The number of illegal U.S.-bound migrants passing through the dangerous Darién jungle plummeted by nearly 99 percent during the month of February 2025 when compared to February 2024, Panama’s Migrant Authority revealed this week.
In its most recently published statistical report, Panama’s Migrant Authority indicated that it recorded a total of 408 migrants passing through the Darién Gap during February 2025 — an amount that represents a 98.9-percent drop from the total of 37,166 migrants logged during February 2024. Similarly, February 2025’s statistics indicate a 81.68 percent reduction in the number of migrants when compared to the 2,229 migrants recorded by the Authority during January 2025.
Out of February’s total, Panama’s Migrant Authority further detailed in its report, 151 were Venezuelan nationals, 43 Cameroonian, 22 Bangladeshi, 21 Colombians, 17 Iranians, and 16 Nepalese nationals, with the remainder comprising nationals of several other Latin American, African, and Asian nations.
The Darién Gap is a dangerous 30-mile-wide, 100-mile-long jungle trail shared by neighbors Panama and Colombia and the only land bridge that connects South and Central America. In recent years, a growing number of migrants, most of them Venezuelans fleeing the socialist Maduro regime, passed through the jungle trail towards the U.S. southern border.
Panamanian authorities documented a record-breaking number of 520,085 migrants who crossed the Darién Gap in 2023 — more than double the number of 248,284 logged in 2022 and about 3.89 times higher than the 133,726 logged during 2021.
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February 2025 also marked the month with the lowest number of illegal migrants passing through the Darién Gap since April to November 2020, when the migrant traffic flow in the region halted as a result of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic lockdowns.
According to Panama’s official statistics, an average of 33,510 migrants per month passed through the Darién jungle between January and June 2024. The unprecedented number of migrants began to drop last year after conservative President José Raúl Mulino took office in July. Since then, Panama enacted a series of policies that have resulted in a noticeable reduction of illegal migrants passing through the dangerous jungle trail.
In addition to Mulino’s policies, migrant transit through the Darién has dramatically plummeted since the election of President Donald Trump in November 2024.
Following the results of the election, transit through the Darién Gap halved in November when compared to the previous month, going from 22,914 documented migrants in October to 11,144 in November. Migrant crossings further dropped by some 43.50 percent in December, going down to only 4,849 during that month.
Most notably, the latest statistics from Panama’s Migrant Authority indicate that no Chinese nationals were logged passing through the Darién jungle trail during February, and only five in January.
Last year, Panamanian security officials launched a crackdown campaign in response to a noticeable surge of illegal Chinese migrants passing through the country. The crackdown led to the dismantlement of “VIP” route providers that offered “safer” and quicker routes through the jungle trail mostly used by Chinese nationals. Since then, illegal Chinese migration passing through the territory plummeted from 2,911 in January 2024 to only five in January 2025, and zero in February.
The start of President Trump’s second term and crackdown on illegal migrants in the United States has reportedly resulted in a new, “inverse” migration flow that has seen thousands of migrants transit through other countries in the region “in reverse.”
Reports published in late February indicated that the “reverse” migrant flow is experiencing an “upward trend,” with more than 2,000 south-bound migrants entering Panama through its border with Costa Rica during February. President Mulino explained at the time that the migrants are entering Panama through Costa Rica after they failed to enter the United States through its southern border.
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“We are very committed to collaborate, especially with our other neighbor, Costa Rica, which is now the gateway for all these people that we have to help to enter Panama with respect to their human rights,” Mulino said.
In early February, Panamanian Public Security Minister Frank Abrego met with his Costa Rican counterpart Mario Zamora to address the developing North-South migrant inverse return flow. Both nations agreed to implement coordinated policies for the safe and orderly return of illegal migrants to their respective countries of origin.
Abrego explained at the time that both nations agreed to establish an initial protocol that sees migrants arrive at a center in Costa Rica before they are transferred to a location in Panama before their subsequent deportation via air or sea as per the terms of an deportation memorandum signed between Panama and the United States.
“We want to guarantee an orderly, legal, humanitarian and safe migratory flow. This meeting marks the beginning of a coordination that seeks to ensure the return of migrants to their countries of origin in appropriate conditions,” Zamora said during the meeting.
Both officials met again last week and proclaimed to be “ready” to attend the reverse migrant flow coming from the United States. Zamora called for South American nations to facilitate and open their doors to the passage of the returning migrants.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
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