CBS News: As Pathways to Freedom Narrow, More Detainees Are Voluntarily Leaving the Country

"As pathways to freedom narrow" … meaning Joe Biden isn't president and letting in tens of millions of unvetted illegals through the border and flying them around the country. CBS News reports that more illegal alien detainees are voluntarily leaving the country, which the Trump administration facilitated with the CBP Home app and even offered a financial incentive.

As pathways to freedom have narrowed in immigration courts across the United States, a record number of detainees are giving up their cases and voluntarily leaving the country.

https://t.co/6cedTYkDc8
— CBS News (@CBSNews) February 12, 2026

Julia Ingram and Kati Weis report for CBS News:

As pathways to freedom have narrowed in immigration courts across the United States, a record number of detainees are giving up their cases and voluntarily leaving the country.
Last year, 28% of completed immigration removal cases among those in detention ended in voluntary departure, a higher share than in any year prior, a CBS News analysis of decades of court records found.
…
"It's set up for every individual who is detained to get to the point where they're just emotionally drained and exhausted through it all of the way that we're being treated, to just say, 'OK, all I want is my freedom,'" said Vilma Palacios, who agreed to return to Honduras in late December after being detained for six months in Basile, Louisiana.

Het gets it.

That literally was the idea. https://t.co/u9VWcxCOhy
— Varad Mehta (@varadmehta) February 12, 2026

Funny how simply enforcing the laws on the books actually helps solve the problem.

There is a lesson here, methinks.
— Pradheep J. Shanker, M.D. (@neoavatara) February 12, 2026

This is why Trump Administration decision to finally follow Congress's demand that aliens remain detained during pendency of hearings is so huge. Self-removal will increase 10 fold once illegals understand they won't be able to stay free in US short term or long term. https://t.co/YzlW5xrCaf
— Margot Cleveland (@ProfMJCleveland) February 12, 2026

Self-deporting is their best option: No ICE tackling you on the street. Free airfare. $2600 to cushion your arrival. And no bar to re-entry again. Very inconvenient, I agree. But THEY failed to care for their paperwork & got themselves into this position. #Deportation
— Becky With The Good Hair (@BeckyJohnson222) February 12, 2026

“Pathways to freedom”

Wow good job @bariweiss you guys are really crushing this whole journalism thing
— Mark Milley’s Stylist 🇺🇸 (@Col_Crockett) February 12, 2026

So, more illegals are choosing to self-deport rather than stay in ICE detention? The system is working.

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Editor’s Note: We voted for mass deportations, not mass amnesty. Help us continue to fight back against those trying to go against the will of the American people.

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