FILE PHOTO: Cuba's Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Carlos Fernandez de Cossio, speaks during a news conference in Havana, Cuba, November 15, 2022. REUTERS/Alexandre Meneghini/File Photo
HAVANA (Reuters) -A proposal by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump for mass deportation of immigrants living illegally in the United States that may include Cubans is unrealistic and unfair, Cuba's deputy foreign minister said on Wednesday.
Trump has pledged a vast immigration crackdown, aiming to deport record numbers of immigrants, an operation that his running mate JD Vance estimated could remove 1 million people a year.
Wednesday's comments by Carlos Fernandez de Cossio followed routine migration talks in Havana with counterparts from the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden.
Any such deportation proposal must be vetted within the bounds of existing migration agreements between the United States and Cuba, he told reporters.
"In that context, it's not realistic to think that there could be mass deportations from the United States to Cuba," de Cossio said.
Under existing accords, Cuba has accepted small numbers of deportations from the U.S. by air and by sea during the Biden administration.
Trump's incoming border czar Tom Homan has said deportations would focus on criminals and those given final deportation orders, but has not committed to exemptions for specific groups or nationalities.
The Trump deportation proposal was not discussed with Biden officials during Wednesday's two-way migration talks, de Cossio said.
A U.S. delegation had met Cuban officials in Havana to review the U.S.-Cuba Migration Accords, which date back to 1984, Brian Nichols, the top U.S. diplomat for Latin America, said on X.
"(The delegation) highlighted our success curbing irregular Cuban maritime and land-based migration," Nichols said.
It was unclear whether Trump would abide by existing accords with Cuba or seek to renegotiate them, as he has in other circumstances.
For decades, Cuba has blamed the U.S. Cold War-era trade embargo for decimating its economy and encouraging the mass migration of Cubans to the United States.
But a large-scale deportation to send them back home would be drastic and unfair, de Cossio said.
"Trying to deport tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of Cubans to Cuba ... would be uprooting people who have already made their lives in the United States," he added.
Trump struggled to ramp up deportations during his first term, from 2017 to 2021.
When counting both immigration removals and faster “returns” to Mexico by U.S. border officials, Biden deported more immigrants in fiscal 2023 than in any Trump year, government data shows.
Immigrant advocates warn that a broader Trump deportation effort would be costly, divisive and inhumane, leading to family separations and devastating communities.
(Reporting by Nelson Acosta; Editing by Dave Sherwood, Stephen Coates and Nicholas Yong)
