The US-Mexico border isn’t the only place where the impact of President-elect Donald Trump’s immigration policies could be acutely felt. There could also be major changes at the US-Canada border.
Tom Homan, whom Trump recently named his “border czar.” Tried to sound the alarm about immigrants entering the United States without authorization through the Canadian border, and outlined plans to make it more difficult to enter the United States through its northern border. Canada is also bracing for a possible influx of immigrants if Trump goes ahead with his mass deportation plan and End temporary protection For more than 1 million immigrants to the United States.
The Canadian border is not often the focus of the US political debate over immigration, but policy discussions on both sides of the border suggest that could change in the next Trump administration. This could both strain the normally friendly US-Canada relationship and reshape Canada’s domestic politics on immigration.
Change is already underway in Canada. Following Trump’s election, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau re-established a special cabinet committee on relations between the two countries, a The main immigration focus. Not only does Trudeau now have to contend with Trump’s policies but increasingly the Canadian public as well Resistant to accepting asylum seekers and refugees In the last four years.
Although it receives less attention than the US-Mexico border, the US-Canada border has been a flashpoint in the past. During his first administration, Trump sought to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS), a set of legal protections for citizens of certain countries facing instability. As a result, Thousands of migrants flocked At the northern border in 2018 to seek asylum in Canada.
In 2023, a dirt road over New York also became available Informal gateway for about 40,000 migrants Immigrate to Canada to seek asylum, mostly from Latin America but some from Asia. The Canadian government eventually closed the crossing in 2023. Now, the border may once again become a priority in US-Canada diplomacy.
Trump’s plan on the northern border
Trump himself has not outlined his plans for the Canadian border, but Homan was clear about his recommendations.
In an interview with a local New York TV station earlier this month, Homan said the northern border is a “Extreme national security vulnerability,” citing increasing migrant encounters in recent years, incl Hundreds of people on US terror watch list. Border agents almost record 199,000 encounters Along the northern border in fiscal year 2024, which ends in October, was about 110,000 just two years ago.
Canada “cannot be a gateway for terrorists to come to the United States,” Homan said in the interview.
He added that he wants the White House to address the pace of immigration by deploying more immigration enforcement agents to the northern border and encouraging Trump to negotiate with Trudeau to increase enforcement on the Canadian side.
Homan also suggested that a version of Trump’s “stay in Mexico” policy could be implemented in Canada. It’s unclear exactly what that might look like or whether the Trudeau government would agree to such a policy, but the original version forced hundreds of thousands of migrants to wait months in Mexico for a decision on their U.S. immigration cases. President Joe Biden ended the policy on the Mexican border, but so did Trump has indicated that he would like to revive it.
Canada is preparing for an influx of immigrants from the United States
Canadian authorities are reportedly preparing for a wave of immigrants from the United States under Trump’s second presidency, as they began during his first. Royal Canadian Mounted Police recorded growth Irregular border crossings between 2016 and 2023 – from just a few hundred arrivals in three months 14,000 at their peak — as a result in part of Trump’s immigration policy.
The most direct example of this is the Haitians who claimed asylum in Canada after Trump ended their TPS status, which had been in place since a devastating 2010 earthquake from which their country has never fully recovered. They cross the border between check posts on foot.
Some Canadian officials are reportedly concerned that Trump’s mass deportation policy and the targeting of TPS and other programs that protect immigrants from deportation will drive people to the Canadian border. The New York Times reported this earlier this month Canadian authorities are “drawing up plans to add patrols, purchase new vehicles and establish emergency reception facilities at the border between New York State and the province of Quebec.”
These resources can help prevent tragedies like the one in 2022 where a family, aided by smugglers, freeze to death On the Canadian side of the border when trying to enter the United States
The Canadian government also wants to enforce its so-called “safe third country” agreement with the United States, which says Canada has the right to deport asylum seekers who travel to the United States before trying to claim asylum in Canada. Those immigrants must then apply for asylum in the United States. Homan has indicated The Trump administration wants to detain them in the United States pending their court proceedings. Currently, most immigrants are released into the United States to await their court proceedings.
Canada’s plans mark a departure from Trudeau’s earlier open-arms approach to immigrants during the first Trump administration, reflecting a Canadians’ feelings about immigration have changed dramatically.
“To those fleeing persecution, terror and war, Canadians welcome you,” Trudeau tweeted in 2017Just after Trump implemented his travel ban on several Muslim-majority countries.
Seven years later, he said in a video statement that his government “did something wrongOn immigration in the post-pandemic era.
“We could work quickly and turn off the taps [of immigration] Fast,” he said.
