He Was Deported to a Country He’d Never Heard Of

In its efforts to deport as many undocumented immigrants as possible, the Trump administration has increasingly relied on a highly controversial strategy: deporting people to countries they have no connection to.

Last week, a federal court ruled the practice to be illegal because it violated people’s right to due process. The administration challenged that ruling, and now it is in front of the Supreme Court.

Nicholas Casey tells the story of Roberto Mosquera, who moved to the United States from Cuba as a child. He has been held in the small country of Eswatini since July 2025.

Guest: Nicholas Casey, a staff writer at The New York Times Magazine who writes about geopolitics.

Background reading: 

• He was deported to a country he’d never heard of. He may never go free.
• How do you interview a deportee being held inside a maximum-security prison?

Photo: Moises Saman/Magnum, for The New York Times

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