US set to deport 85 Nigerians

The United States is set to return the first set of Nigerian deportees under the Donald Trump administration to Lagos.

The US envoy to Nigeria, Richard Miller, disclosed this in Lagos, according to a statement issued by Nigeria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Sunday.

Mr Millier, according to the statement, said Nigerians who were convicted in the US would be repatriated to Lagos State as the first batch of deportees.

“Those to be repatriated would be dropped in Lagos. There wouldn’t be room for whether it should be in Port Harcourt or Abuja.

“The first group will be convicted prisoners. Those who committed crimes and are in US prisons. Some of them are those who have violated US immigration laws. They appealed but were denied, yet they are still in the US. They have committed immigration crimes, people who have been ordered to leave,” he said.

This is coming weeks after the US government identified 3,690 Nigerian nationals to be deported amid the nation’s clampdown on illegal migration.

PREMIUM TIMES earlier reported that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) had identified 3,690 Nigerians among the 1.4 million “illegal migrants” set to be deported.

A document by ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) showed the migrants have been on ICE’s non-detained docket with final orders of removal since 24 November 2024.

The non-detained docket includes people who have been ordered to leave the US or are in the process of being deported but are not being held by ICE.

With 3,690 individuals, Nigeria has the second-highest number of citizens slated for deportation in Africa, following Somalia, which has 4,090.

Mass deportations are part of the campaign promises of US President Donald Trump, who has been criticised for violating human rights and national laws in the deportation process.