Twenty people were flown from the United States to Roberts International Airport in Liberia on 20 August 2026. None of them was Liberian. CBS News filmed the arrival and reported the same day that a small group refused to leave the aircraft, that they were escorted off and then returned to it, and that what became of them afterwards was not known.
Roughly twenty people from different countries landed in Liberia. Liberia had said it would accept up to 1,200 people transferred from the United States over the following year, and would allow new arrivals to apply for asylum there.
Checked 11 September 2026The written reportWatch on YouTube instead
The question CBS left open was answered the next day. On 21 August 2026 Reuters reported that five people the United States attempted to deport to Liberia resisted getting off the plane and were taken to Equatorial Guinea instead, and it repeated the account on 8 September. They were housed at the Bamy Hotel in Malabo, where armed police drew weapons on the people held there twice in five weeks.
Reuters puts the number who refused at five. The lawyer acting for them puts it at six. Both figures are recorded and neither is preferred.
Update, 5 November 2026. Later reports put the number at six. The Associated Press, citing a person on the plane and a lawyer in contact with the six, reported six on 24 August 2026, and Human Rights Watch (8 October 2026) and Third Country Deportation Watch (updated 27 October 2026) also give six. The U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (October 2026) gives five. The count is unresolved. Sources: Associated Press, 24 August 2026 · Human Rights Watch, To Scare People, 8 October 2026, pp. 50 to 51 · Third Country Deportation Watch, Equatorial Guinea, updated 27 October 2026 · U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, tracker, October 2026
Where the full account is. The Coalition’s country guides carry the dated record for each state. What happened at the airport is on the Liberia guide. What happened after the plane flew on is on the Equatorial Guinea guide.
This page reports what a news organisation published. It is not advice, and nothing here is the Coalition’s interpretation of United States law.
Correction, 5 November 2026: this report said that the question was answered nineteen days later, by Reuters on 8 September 2026. Reuters first reported it on 21 August 2026, the day after the flight, and repeated the account on 8 September. The passage has been corrected above.