# Jamaica Receives First U.S. Third-Country Deportation Flight as the Supreme Court Prepares to Hear the Policy

Twenty-two migrants landed in Kingston under a June agreement capped at 25 per fortnight. The justices will weigh the policy in December.

- Section: [Border & Security](https://rightnewsrightnow.com/border-security/)
- Published: 2026-10-18
- By: RightNewsRightNow Staff
- Canonical page: https://rightnewsrightnow.com/articles/jamaica-first-third-country-deportation-flight/

Jamaica has joined the list of countries taking people deported from the United States who are not Jamaican.

Fox News reports the first flight arrived Tuesday at Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston with 22 migrants aboard. It follows a Memorandum of Understanding that Jamaica signed with the U.S. in June. The agreement caps arrivals at 25 "per fortnight."

The Trump administration uses third-country removals for migrants who say their home countries are too dangerous to go back to. Fox's links point to similar arrangements elsewhere, including a flight to Liberia in August and a deal for Liberia to accept 1,200 third-country deportees within a year.

Jamaica's government described the arrangement in a joint statement from its national security and foreign affairs ministries, as quoted by Fox from NBC News. It called the program "a transit arrangement intended to facilitate the return of Third Country Nationals to their country of origin or other receiving countries," with help from the International Organization for Migration. The statement said Jamaica will not pay for it, and that "no third-country national with criminal antecedents will be permitted to transit through Jamaica."

The legal picture. Fox says critics have attacked third-country deportations heavily, and the Supreme Court will consider whether the policy is lawful in December. In September the Court let the administration keep deporting while the case is argued, with Justices Sotomayor, Kagan and Jackson saying they would have denied the request. Lower courts have not banned these removals outright. Fox says they have required procedures that give people a chance to raise claims that they would face persecution or torture in the destination country.

What this does not tell us: the migrants' nationalities, how long they will stay in Jamaica, or where they go next. The report does not say, and we are not filling that in.

## Source

Original reporting: [Fox News](https://www.foxnews.com/politics/jamaica-accepts-first-flight-third-country-deportations-us-amid-looming-supreme-court-battle)