The federal government has deported hundreds of thousands of people over drug convictions in recent years, details a new report—even for charges “that in many cases no longer exist under state laws.” It’s compelling evidence of the particular harshness with which drug laws still target noncitizens.
The report—titled “Disrupt and Vilify”—The War on Immigrants Inside the US War on Drugs—was released by the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA) and Human Rights Watch on July 15. It found that from 2002-2020, at least 500,000 people were deported from the United States whose most serious charge was for drugs. Of that total, 260,000 people were deported from 2002-2012, while a further 240,000 were deported from 2013-2020—suggesting a slight long-term acceleration, despite states’ drug policy reforms.
As one example, federal criminal laws against marijuana conflict with the 24 states, plus Washington, DC, that have legalized. Noncitizens continue to face deportation for cannabis possession that is legal in those places.
“Even in states where marijuana has been legal for years, immigration authorities can order people deported because marijuana is still a controlled substance federally,” Norma Palacios, a policy coordinator at DPA who helped edit the report, told Filter. “Convictions of even the most minor drug offense, possession of a small amount of a controlled substance, carries [major] consequences for immigrants.”
The result is families being split apart and communities disrupted. The report’s authors say that Congress must reform federal immigration laws so judges can make decisions on each individual case, while state governments should make sure drug policy reforms help non-citizens.
“When that parent is detained or deported, they are unable in most cases to be reunited with their child.”
Marleina Ubel, a senior policy analyst at New Jersey Policy Perspective who was not involved in creating the report, explained to Filter how deportations have created a crisis of abandoned children in the foster system—though we don’t even have reliable data to track its severity.
“What happens to families and children that get left behind, especially citizen children?” she asked. “Because we do have a lot of families that are mixed status, like noncitizen parents with citizen children. What happens is when that parent is detained or deported, they are unable in most cases to be reunited with their child because your child cannot travel without a US passport. It is almost impossible to get one in that situation, so we have a lot of children essentially orphaned.”
The convictions that got people deported most commonly involved cocaine (40 percent), marijuana (35 percent), amphetamines (13 percent) and heroin (8 percent). The report also found that 41 percent of all these convictions were for sales, while 31 percent were for “possession/use.” That ratio varied widely according to the specific drug, however: The largest proportion of marijuana convictions (42 percent) were for possession, whle for heroin it was sales (68 percent).
Drug-related deportations especially target recent immigrants: Most of the people deported (56 percent), had been in the US for two years or less.
“This report underscores that punitive federal drug laws separate families, destabilize communities, and terrorize noncitizens.”
“The uniquely American combination of the drug war and deportation machine work hand in hand to target, exclude, and punish noncitizens for minor offenses—or in some states legal activity—such as marijuana possession,” said Maritza Perez Medina, DPA’s director of federal affairs, in a press release shared with Filter. “This report underscores that punitive federal drug laws separate families, destabilize communities, and terrorize noncitizens, all while overdose deaths have risen and drugs have become more potent and available. It’s imperative that our government revises federal law to match current state-based drug policy reforms to end and prevent the immense human suffering being inflicted in the name of the drug war.”
“Why should parents or grandparents be deported away from children in their care for decades-old drug offenses, including offenses that would be legal today?” asked Vicki Gaubeca, associate US director for immigration and border policy at Human Rights Watch. “If drug conduct is not a crime under state law, it should not make someone deportable.”
The researchers analyzed decades of federal data and interviewed 42 people including immigrants, family members and attorneys. The data show that between 2013-2020, one in every five deportations over a conviction was for a drug charge. Over the whole time period studied, deportations include 156,000 people whose most serious charge was drug use or possession, including 47,000 for marijuana charges.
People who are deported include refugees, people who served in the US armed forces, and those who came to the US as children and grew up here. Individual cases included women who were sexually abused by corrections officers while in detention, and people deported to unsafe and unstable countries, such as Haiti.
“I served my time. So I should go back home, where my father, my mother, my nieces, my son, daughter [are]. My whole community is in Chicago.”
The researchers spoke with Samuel, an immigrant from Sierra Leone who was deported in 2021. He described brutal conditions in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention, and retaliation he endured for speaking up: “The more uncomfortable you are, the more you say you are ready to [be deported]. That’s the whole objective. They put you in a stressful situation so that you just say, I just want to go. Just get me out of here … they kept the place cold, the food [was] barely edible.”
Miguel Perez Jr., a US military veteran and 30-year resident of Chicago, was deported to Mexico after cocaine convictions. “Yes, I committed a crime,” he said. “Yes, I pled guilty. But yes, I served my time. So I should go back home, where my father, my mother, my nieces, my son, daughter [are]. My whole community is in Chicago. That’s where I belong.”
Immigration law defines many drug charges as “drug trafficking aggravated felonies,” which can apply even to people with low-level convictions that would normally carry little or no jail time. This prevents people from being eligible for legal permanent residence or citizenship, and can subject them to automatic deportation. Immigration judges in these cases cannot consider a defendant’s family ties, history or military service, effectively denying the judge discretion.
Most people deported are Black or Brown, with Black immigrants targeted most: Overall, more than one in five people facing a criminal deportation case are Black, and Black immigrants are on average held in detention longer and less likely to be granted release.
The report sets out what lawmakers can do to fix this. Congress would need to reform immigration law to abolish “one-size-fits-all” deportations that are automatic for certain convictions. This would let immigration judges decide, based on individual circumstances and the nature of the charges, whether they consider deportation is warranted.
Congress could also put a statute of limitation on deportations—so people can’t be detained and deported based on convictions that are years or decades old.
State governments also need to take stronger action, the authors wrote, so that policy reforms—like de-felonization or decriminalization of certain drug activities—benefit non-citizens as well as citizens.
“I am disgusted by the federal rhetoric around immigration. We have become so much more hostile to immigrants in the last decade than in our recorded history.”
Yet political momentum in DC seems to be in the other direction—toward even harsher immigration policies.
Donald Trump and Republicans are running on an apocalyptic anti-immigrant platform to launch the “largest domestic deportation operation in American history,” proposing massive new detention camps and even promising to end birthright citizenship for children of immigrants born on US soil.
President Biden and Democrats, meanwhile, have struck a more conservative stance than previously, proposing an immigration bill that was widely seen as ceding to Republican demands on border closures and automatic deportations. The bill failed earlier in 2024 because Republicans, directed by Trump, wouldn’t support it—in what was largely viewed as an electoral calculation. But in June, Biden implemented an executive order, suspending asylum rights for “migrants who cross our Southern border unlawfully.”
“I am disgusted by the federal rhetoric around immigration,” Ubel said. “We have become so much more hostile to immigrants in the last decade than in our recorded history. I can’t speak to the likelihood for reform, but I think people need to make their voices heard on this issue, because our country is richer, it’s a better place because of our immigrant neighbors and we should be protecting them.”
Photograph of of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents via Facebook
The Influence Foundation, which operates Filter, previously received a restricted grant from DPA.