Angie Nixon says Trump deported over 13,000 Cubans; available data puts the total near 12,000

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Angie Nixon said on Oct. 4 that President Donald Trump has deported "over 13,000 Cubans" across his two terms, a claim PolitiFact rated Mostly True. The best available data puts the total close to 12,000 as of early August, and the number may have grown since then, according to the fact check published Oct. 13 by PolitiFact Florida and WLRN.

The claim matters in Florida because Cuban Americans, concentrated in South Florida, are a large and closely watched voting bloc, and they largely supported Trump in the 2024 presidential election. Nixon made the statement on CBS News Miami's "Facing South Florida" with host Jim DeFede as she courted South Florida voters.

"Donald Trump is the deporter in chief and we have witnessed him deporting over 13,000 Cubans since he has been in office, his first term and his second term," Nixon said.

What the numbers show

PolitiFact pieced together the total from two sources, because the federal government does not publish a second-term count.

PolitiFact asked the Department of Homeland Security how many Cubans have been deported during Trump's second term, but the department did not provide a figure, and neither DHS nor U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement reports the number on its website.

Brian Root, a senior adviser at Human Rights Watch, provided the second-term estimate. The group based it on ICE data obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request by the Deportation Data Project at UCLA's Center for Immigration Law and Policy. PolitiFact noted that more Cubans have likely been deported since August, which is why the shortfall from Nixon's 13,000 did not lower the rating further. Nixon's campaign did not respond to PolitiFact's request for comment.

Deportations to third countries

A large share of recent Cuban removals have not gone to Cuba at all. Human Rights Watch reported in May that from Jan. 20, 2025, to March 9, 2026, U.S. authorities deported more than 18,000 people to countries other than their own, nearly 13,000 of them to Mexico, according to PolitiFact. About 4,400 of those sent to Mexico were Cubans, PolitiFact reported. WLRN's earlier coverage of the same Human Rights Watch report, titled "Casting Us Aside to Die," cited a figure of 4,300 Cubans stranded in Mexican cities such as Villahermosa and Tapachula.

The U.S. has also sent Cubans to Liberia, Equatorial Guinea, Guyana and Eswatini, PolitiFact reported. The administration has signed third-country deportation agreements with more than 35 countries.

The Florida connection runs deep. Many of the Cubans Human Rights Watch interviewed were 60 or older and had lived in the U.S. for decades, mainly in Florida, according to PolitiFact. Some arrived during the 1980 Mariel boatlift or in the 1990s. Alcira Silva Hava, a co-author of the report, told WLRN in June that Florida is the main place the arrests and deportations are happening from, naming the state-run detention center in the Everglades known as "Alligator Alcatraz" and the Krome detention center in Miami-Dade County.

The report also described the people being removed. Over half of the Cuban immigrants Human Rights Watch interviewed had lived in the U.S. for at least three decades, and many were over 60 with chronic health conditions, WLRN reported. More than half had a previous criminal conviction, but only 16 percent had a violent or potentially violent offense on their record, according to the report. Silva Hava told WLRN of one Cuban man who was first flown to Cuba, refused entry by the Cuban government, returned to the U.S. and then deported to Mexico.

Why Cubans became targets

Historically, Cubans have not been a main focus of U.S. deportation policy, PolitiFact noted. Two changes shifted that.

First, the Trump administration ended a Biden-era parole program that allowed vetted Cubans and other immigrants with U.S. sponsors to enter the country. When the program ended, so did parole-based work permits, and the administration began deporting some of those who had come through it.

Second, the administration has moved against Cubans with old deportation orders who had remained in the U.S. for years because Cuba would not take them back. Michael J. Bustamante, an associate professor of history at the University of Miami who holds the Emilio Bacardí Moreau Chair in Cuban and Cuban-American studies, told PolitiFact that the Cuban government generally has refused to accept deportees who previously committed crimes in Cuba or in the U.S. That group has been in limbo, he said, and the administration has particularly targeted them for removal to third countries.

"It wasn't a protection on paper. In theory, they always had pending orders of deportation, but there was kind of an inertia there," Bustamante said. "We're talking people who've been in the country for 30-plus years or 40-plus years who never thought that they would be sent anywhere."

Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera, an immigration studies expert at George Mason University, told PolitiFact that what has changed is the pace. People with pending cases and people showing up for routine immigration check-ins have been arrested, she said.

The Senate race backdrop

Nixon, a Democratic state representative from Jacksonville, is challenging Republican Sen. Ashley Moody, whom DeSantis appointed to the seat Marco Rubio vacated when he became secretary of state. The election is Nov. 3.

Recent polls have generally shown Moody ahead. A Mason-Dixon poll for NBC6 and Telemundo 51 released this month found Moody leading Nixon 50 percent to 40 percent, with 8 percent undecided, while a September St. Pete Polls survey showed a near tie.

The verdict and what's next

PolitiFact concluded that Nixon's statement is accurate but needs clarification or additional information. Government data shows about 3,400 Cuban deportations in Trump's first term, and Human Rights Watch's estimate of about 8,500 in the second term brings the total near 12,000 through Aug. 5. Without an official DHS count, the exact figure, and whether it has passed 13,000, remains unconfirmed.

A fuller picture depends on the release of more ICE data through records requests, since the agency does not publish deportations by nationality on a regular basis.