5. Department of Homeland Security · Major · Day one

Reinstate the Remain in Mexico (Migrant Protection Protocols) policy

Partially done

Printed page 151 5. Department of Homeland Security

“Recommence negotiations with Mexico to fully implement the Remain in Mexico Protocols.”

Printed again in Chapter 6.

Printed page 178 6. Department of State

“Reimplementation of the Remain in Mexico policy, safe third-country agreements, and other measures to address the influx of non-Mexican asylum applicants at the United States–Mexico border must be Day One priorities.”

What has happened

Jan 21, 2025 Partially done
DHS announced it was restarting the Migrant Protection Protocols immediately under the 2019 policy guidance, citing INA §235(b)(2)(C). We found no allowlisted record of Mexico's agreement to receive returns or of enrollment figures for the reinstated program; DHS's April 2025 environmental notice still described the "proposed resumption" of MPP.
- DHS Reinstates Migrant Protection Protocols, Allowing Officials to Return Applicants to Neighboring Countries (press release)
  Primary Executive branch Jan 21, 2025
- DHS notice: Draft Programmatic Environmental Assessment for the proposed resumption of the Migrant Protection Protocols
  Primary Executive branch Apr 25, 2025
Jan 20, 2025 Attempted
Executive Order 14165 (Securing Our Borders) §6 directed the Secretary of Homeland Security, with State and the Attorney General, to take all appropriate action to resume the Migrant Protection Protocols.
- Securing Our Borders (Executive Order 14165), §6 on the Migrant Protection Protocols
  Primary Executive branch Jan 20, 2025
- Executive Order 14165 — Securing Our Borders
  Primary Executive branch Jan 20, 2025

Research log

What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence

Research notes

The Chapter 5 Quote asks for negotiations with Mexico to fully implement MPP; the Chapter 6 Quote asks for reimplementation. DHS reinstated the policy on paper on 2025-01-21, but we could not find, on an allowlisted source, either Mexico’s agreement or a count of people returned under the 2025 program. CBP’s Migrant Protection Protocols Fiscal Year 2025 statistics page (https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/migrant-protection-protocols-fy2025, loaded) reports only re-apprehensions of people returned under the earlier program and no FY2025 enrollments; the OHSS MPP cohort-report page was last updated 2025-02-11. Hence partial, not done. If a DHS or CBP page reports returns to Mexico under the reinstated protocols, move to done from that date.
Bills making MPP mandatory — H.R. 273 REMAIN in Mexico Act of 2025, H.R. 551 / S. 112 Make the Migrant Protection Protocols Mandatory Act of 2025 — were introduced in January 2025 and not acted on (leads).
No court order against the 2025 reinstatement was found in the CourtListener keyword file (“Migrant Protection Protocols”) or the bulk docket snapshot.

Action: reinstate
Object: Remain in Mexico Protocols
ID: 368