Liberia received fewer US deportees after some refused to disembark

On Thursday, August 20, 2026, a plane carrying six deportees from the United States touched down at Roberts International Airport in Monrovia, Liberia. According to a witness and a lawyer who spoke to the passengers, the six individuals - four Cuban men, a Brazilian man, and a Cameroonian woman - refused to disembark the aircraft.

They claimed Liberia was not their country and expressed fear of facing danger there. Upon arriving in Liberia, the six were separated from the rest of the deportees. Meredyth Yoon, a spokesperson for Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta, reported that the six passengers were then transported to Malabo, the capital city of Equatorial Guinea.

They were informed they would be returned to the United States, but instead, were flown to Equatorial Guinea, a third country that has a deportation agreement with the United States. This incident highlights the use of a legal loophole by the Trump administration to indirectly repatriate asylum seekers to countries where they fled, despite these countries not being their own.