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When Rebel News Quebec reporter Alexa Lavoie pressed Quebec's party leaders on asylum seekers, radical street protests and public safety, they pointed at Ottawa and City Hall. 

On Thursday's Rebel Roundup livestream, Sheila Gunn Reid and Tamara Ugolini reacted to the questions Alexa asked at the scrum after the leaders' debate. Both hosts said the leaders were ducking responsibility, and that provinces have far more tools to deal with mass migration and radicalization than their politicians let on.

Alexa asked Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon whether he would restrict services for asylum seekers, as Conservative Leader Éric Duhaime has proposed. St-Pierre Plamondon called Duhaime's promise to clean up the file "pure fiction," because it is "entirely under the control of the federal government." 

Tamara said he seemed to answer in good faith, but noted that the province still stayed silent for five years while asylum claims soared far beyond historical averages. 

"There's still that deflection and lack of responsibility from all levels of government on how this problem gets solved," she said. 

Sheila pointed to Alberta, where voters will answer five referendum questions on immigration this October. One would limit provincially funded health care, education and social services to citizens, permanent residents and people with "Alberta-approved immigration status."

"There are things that you can do to become a deterrent to over-immigration and over-immigration settlement that you can do as a province, that Quebec can certainly do," said Sheila.

Sheila also said many asylum seekers "country shop" for the best benefits, and will "province shop" the same way once they're in Canada. Tamara said federal Immigration Minister Lena Diab suggested that rejected claimants can keep getting benefits while their appeals sit in a years-long backlog. She added that the Canada Border Services Agency has lost track of close to 500,000 people who are due for deportation or are otherwise in the country illegally.

"Don't be the province that offers the highest number of social supports to people who are not supposed to be here, or who are at least here temporarily," said Sheila.