Inside the ordeal of deported migrants as US and Colombia squared off
Daniel Oquendo, 33, remembers well the first words US border agents told him after he crossed the US-Mexico border on January 20.
Eight days later, Oquendo is back in his native Colombia, after a bitter diplomatic row between US President Donald Trump and Colombian President Gustavo Petro. He was one of about 200 Colombian migrants who were supposed to be deported early on Sunday – but were turned around by Colombian authorities.
'It was very confusing: Nobody told us anything. US Customs and Border (Protection) took us from our cells in San Diego and put us on a C-130, with seats and all of that. They told us the flight to Bogota was going to be seven hours, but when we landed, it was 10 hours, and as soon as the back door for the plane opened, we could see an ambulance saying 'Houston,'' Oquendo said.
'We were back in the United States, and still, nobody would tell us nothing.'
It turned out that Petro had blocked the landing of the two US military flights carrying deportees, sparking a back-and-forth with his US counterpart involving threats of tariff wars before Bogota finally relented.
After Houston, Oquendo and the other migrants spent the night in El Paso, where CBP (US Customs and Border Protection) officers took their handcuffs away, and on Monday, officials from the Colombian consulate arrived to interview them.
His return to US soil was brief. On Tuesday, Oquendo was finally repatriated to Colombia in an aircraft sent by the Colombian government, which touted the flight as a more dignified and respectful transport.
Deportation flights were nothing new to Colombia – there were more than a hundred flights in 2024 – but the spectacle of handcuffed deportees in a military plane had crossed a line for Petro.
'A migrant is not a criminal and must be treated with the dignity every human being is worthy of … I can't have the migrants stay in a country that doesn't want them; but if this country sends them away it must be with dignity and respect towards them and towards our country. We will welcome back our fellow countrymen on civilian planes, without a criminal's treatment,' the Colombian president posted on Sunday morning.
Oquendo thinks the showdown was superfluous. 'That was just an unnecessary media circus. The president wanted to make a case out of us and … what for? In the end, he had to accept the deportations. It was all for nothing,' he told CNN.
But not all of the deportees agree. Andrei Barrientos, 36, another Colombian who was deported on Tuesday morning from El Paso to Bogota, told CNN it was a surprisingly welcoming experience after days of uncertainty.
'One must thank the president for the nice treatment they gave us. We were still in El Paso, and as soon as we boarded the plane, the officers there smiled to us and told us: 'Welcome to Colombia!'' he said.
Neither of the two knew of the diplomatic standoff behind their repeated round trips until they arrived in Bogota, they said.
'I learnt all of this today, when I landed in Bogota and it was full of journalists asking me what had happened … What did I know? In the CBP centers, there are televisions, but they don't allow news channels, it's all sports and old movies, and of course we didn't have a phone. Only now I'm realizing what happened there,' Barrientos told CNN.
He believes Petro had an important point to prove.
'We didn't do anything wrong: I'm not a criminal. Yes, I crossed the border illegally, but I was doing that to help my family … and they treated me like I was a gangster,' he told CNN.
While handcuffing and removing the belts and shoelaces of deportees is standard practice in this type of operation, both Oquendo and Barrientos feel they were treated in a demeaning way by US immigration officials, especially when boarding the military flight in the early hours of Sunday.
'The CBP, they mostly spoke Spanish, they handcuffed us and pushed around as if we were in jail. I understand the military has some procedures, but there were children, families,' said Oquendo, who crossed in Tijuana and was apprehended in San Diego.
According to the Colombian Migration Institute, among the migrants deported this week were 77 women and 16 minors.
For Barrientos, it was his second time being deported from the US – and likely his last. 'I don't want to try a third time,' he told CNN, saying now he plans to look for opportunities in his native Medellin.
Oquendo, though, points to intractable economic conditions in Colombia that he says make it impossible to stay.
'My whole family chipped in to help me, I can't let them down,' he told CNN. 'Right now I'm here in Bogota and I have a place to stay, but there are no jobs here. I have to keep going somewhere.'
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