The fourth C-17 military transport deportation flight, which departed Thursday from Fort Bliss, landed in Guatemala City. On board were 80 Guatemalan nationals rapidly removed by the Trump administration. 

President Trump has stated that his administration is only deporting criminals. But those onboard denied that they were violent criminals and had been in the U.S. only a short time.

The use of military equipment made many uncomfortable.

“I don't feel that it was right that they brought us a plane like that,” a 34-year-old from Guatemala City, who declined to give her name, commented while standing in the reception center on Thursday. “We didn't steal. We didn't kill anyone to have them do that to us.”

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Guatemalan immigration authorities told reporters that 56 men, 20 women and four minors accompanied by a family member were on the flight.

After arriving in Guatemala, those aboard the deportation flight passed through the doors of the USAID-funded deportee reception center in Guatemala City. The colorful murals and warm brick walls inside contrast the somber tone of the migrants arriving on the deportation flight.

Deportees received a simple sack lunch, the first thing they had eaten that day. They were then turned to the streets, where cabs or old retired U.S. public school buses waited to give them rides to their homes or back to the migrant trail.

Earlier that day, the massive gray C-17 cargo plane sat on the runway of Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso. The powerful engines hummed as the rear door slowly closed, preparing for take off.

U.S. Border Patrol Special Operation Supervisor Hamid Nikseresht described the flight as a “whole-of-government approach, utilizing every resource possible to secure America's borders.”

All those who were removed under Title 8.

Nikseresht warned that this was an example of how if migrants cross into the U.S. illegally, then they could find themselves home within seven hours. A normal deportation charter flight or a commercial flight can arrive in Guatemala City in less than three hours from El Paso.

The flight left El Paso at 10 a.m. MT on Thursday, Jan. 30, as a frigid wind blew across the tarmac. Six hours later, it arrived just before sunset in warm, partly cloudy Guatemala City.

The whole flight, the migrants were chained. These restraints were not removed until they arrived in Guatemala before they stepped out of the back of the massive transport plane.

One migrant said he felt like "a chained-up dog." Another migrant said they were bound during the flight.

“They chain us by the feet, by the hands, by the waist,” Rocío, a Guatemalan woman who only identified herself by her first name, said upon arrival. “It was a very difficult experience. We were going to look for the American dream, but it was something that was denied to us.”

However, not all migrants were restrained .

Mariela Che, a 20-year-old from the Guatemalan Department of Alta Verapaz said that she was not restrained due to her pregnancy. Yet she said that she still cried as the flight departed, and now she said she worries for her unborn child.

She described her detention and the flight as being "very hard."

At least seven military deportation flights on C-17 cargo planes have left El Paso, Texas and Tucson, Arizona, since Trump announced the use of military planes on Jan. 24 as part of his national emergency declaration on immigration.

So far, four flights carrying 304 people have arrived in Guatemala, and one flight carrying 80 people to Ecuador as of Friday morning, Jan. 31. Two other military flights were turned back after Colombia refused to permit them to land on Jan. 26, causing a diplomatic spat between Trump and Colombian President Gustavo Petro.

Each flight has taken longer than normal deportation flights. They have had to cross over Costa Rica before heading south to Ecuador or north to Guatemala.

'Dehumanization' of migrants

Concern over alleged abuses and human rights violations on the removal flights have been raised for years. But the concerns over the treatment and conditions of immigrants on the deportation flights have grown following Trump’s increased use of military planes.

“There is concern for the broader dehumanization implicit in the unnecessary involvement of military resources in this kind of operation,” Phil Neff, with the University of Washington’s Human Rights Center, said.

Colombia decried the use of handcuffs on deportees after blocking the flights on Jan. 26. Honduras, too, has condemned the treatment of migrants.

Guatemala, too, appears to be pushing back against the long-held use of restraint on migrants on deportation flights. The Guatemalan daily newspaper La Hora reported that Guatemalan authorities are attempting to dialogue with the Trump administration to no longer treat migrants like criminals.

Many of the migrants deported to Guatemala City on Thursday are returning to debts from their journey, with some families paying up to 140,000 Quetzales, or nearly $18,000, for lack of opportunity and violence. This, coupled with the rising cost of living in Guatemala, will likely push many deportees to try again to reach the United States.

“Maybe I will try again,” one 25-year-old migrant from Guatemala City said, declining to provide her name. “But I will let the situation calm down a little.”