As part of the vote on the budget for 2025, an explosive report has been submitted to the French National Assembly by the former Minister for Integration. It reveals, with figures to back it up, the catastrophic record of deportation of illegal immigrants in France—a growing source of public discontent.
The report, published last month, for the first time gives an extremely precise and accurate overview of France’s policy for deporting illegal immigrants, to provide input for the ‘immigration, asylum and integration’ mission of the 2025 finance bill. The investigation was carried out by a former minister and MP from Emmanuel Macron’s party, Brigitte Klinkert.
Even though the document was released more than a month ago, it has curiously not been commented on in the media, and the newspaper Le Figaro is the first media outlet to examine its contents. The revelations it contains are overwhelming.
In all its figures, the survey takes care to systematically isolate the specific case of North Africans from the total number of illegal immigrants on French soil, to give an idea of the proportions. Of the 137,730 ‘foreigners of all nationalities’ who were ‘targeted’ last year by an obligation to leave French territory (OQTF), 47,535 were North Africans, i.e., 34% of the French total—whereas they represent only 22% of people subject to deportation in Europe as a whole.
Once deportation orders have been issued, France stands out for its low enforcement rate. This fact is well known and has been highlighted by several scandals, involving migrants under OQTF who have not been deported but remained in the country, able to commit rape and murder, as in the Lola case or the Philippine case. The numbers in the Klinkert report confirm this observation, which is intuitively shared by the majority of French people. The deportation rate in France is 7.7%, taking all nationalities together, while it is almost 19% at the European level—almost three times higher than in France.
The main reason for the low rate of enforcement of OQTFs is the refusal of host countries to issue the consular passes needed to repatriate deportees to their countries of origin. “In 2023, out of a total of 2,120 expulsion cancellations, 96% were due to refusals to issue consular passes, mainly from authorities in Maghreb countries,” says Klinkert.
This figure is clear evidence of the weakening of France’s international position under the Macron era. The country is struggling to gain respect and set conditions, and is suffering from the tensions that are multiplying with the countries of origin of illegal immigrants, at the forefront of which, unsurprisingly, is Algeria. Today, relations between France and its former North African departments are at a standstill, and any collaboration on the issue of illegal immigrants—as on so many others—is proving virtually impossible.
One of the main aims of Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, in office since September 2024, is to extend the length of time illegal immigrants are held in detention to get more time to obtain the famous laissez-passer. The case of the murder of Philippine is emblematic in this respect: the consular pass requested for the murder suspect, under OQTF, was issued just a few days after his judicial release from the detention centre where he was being monitored. The author of the report remains sceptical about the usefulness of the measure recommended by Retailleau. The problem of consular passes is above all a matter of political blockage, not purely administrative delay. Attempts to reverse the balance of power by reducing the number of visas granted by France have so far failed to produce the desired results.
A perverse mechanism has now been put in place: the judicial authorities are anticipating foreseeable consular refusals and are therefore issuing expulsion cancellations—revoking issued deportation orders— all day long. The number of such cancellations has quadrupled between 2019 and 2023. Although the most recent trend is slightly downwards, there are still around 500 expulsion cancellations every month, mainly for serious offenders. “It’s totally demotivating for the civil servants assigned to this thankless task,” a border police officer told Le Figaro. Another reason for the failure of deportations is refusals to embark, which are encouraged by migrant associations that provide arguments to illegal immigrants to help them with their application—a phenomenon observed elsewhere in Europe.
The comprehensive diagnosis is there to call for action. Unfortunately, once again, no significant change in France’s deportation policy is to be expected. The draft 2025 budget currently before the National Assembly includes a significant cut to funding for the fight against illegal immigration, which seems at odds with the strong rhetoric from the minister of the interior, who tried to reassure parliamentarians by suggesting an amendment from the prime minister—for the moment still just a promise.
While we wait for action, the Rassemblement National continues to denounce the discrepancies between official rhetoric and budgetary policy—rhetoric that is finding an attentive ear among a growing number of French people.
