Freeland mum on accepting more migrants after Trump victory
On Wednesday, Deputy Prime Minister Freeland was asked by a reporter if there is a plan to prevent people from coming to Canada to avoid being deported. She claimed that a plan exists but declined to provide any further details.
Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland provided no details Wednesday on the Liberal plan to push back against illegal immigration, following a second Trump victory last evening.
The Deputy prime minister assured Canadians that her government recognizes the importance of border security, and dictating who comes into Canada. “We will do that,” she added.
The federal government quietly expelled migrants who entered Canada through Roxham Road in March 2020 to limit the spread of COVID, a measure implemented until late 2021. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau admitted this approach was “reasonably effective.”
He later told reporters that Parliament could not resolve the border crisis with “simplistic solutions.”
Freeland followed her remarks Wednesday with caution, noting the RCMP says more folks could enter Québec following a second Trump win.
Under the pact, asylum seekers in Canada or the US could make their claim in the first country they enter. However, a loophole in that agreement allowed those who enter Canada through an unofficial crossing to remain in the country without the immediate threat of deportation.
Trudeau and then-president Joe Biden renegotiated the Safe Third Country Agreement to curb illegal immigration last March, but the relief was short-lived.
Federal border agents processed a record number of asylum claims at airports this past year, following the closure of Roxham Road.
Some 39,171 asylum seekers entered Québec through Roxham Road in 2022, according to department officials.
Recent Immigration data pegs the number at 41,350 asylum claims at airports last year. More than half of the claimants landed at Montreal-Trudeau Airport, dubbed the “new Roxham Road."
Thousands more now arrive by air, at major airports in Toronto and Montreal.
Canadian terminals are on pace for another record year, processing 31,000 asylum claims between January and July — three times the number that have been processed at land ports of entry.
The same reporter then asked Freeland: “Is there a plan in place [for] people [coming] to Canada to avoid being deported?” The deputy prime minister provided another scrambled response.
“Canadians expect us to control our border [and] quite rightly believe that … Canadians [decide] who comes to our country and who doesn’t,” she replied.
“That is something we absolutely have a plan to ensure.”
Québec Premier Francois Legault first told the Trudeau government that migrants could no longer come to the province last January. He maintains that resources are “thinly stretched” to accommodate more people.
“It is time for Justin Trudeau to put out a new tweet to say not to come anymore because we have exceeded our reception capacity,” Legault said at the time. “At some point, Trudeau has to send a new message.”
In 2017, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promised to “welcome” all those “fleeing persecution, terror, and war” in response to President Donald Trump’s then deportation of illegal immigrants.
Legault claimed most migrants entering Canada through the unofficial border crossing were not refugees.
Alex Dhaliwal
Calgary Based Journalist
Alex Dhaliwal is a Political Science graduate from the University of Calgary. He has actively written on relevant Canadian issues with several prominent interviews under his belt.
COMMENTS
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Bruce Atchison commented 2024-11-06 21:20:36 -0500Migrants are mostly freeloaders. They just want to glom onto our generous welfare benefits. Among the freeloading crowd are foreign students who claim asylum when they countries are in fact peaceful. I refuse to call these people migrants.
