chilean economy.
Argentina and Milei’s DNU
In May 2025, Javier Milei’s Argentine government put an end to Argentina’s tradition of welcoming migrants through a Decree of Necessity and Urgency (DNU) that restricts foreigners’ access to essential public services such as health care and education, with dangerous discrimination lurking in the background.
By using a DNU, Milei sidestepped legislative debate to impose a policy of systematic suspicion. Argentina, a country built on migratory flows, now sees the right to healthcare transformed into a privilege contingent on perfect documentation, shattering the model that defined the nation for decades.
CECOT Exposes El Salvador’s role in human rights violations.
Eighteen of the 250 Venezuelans who were illegally detained at the Center for the Confinement of Terrorism (CECOT) have filed a formal complaint with the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR). They were transferred without trial from migrant detention centers in the United States to the CECOT, alongside alleged highly dangerous gang members of Salvadoran origin, until their release and repatriation to Venezuela in July 2025. This, moreover, was not an acknowledgment of a legal error, but rather the result of diplomatic negotiations between the administrations of Nicolás Maduro and Donald Trump, without the participation of the Government of El Salvador, whose actions reinforce the argument that a system has emerged that has turned the persecution of migration into a business, in which countries receive resources and political legitimacy in exchange for managing the extraterritorial incarceration of migrants, turning human mobility into a means of geopolitical bargaining.
Mexico and the Complaint Against ICE’s Lethality
Mexico’s President, Claudia Sheinbaum, has drawn a red line against ICE’s institutional violence. The Mexican government announced that it will bring before the IACHR the cases of Mexican nationals who have died in custody or during operations, which now total 14 victims.
Despite constant diplomatic complaints, the U.S. State Department’s responses have been evasive. Hardline rhetoric has permeated operational forces, resulting in procedures where the migrant’s life is secondary to the goal of detention. Mexico seeks to ensure these operations are no longer viewed as internal security actions but are instead judged as systematic human rights violations.
Europe and the ‘Return Regulation’
In Europe, the most right-wing Parliament in history has ratified the Return Regulation, a set of rules that represents a capitulation of European liberal values.
The key points are:
Return hubs: Outsourcing of detention to non-EU countries with opaque oversight.
24-month detentions: Extension of detention for undocumented individuals for up to two years.
Withdrawal of rights: Elimination of social benefits and lifetime entry bans.
Alliances with governments accused of human rights violations:Deportations will be negotiated with countries under regimes such as the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Organizations such as PICUM warn of the creation of ‘legal black holes,’ the incorporation of practices like mass raids and deportations that characterize Trump’s ICE-style approach, justified by the fact that only 20 percent of removal orders are actually carried out.
The Collapse in the U.S.: ICE at Airports
In March 2026, the country faced a partial shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) due to budget disputes over immigration enforcement. This has led ICE agents to take over security at airports following the resignation of Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents. ICE now acts as the first point of contact for any traveler, blurring the line between airport security and ethnic-racial persecution.
The Migrant Economy: the Ignored Reality
While the global right promotes hostility, data from 2024 reveals an inescapable economic reality. Remittances to low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) reached $656 billion.
In countries such as Tonga (41 percent of GDP), Tajikistan (39 percent), and Nicaragua (27 percent), migration is one of the drivers of the economy thanks to remittances.
In the case of Mexico and India, they received $120 billion and $66 billion, respectively. These figures far exceed Official Development Assistance (ODA) to recipient countries.
Capitalism certainly recognizes their importance and exploits them: remittances cost migrants a fee (6.4 percent global average) per transfer.
The landscape in the newly begun year of 2026 reveals that we are facing a profound global shift—and not for the better. The deaths of individuals during ICE operations and the EU’s new legal framework are shaping a world where human mobility is criminalized at levels never seen before. This follows the global far-right’s succeess in imposing its ideology within the legal and political framework, through a strategy to make the life of migrant workers more precarious; that is, the life of those who are exploited for resources via fees on their remittances and consumption, yet are persecuted and have their rights restricted in the countries where they produce.
With regard to migration, we are facing forces that seek to bury the concept of universal human rights, just as they are doing with international law and the rules-based world order.
This article was produced by Globetrotter.
