The Trump administration promises to double down on what it says will be the fiercest deportation program in U.S. history. Judging by history and rhetoric, the administration has no qualms about stripping kids from their parents and spouses from their partners.
Many asylum seekers in the U.S., their advocates and liberal mainstream media have mused that some cornered refugees may flee up north to “tolerant” Canada, and find reprieve there.
It happened before in 2017, during Donald Trump’s first presidency. Fifty thousand foreign asylum seekers residing in the U.S. suddenly fled north to Canada. They benefited from a substantive exception (what anti-immigrant forces decried as a “loophole”) within the so-called Safe Third Country Agreement (STCA), a law signed in 2002 and implemented in 2004. The agreement sought to ensure that most people who enter Canada via the U.S. cannot claim asylum in Canada, and vice versa. The exception stipulated that the STCA only applied at official land border crossings, so asylum seekers who crossed into Canada through unofficial sites of entry were not subject to the STCA and therefore were still able to make a claim for refugee protection in Canada.
Following a surge of unofficial border crossings in 2017, Canada and the U.S. officially expanded the scope of the STCA in 2023 to remove this exception, making it more difficult for asylum seekers to claim protection in Canada.
Now, the exceptions to the STCA are much narrower: To escape its application, asylum seekers must show they already have family members in Canada who are citizens or permanent residents, or that they are unaccompanied minors, or that they hold a valid work or study permit or that they could face the death penalty in the U.S. if returned.
Desperate asylum seekers from the U.S. cannot safely assume that a “welcoming” Canada perpetually awaits them. The idea of Canada as a “safe haven” for asylum seekers is a myth cultivated for far too long.
The fallacy of a welcoming Canada, an exceptional Canada that has a better moral compass than the U.S., is just that: a fallacy.
Justin Trudeau, the nation’s former prime minister who famously tweeted to the world in January 2017 that, “To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you,” and the Liberal Party he led until recently are chief proponents of that fallacy.
In reality, Canada could be on course to have a “Trump Lite” government when its federal elections occur, by law, before October 20. Pollsters currently show the Liberals, now led by newly sworn-in Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, neck and neck with the Conservatives, though Trump’s trade war threats are boosting the chances of Carney’s party.
Canadian politicians are pretending to denounce the racist, anti-refugee dog whistles, while at the same time enacting new anti-immigrant laws.
The fiery, anti-refugee Conservative Party of Canada is refining its anti-immigrant rhetoric, emboldened by crass talk from Trump’s GOP across the border. Pierre Poilievre, the leader of the Conservatives and candidate to become Canada’s next prime minister, has lambasted refugees crossing from the U.S. as “illegals.”
Should he win, his first business of the day will likely be to curtail a range of Canada’s refugee intake policies. Already, Canada has scrapped the popular grandparents’ permanent resident visa sponsorship program, which allowed Canadian permanent residents and citizens to sponsor their non-Canadian parents to relocate to Canada as permanent residents. In 2024, when a populist outcry linking “too much immigration” with Canada’s strained public services got hot, Trudeau’s government removed that specific visa.
Refugees fleeing Trump’s immigrant crackdowns up north to Canada can expect swift detentions and pushbacks into the U.S. by Canada whether Poilievre wins or Carney’s party continues in power.
But it is simplistic to blame Canada’s opportunistic politicians alone for anti-refugee rhetoric. A growing mass of ordinary Canadians themselves are getting hostile to asylum seekers coming from the U.S. or elsewhere.
As the cost of living crisis rocks Canada, recent surveys have revealed that the majority of Canadians are now significantly opposed to more immigration and refugee intakes. They demand that the door be shut. Lots of ordinary Canadians wrongly believe that refugees are the reason why the country is facing a massive shortage of housing — 300,000 units for the 2024-2026 period. Hate marches are cropping up in Canadian cities with cowardly protesters making newcomers scapegoats for the government’s incompetence in housing, health care and wage growth.
Canadian politicians on both sides of the spectrum are pretending to denounce the racist, anti-refugee dog whistles, while at the same time enacting new anti-immigrant laws, such as slashing visas for students and skilled immigrants. For example, David McGuinty, the Liberal lawmaker who represents my constituency in Ontario, and who doubles as the public safety minister, is now a regular visitor to Washington, on pleading trips to convince the Trump administration that Canada is serious about militarizing its border.
Trump has publicly groaned that Canada is a bad “abuser,” taking advantage of the U.S. to enjoy a trade surplus while allowing drugs and undocumented immigrants over the border into the U.S. Of course, that’s a plain lie as per available data.
This is bad news for refugees thinking of heading up north. Canada is rapidly stiffening its borders with a high-tech arsenal as a sweetener deal to placate Trump and dodge his tariffs. Though it frames itself as a tougher alternative more ready to take on Trump’s hostile threats of a trade war and even annexation, the Conservative Party of Canada has gone out of its way to massage the U.S. president. It promises to activate all sorts of border drones, sensors and Black Hawk helicopters as part of a package to soothe Trump’s fury. “Send Canadian Forces troops, helicopters & surveillance to the border now,” yapped Poilievre in February, calling to “put Canada First.” It is unclear though whether Canada will source the border securitization gear from U.S. companies, considering how Trump’s tariffs on Canada have gravely soured business relations on either side.
If this Conservative vision becomes a reality, refugees from the U.S. who show up at Canada’s border fleeing Trump’s administration will likely be arrested, thrust back into the hands of U.S. border czars and deported to their home countries.
It’s a double jeopardy.
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
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