4 Lessons for Trump From the UK’s Failed Rwanda Migrant Deportation Deal

On Sunday, Rwanda’s foreign minister said his country was in “early stage” talks with the Trump administration about a deal to take in migrants deported from the United States.

That news had a familiar ring in Britain, where the former Conservative-led government agreed to a deal in 2022 to permanently deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, then spent two years and hundreds of millions of pounds trying — largely fruitlessly — to make the plan happen.

When Britain’s highest court ruled that the proposal broke human rights law, the Conservative government tried to use new legislation to override the judgment. But in the end, the policy proved an almost complete failure, and the new Labour government, which was elected last year, scrapped it, citing its huge expense and unworkability.

Here are some lessons the British debacle may hold for the Trump administration.

It could be expensive.

The British government spent 715 million pounds, about $955 million, on the plan, which it claimed would deter illegal migration.

As well as £290 million paid directly to the Rwandan government, millions more went on preparing deportation flights, readying detention centers and I.T. systems, and paying for staffing and legal costs. But in the end, only four migrants ended up being sent to Rwanda — and they went voluntarily and were paid £3,000 each to do so.

Official documents show that the figures were a small fraction of what would have been spent if the deal had been fully carried out. The British government had agreed to pay Rwanda £150,000 for every person deported, a sum that would pay for a five-year “integration package” of accommodation, food, medical services and education.

After the deal was scrapped, Rwanda said it would not pay any money back as there was no reimbursement clause.

Yvette Cooper, the Labour home secretary, said that the Conservatives ultimately planned to spend more than £10 billion on the Rwanda policy over a six-year period.

The Conservatives argued that the cost was worth it because fewer people would try to come to Britain on small boats if they feared being sent to Rwanda.

Rwanda probably can’t take large numbers of deportees.

The Central African country is only about 10,000 square miles in size, about the same as Massachusetts.

The Trump administration has not disclosed how many people it might want to send to Rwanda, which is already one of the world’s most densely populated nations.

During a British Supreme Court hearing in 2023, a lawyer representing the government acknowledged that the number of asylum seekers that Rwanda could take was “initially low” and cited a need for “capacity building” in the country.

British news reports at the time suggested that a maximum of 1,000 people in total could have been transferred from Britain to Rwanda over five years. In 2022, the year the deal was struck, at least 45,000 people arrived in Britain on small boats.

Under an Israeli deal, migrants sent to Rwanda disappeared.

Any agreement with Washington would be the latest in a series of migration agreements struck by Rwanda. The African nation already hosts hundreds of African refugees from Libya who are awaiting resettlement under a deal agreed to six years ago with the United Nations refugee agency and the African Union.

The British treaty was never fully tested before being scrapped. But a secretive agreement signed with Israel in 2013 operated for five years before being ruled unlawful by the Israeli Supreme Court. Details of that agreement were discussed during the court battle in Britain.

Under the Israeli deal, Eritrean and Sudanese asylum seekers who had sought refuge in Israel were deported to Rwanda with “explicit undertakings” that they would have their claims considered and would “enjoy human rights and freedoms,” according to documents provided in evidence during the British Supreme Court’s hearings.

But the British justices found that Rwanda had not complied with those assurances and that asylum seekers deported by Israel “were routinely moved clandestinely to Uganda” by being driven to the border or put on flights.

The Rwandan government did not immediately respond to requests for comment for this article.

There could be legal challenges.

The Trump administration has already shown a willingness to defy the courts, given that it has so far refused to comply with orders to return at least two men wrongly deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador.

But in the case of Britain, the fact that the plan would have breached multiple domestic laws enforcing human rights, as well as the United Nations Refugee Convention, contributed to the plan’s ultimate failure. Under the terms of the deal, Rwanda was to take in undocumented migrants and process their asylum applications. Even if the migrants were later found to qualify for refugee status, they were expected to be resettled in Rwanda and never return to Britain.

The British Supreme Court ruled in November 2023 that the plan was unlawful because of the risk that genuine refugees could be sent back to the countries they had fled, putting their safety at risk.

Abdi Latif Dahir contributed reporting.