Migrant deaths in the Americas fell by more than 1,000 in 2025 compared to the prior year, according to data published Monday by the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration, a drop the agency attributes to the sharp decline in illegal border crossings under President Donald Trump.
The IOM’s annual Missing Migrants report recorded 408 deaths during migration in the Americas in 2025, down from 1,272 in 2024. The agency said the decrease was “due in large part to a real decline in movements along high-risk, irregular routes.”
Deaths in the Caribbean fell as well. The IOM recorded 130 migrant deaths in that region in 2025, compared to 302 the year before. On the direct Caribbean-to-United States route, deaths dropped from 187 in 2024 to just 5 in 2025.
The report was published by an organization headed by Amy Pope, a Biden administration nominee.
The figures track directly with the collapse in illegal border crossings that followed Trump’s return to office in January 2025. The administration moved quickly to reinstate Remain in Mexico, resume wall construction, and deploy military personnel to the southern border. Monthly illegal crossing encounters, which peaked in the hundreds of thousands under President Joe Biden, fell to near-record lows by mid-2025.
“The humanitarian argument for open borders was always a lie,” said Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-WI), a member of the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration. “You want to save migrant lives, you shut down the routes. That’s what the data shows.”
The IOM report noted that migrant deaths in Europe reached a record 3,500 in 2025, as European nations continued to absorb large-scale irregular migration with no comparable enforcement response.
