Migration occupies a central and divisive place in US politics. Yet rarely is it asked why migrants are compelled to leave their homes in the first place, and what role US foreign policy might play in that decision.

There is growing evidence that economic sanctions — a go-to US foreign policy tool — are a major driver of migration to the United States, particularly from Cuba and Venezuela. Addressing migration at its roots will require reevaluating US sanctions policy as part of a broader rethinking of the US foreign policy role in pushing people to migrate. The following points are drawn from a soon to be released issue brief on sanctions and migration that can be found on CEPR’s website.

Economic Hardship Drives Migration

• There is overwhelming evidence that economic factors — household income, employment, national economic conditions, food security, etc. — are key drivers of migration.

Sanctions Fuel Economic Hardship

• Broad-based sanctions can impede economic growth; trigger or extend recessions and depressions; restrict access to critical resources like medicine, food, and energy; disrupt humanitarian aid (despite nominal exemptions); and consequently exacerbate poverty, illness, and hunger.

• Sanctions can lead to a significant number — in some cases tens of thousands — of preventable deaths.
• In a 2023 literature review, CEPR Senior Research Fellow Francisco Rodríguez determined that 94 percent of peer-reviewed econometric studies on the subject found substantial, statistically significant “negative effects on outcomes ranging from per capita income to poverty, inequality, mortality, and human rights” resulting from sanctions.

Sanctions Induce Migration

• An October 2024 study (the first of its kind) found that US-EU sanctions increase emigration from target countries by 22 to 24 percent, on average.
• This peer-reviewed study also found that “migrant flows return to their pre-sanction level once sanctions are lifted.”

Trump-Biden Sanctions Have Spurred Cuba’s Depopulation

• The six-decade US embargo has severely stunted Cuba’s economic growth, with Cuban civilians bearing the brunt of the consequences.
• Trump-Biden policies — including the baseless State Sponsor of Terrorism designation and the failure to waive Title III of the Helms-Burton Act — have plunged Cuba into its worst economic and humanitarian crisis in contemporary history.
• Cuba today is suffering blackouts, food, fuel, and water shortages, the deterioration of basic services such as garbage collection, and the spread of preventable diseases.
• This economic crisis in turn spurred the departure of over a million people, representing 10 percent of the country’s entire population, in 2022 and 2023 alone.
• In 2022, the US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) encountered more Cubans than any other nationality except Mexicans, constituting more than 10 percent of all encounters, despite that Cuba is a small country.

“Maximum pressure” Sanctions Fueled a Venezuelan Exodus

• From 2012 to 2020, Venezuela experienced a 71 percent collapse in GDP per capita — the largest peacetime contraction of any country in modern history, and the equivalent of three Great Depressions.
• CEPR Senior Research Fellow Francisco Rodríguez estimates that over half of this contraction was due to US sanctions, largely as a result of decreased oil output.
• In a new study, Rodríguez estimates that 4.1 million of the 7 million that fled Venezuela did so because of sanctions.
• He further estimates that a return to “maximum pressure” sanctions would cause the migration of another 1 million people from Venezuela over the next 5 years.
• In 2023 and 2024, CBP encountered more migrants from Venezuela than from any other country except Mexico.
• Venezuela is the single fastest-growing country of birth of US immigrants since the “maximum pressure” approach began in 2017.
• The Trump administration was repeatedly warned that mass migration was a likely consequence of its sanctions policy, yet pursued it anyway.

One Clear Way to Address Migration Root Causes: Lift Economic Sanctions

• In May 2023, 21 members of Congress sent a letter to President Biden urging the easing of sanctions on Cuba and Venezuela in order to mitigate push-factors for migration.
• A separate letter from over 50 economists and other scholars corroborated their claim that lifting sanctions would help ease migration.
• Former Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, whose country is also impacted by migratory flows, and other Latin American leaders have said the same.

An Alternative Approach to Migration Is Available

• An alternative vision to migration would critically assess how US foreign policy exacerbates global inequalities and creates conditions that drive migration.
• The new Congressional Caucus to Address Global Migration and the Migration Stability Resolution take an approach that is both more effective and more humane.
• In the words of Rep. Casar (D-TX), a lead sponsor of the Migration Stability Resolution, these efforts seek to: “[change] the failed US policies that cause displacement abroad and force people to flee their home countries.”