‘They just sent me here’: Inside the first major Haiti deportation flight

More than 160 people were deported from the United States to Haiti on Thursday, marking the first major deportation flight to the Caribbean nation since the Trump administration cleared a key legal hurdle in its effort to end Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, for hundreds of thousands of Haitians.

The return flight landed not in Haiti’s gang-ravaged capital, but in the northern city of Cap-Haïtien — a telling sign of the security crisis awaiting those sent back.

The flight carried 161 people, including Haitian nationals who had previously held TPS and others who had served prison sentences, according to Haiti’s National Office of Migration. It remains unclear how many former TPS holders were among those on board. The deportations followed court decisions that cleared the way for the Trump administration to end protections that had allowed many Haitians to live and work legally in the United States for years.

A landing far from the capital

The plane touched down in Cap-Haïtien because Port-au-Prince’s main airport remains too dangerous amid the country’s continuing gang crisis. Many of those arriving kept their faces covered as journalists recorded the scene, while most declined to speak publicly.

For some deportees, the uncertainty began the moment they stepped off the aircraft.

Jean Diane Louis, one of the few willing to speak to reporters, said he had left Haiti when he was just five years old and that his family now lives in New York City. After serving a 19-year prison sentence for a crime he said he did not commit, he said immigration authorities took him into custody and deported him.

“Then ICE came and took me,” he told the Associated Press. “They just sent me here.”

For some, Haiti is almost a foreign country

The deportation flight included people who were not even born in Haiti but were sent there because of their Haitian ancestry, according to Jean Négot Bonheur Delva, director general of Haiti’s National Office of Migration.

One returnee, Delva said, had been born in the Dominican Republic and knew little about Haiti. Authorities were attempting to determine whether he could be reunited with relatives in either country.

Others now face the difficult task of reaching different parts of Haiti, including areas where travel itself has become dangerous because armed gangs control key routes and have attacked vehicles.

Officials offered returnees food, drinks and up to $65, while those unable to reach their destinations immediately were to be placed temporarily in secure accommodation, according to Haiti's migration office.

Deportations resume as Haiti struggles with violence

The timing of the deportations has drawn sharp criticism from migrant and human rights advocates, who argue that Haiti is ill-equipped to absorb a growing number of forced returnees.

Gang violence has displaced about 1.5 million people across the country, while more than half of Haiti's nearly 12 million residents need humanitarian assistance, according to figures cited by the Associated Press. More than 3,100 people were reported killed and another 1,189 injured between January and June.

Haiti's Group Supporting Refugees and Returnees said the country was not prepared to receive large numbers of people losing TPS protections, warning that adequate government support systems were not in place. The group also pointed to the more than 140,000 Haitians deported from neighbouring countries, including the Dominican Republic, during the first half of the year.

The end of TPS changes the picture

The flight came after a series of legal developments that allowed the Trump administration to move ahead with ending Temporary Protected Status for Haitians. The U.S. Supreme Court allowed the programme's termination in June, and a federal judge later lifted an order blocking deportations of Haitians covered by TPS.

The change has left hundreds of thousands of Haitians facing an uncertain future, with arrests and deportations continuing even as conditions in their home country remain deeply unstable.

The Associated Press reported that ICE enforcement activity has also intensified in places with significant Haitian communities, including Springfield, Ohio, where a Haitian pastor and another man were arrested on Thursday, according to a local immigrant-support organisation.

A journey back with no clear destination

For Haiti, the challenge is now larger than simply receiving a deportation flight.

Some of those arriving have spent decades abroad. Others left as children. Some have families in the United States, while others are returning to a country they barely know — and in some cases, do not have a clear home to return to.

As the U.S. steps up deportations following the end of TPS protections, the scene in Cap-Haïtien offered an early glimpse of what could follow: people arriving with limited assistance, uncertain travel plans and an immediate need to navigate a country already overwhelmed by violence, displacement and humanitarian need.

(With AP inputs)