Canada to spice up border safety amid Trump tariff risk: What to know

Montreal, Canada – Canada has pledged to bolster safety at its border with the USA, days after US President-elect Donald Trump threatened to impose crippling tariffs in response to drug trafficking and undocumented migration.

Canadian Public Security Minister Dominic LeBlanc informed reporters on Wednesday night that his authorities “could make further investments” on the border, with out offering concrete particulars.

He additionally mentioned Ottawa would impose better restrictions to forestall individuals from going by means of Canada to achieve the US with out permits.

“We’ll proceed to tighten the screws on that course of to ensure that we proceed to have an immigration system and borders that in reality assist the integrity and safety that Canadians and Individuals work on every single day,” LeBlanc mentioned.

The minister’s remarks got here after a gathering in Ottawa between Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and provincial premiers, who’ve raised considerations and demanded motion over Trump’s tariff risk.

In a social media put up on Monday, Trump — who takes workplace in January — warned Canada and Mexico that he deliberate to impose 25-percent tariffs on imports from each international locations “till such time as Medicine, specifically Fentanyl, and all unlawful Aliens cease this Invasion of our Nation!”

“Each Mexico and Canada have absolutely the proper and energy to simply resolve this lengthy simmering drawback,” the president-elect added.

Whereas migrant and asylum seeker crossings on the US-Mexico border have drawn world headlines for years, the state of affairs on the US’s northern border with Canada receives far much less consideration. Right here’s what it is advisable know.

How many individuals are crossing the US-Canada border?

US Customs and Border Safety (CBP) registered slightly below 199,000 “encounters” on the border with Canada between October 2023 and September of this yr.

This contains individuals caught getting into the US illegally, in addition to people who find themselves deemed inadmissible at a port of entry.

By comparability, CBP recorded greater than 2.13 million encounters on the US-Mexico border in that very same interval.

What about drug trafficking?

Drug seizures on the border have gone down considerably, in response to CBP figures.

Between October 2023 and September 2024, about 5,245kg (11,565 kilos) of medication — largely marijuana — have been seized by US authorities. That’s down from some 25,000kg (55,101 kilos) seized over the identical interval a yr earlier.

What immigration guidelines govern the US-Canada border?

Final yr, the US and Canada expanded a decades-old settlement to offer authorities the ability to instantly expel asylum seekers who cross the nations’ shared border at unofficial factors of entry.

Since 2004, the Secure Third Nation Settlement (STCA) has compelled asylum seekers to use for defense within the first nation they arrived in — the US or Canada, however not each.

However a loophole had allowed individuals to hunt safety in the event that they reached Canadian soil. 1000’s of asylum seekers crossed into Canada throughout Trump’s first time period in workplace amid a wave of anti-immigrant insurance policies.

Now, the STCA applies to everything of the US-Canada land border, which stretches 6,416km (3,987 miles), and folks may be turned again between ports of entry.

Who’s making an attempt to get into the US through Canada?

In current months, as the principles governing the border tightened, residents of nations that don’t require visas to journey to Canada have used the nation as a jumping-off level to attempt to attain the USA.

Final yr, media shops reported that US President Joe Biden’s administration had requested Canada to impose visa necessities for Mexican nationals amid a rise in crossings on the northern border.

Ottawa reimposed the visa measures in February in response to what it mentioned was a spike in asylum claims from Mexican residents.

In the meantime, asylum seekers who’ve had their safety claims rejected by Canada have additionally sought to cross into the US in recent times — generally with the assistance of human smugglers, and generally with lethal outcomes.

In 2023, a household that had their asylum declare rejected in Canada drowned whereas making an attempt to cross into the US by boat. They have been dealing with deportation to their native Romania. Their our bodies have been discovered within the St Lawrence River.

In January 2022, a household from India additionally froze to dying in Manitoba — a province in central Canada — after they tried reaching the US on foot throughout freezing winter climate.

So does the state of affairs actually benefit Trump’s tariffs risk?

That relies on who you’re asking.

Each American and Canadian lawmakers have urged their respective governments to do extra to deal with the state of affairs on the border.

For instance, in September, a bipartisan group of US senators put ahead laws to “strengthen safety” on the border with Canada. The invoice would require the Division of Homeland Safety to conduct a “Northern Border Risk Evaluation” and replace its technique there.

“The threats at our Northern border are always evolving, and so too should our technique to fight these threats,” Senator Maggie Hassan, a Democrat who co-sponsored the measure, mentioned in an announcement. Her state, New Hampshire, sits on the border.

“This bipartisan invoice will strengthen regulation enforcement’s efforts to cease the transnational prison organizations which are flooding our streets with fentanyl and different lethal medicine.”

What have Canadian politicians mentioned?

Whereas most Canadian politicians have pushed again in opposition to the prospect of Trump’s 25-percent tariffs — saying such a transfer would incur job losses and spark an financial downturn — a bunch of right-wing premiers have argued the US president-elect raises “legitimate” considerations concerning the border.

“The federal authorities must take the state of affairs at our border significantly,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford mentioned in a social media put up this week. He has known as on Canada to impose retaliatory tariffs in opposition to the US ought to Trump transfer ahead along with his plans.

Francois Legault, the right-wing premier of Quebec who has urged a harsher border crackdown amid an inflow of asylum seekers into the French-speaking province, mentioned he requested a “detailed plan” from the federal authorities “to higher safe the borders”.

“That might restrict unlawful entries into Quebec and keep away from Mr Trump’s 25% tariffs,” Legault wrote on X. Final month, he additionally prompt Canada ought to forcibly switch tens of 1000’s of asylum seekers out of Quebec to different elements of the nation.

The stress on Trudeau, who has been in energy since 2015, comes because the Canadian prime minister has seen his reputation plummet amid a housing disaster and hovering prices of dwelling.

Latest polls present his Liberals trailing far behind the opposition Conservative Celebration forward of a federal election that have to be held earlier than late October 2025.

Conservative chief Pierre Poilievre has seized on the border situation to criticise the prime minister. “Justin Trudeau broke the border,” Poilievre informed reporters on Thursday. “All of the chaos at our border is the results of Justin Trudeau.”

What have human rights advocates mentioned?

Julia Sande, human rights regulation and coverage campaigner at Amnesty Worldwide Canada, mentioned the US president-elect’s feedback this week concerning the US-Canada border have been “deliberately imprecise” and unclear.

“There’s point out of individuals crossing the border. Are we speaking about asylum seekers? He talks about unlawful actions; clearly, crossing to hunt asylum shouldn’t be unlawful,” Sande informed Al Jazeera.

“And it’s due to the Secure Third Nation Settlement that individuals are compelled to cross between ports of entry to hunt security,” she added.

“It’s one factor if we’re speaking concerning the stream of medication, however when it contains individuals and also you’re utilizing phrases like ‘unlawful aliens’, I’d hope that politicians would push again in opposition to that.”

Alex Neve, a professor of worldwide human rights regulation on the College of Ottawa, additionally mentioned it was “deeply troubling” to see Canadian leaders “falling in step with Trump’s infected, bullying narrative concerning the border”.

“Instantly precedence primary in Canada is ‘safeguarding’ the Canada/US border, as a result of Donald Trump has mentioned it have to be so. Doesn’t appear to matter that the numbers don’t even remotely bear out his hateful fearmongering,” Neve wrote on social media.

“This hyperbolic speak of hordes of unlawful migrants, more and more spouted by governments all over the world, inevitably bodes sick for refugees and migrants, with really life and dying penalties, and shopping for into it makes us a part of the issue.”