The Longest Undefended Border in the World
"Canada works closely with both the United States and Mexico on shared challenges, including border security.""In collaboration with these partners, Canada has been monitoring migration trends from Mexico and has no plans to reimpose the visa requirement at this time."Canadian Ministry of Immigration"We're seeing an unprecedented level of migration around the world and in our region.""The challenge of migration is a hemispheric one, and hemispheric challenges require hemispheric solutions."U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas
A train traveling near the US-Mexico border toward Uvalde, Texas, was stopped Friday after a Union Pacific conductor reported stowaways on board From Kinney County Sheriff's Office/Facebook |
Mr.
Mayorkas has stated that the United States' position is that Canada
should reinstate visa requirements for Mexicans seeking to enter Canada.
Canada's previous Conservative government led by then Prime Minister
Stephen Harper viewed it as a necessary step to impose a visa
requirement for Mexican citizens wishing to enter Canada, a step that
the government of Mexico was displeased with but which Canada felt to be
warranted.
When
the new Liberal-led government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
entered the scene, that visa requirement was summarily suspended. It was
PM Trudeau's decision to reverse almost every decision taken by the
previous government, and the visa requirement was among them. Now the
Biden Administration, struggling with an ongoing and increasingly
problematic migration flood has asked Canada to reimpose visa
requirements on Mexicans entering Canada.
The
hope is to enable the prevention of a surge of illegal crossings at the
northern border between Canada and the United States. Canada has
responded through its minister of immigration that there are no plans in
the foreseeable future to accommodate the American request. Visa-free
travel by Mexican citizens is to continue. And the United States is left
to deal with the chronic illegal immigration problem that has vexed
every one of its administrations.
At
the present time, Mexican nationals and anyone else who is in Mexico
can board a plane to fly to Canada, enter visa-free then surreptitiously
make their way into the United States. This loophole accommodates not
only Mexican citizens but Asians, Russians, Central and South Americans,
Middle Easterners and any others who have a mind to arrive in Mexico
for the sole purpose of using Canada as a route to the United States.
Canada's
current prime minister, Justin Trudeau, visualizes huge immigration
numbers from across the globe entering Canada as a positive for the
country's future. To increase the size of its population to relieve a
shortage of workers in Canada, both at the present time and into the
future. In the process he has exacerbated an acute shortage of medical
personnel and stretched the capacity of the universal Canadian health
system to breaking point. A housing shortage is another issue a rapid
introduction of a half-million emigrants yearly exacerbates.
Yet
the Trudeau administration is unmoved by the U.S. request for obvious
reasons. Migration "encounters" at the U.S.-Mexico border have reached
record heights, with illegal entrants from all over the world; Europe,
Asia, Central or South America who transit through Mexico (and Canada)
with the aid of human traffickers. Imposing a massive financial burden
for the U.S. in policing and asylum financial support, as for children
abandoned at the border.
A
recent estimate for the cost of the immigration crisis in the U.S. for
2022 revealed the cost at all levels of government to have reached
$150.7 billion. A total that is greater than the entire budget of the
Canadian government for that same year. Homeland Security Secretary
Mayorkas met last week with his Canadian counterpart at the 2023
Canada-United States Cross-Border Crime Forum held in Ottawa. The number
of Mexican migrants entering the U.S. from Canada has steadily
increased since the visa requirement was lifted in 2016.
While
the number of apprehended migrants remains relatively small, they have
doubled in a year and the concern is that as the U.S. continues to crack
down on its illegal immigration problem at the Mexican border, numbers
using Canada as a backdoor entry will dramatically increase, without the
reimposition of visa requirements.
Labels: Canada, Illegal Migration, Northern Border Canada/US, US/Mexico Border, Visa Requirements
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