Canada

Under President Xi Jinping, China has invested in state media outlets to influence the opinion of foreign publics, including Canada.

When the U.S. Border Patrol tallies the arrests of those illegally crossing the border with Mexico in the past fiscal year, which finished at the end of September, the numbers will shatter a two-decade old record. Through the end of August, the Border Patrol had already made more than two million apprehensions, well above the previous record of 1.7 million set more than two decades ago. What those numbers don’t tell you is that for the past 30 years, the United States has poured hundreds of billions of dollars into “securing” its southern border. Yet to hear the politicians tell it, the border has never been more insecure than it is today. If U.S. leaders want to address the problem rather than just feeding a political fire, it is time to stop chasing the illusion of a secure border and start working with neighbours across the region, including Canada, to tackle the political and economic roots of the crisis. This latest in a long series of migrant crises has been seized on by the Republican governors of Florida and Texas, who are using taxpayer money to bus and fly border crossers to Democratic strongholds, including the tony vacation island of Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts. “In Florida, we take what is happening at the southern border seriously,” said Governor and Republican presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis. He certainly takes it seriously as a political stick for bashing the Democratic administration of Joe Biden over “open borders.” But even more thoughtful figures such as Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, who held senior posts in the Department of Homeland Security after its 2003 formation, are prey to similar delusions. “As many resources as we have put on the border, we still don’t have it fixed,” he told an audience in Washington last week. His solution? Divert the US$80-billion recently budgeted to crack down on tax cheats and spend it on still more border enforcement. That’s been the game plan for 30 years. Before the U.S. government began fortifying crossing points in California and Texas in the mid-1990s, there were no walls along the border with Mexico; today there is more than 1,100 kilometres of fencing, some as high as nine metres, along the 3,138-km frontier. There were no drones or fixed surveillance towers or hovering blimps. The Border Patrol had 4,000 agents along the borders; today there are more than 20,000. Each year, the U.S. government spends more on border enforcement than on the FBI and all other national law enforcement combined. But the more Washington spends to secure the border, the more insecure the border becomes. The harder it has become to cross, the more that desperate migrants have turned to criminal cartels to assist their journey. Border enforcement has created a huge organized crime problem, which has been especially harmful for Mexico. On the U.S. side, the decades-long obsession with border security has only shown the public how far performance has fallen short of promise. A perfectly secure border may be possible for island nations such as Australia and New Zealand, but it is not for large countries with long land borders. The latest crisis is especially challenging because many of the border crossers are running from violence more than poverty. Most of the recent arrivals are fleeing three failed regimes in the region – Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua. Under U.S. law and international obligations, those migrants have a right to request asylum protection, even if they crossed the border illegally. If they can make it to the U.S. – an often desperate and dangerous journey – they are permitted to stay pending immigration court hearings, which, given current backlogs, may be many years in the future. More border enforcement and cheap political stunts will solve none of this. The Biden administration, to its credit, is trying to take small steps toward reform. It has launched a new initiative to resolve asylum cases – the decision on whether an individual faces persecution at home on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinions or membership in a particular social group – more quickly after migrants arrive. This is controversial with immigrant rights groups, since more asylum seekers will be denied protection and removed before they can settle in the country. But it will also begin to restore some integrity to the process. The administration has also signed on to the recent Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection, in which most governments in the Americas, though not some key ones, have pledged to work on a regional approach for managing migration. Canada has a strong interest in the success of these efforts. It has been able to hide behind the 2004 “Safe Third Country Agreement,” under which asylum seekers who arrive first in the U.S. are barred from seeking protection in Canada. That agreement has been challenged by human-rights groups and is now being considered by the Supreme Court of Canada. If the deal is struck down, it could open the door to scores of asylum seekers hoping for more favourable treatment north of the border. If that happens, Canada’s border enforcement efforts are likely to be no more successful than those in the United States.

Protests against pandemic restrictions in Canada have shut down a vital economic link with the United States and inspired copycats around the world. Here’s what to know.

It has been over two years since Chinese officials detained Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor. How the next U.S. administration handles this issue could foreshadow the future of U.S.-Canada relations.

This post is coauthored by Laurie Trautman, the director of the Border Policy Research Institute at Western Washington University, and a global fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center; and Edward Alden, the Bernard L. Schwartz senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Ross distinguished visiting professor of U.S.-Canada economic relations at Western Washington University. Governors across the United States, reacting to the absence of federal leadership and direction, have been forming regional compacts to try to agree on guidelines for reopening their economies as the new infection rates from the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) begin to diminish. Three arrangements were announced this month: a northeast pact among Delaware, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island; a midwest pact among Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin; and a western states pact signed by the governors of California, Oregon, and Washington. These initiatives are encouraging, and could create a model for the rest of the country for how neighbors should cooperate when their joint safety and prosperity is under threat. But there is big hole in these efforts. Since the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement in 1989 and the 1995 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the U.S. economy has become increasingly integrated with its northern and southern neighbors. Since the outbreak of the virus in March, those borders have been closed to travel for all but essential workers, increasing the damage to local economies that depend on cross-border exchange. Out in Washington state where we both live, there is a real danger that the western U.S. states will go one way on the speed and rules for reopening while western Canada goes another. This would drive a wedge into a vital component of economic growth in our region, which rests on building a more prosperous, cross-border Cascadia corridor extending from British Columbia to Oregon. In a story that has been replicated across the border states north and south, the virtual shutdown of the U.S.-Canada border at Peace Arch since March 20, 2020, has been one of the most disruptive actions taken by governments in the crisis. The thousands of crossings each day have become a trickle; cross-border passenger travel between Washington and British Columbia has fallen by roughly 98 percent, with steep costs for business on both sides of the border. Those costs may continue even after the U.S. starts to reopen its economy. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said the border will remain restricted for “many weeks”, and the only way the border will fully reopen is if officials on both sides are confident that cross-border travelers will not become a new vector for disseminating the virus. The growing calls from U.S. President Donald Trump urging the states to restart economic activity even as the virus continues to spread in many parts of the country will not help reassure our northern neighbors. On the west coast, the province of British Columbia will need a lot of persuasion to start welcoming Americans again. To date, the province has seen just over 1,700 cases and fewer than 100 deaths, compared to more than 12,000 cases and nearly 700 deaths in Washington alone. The gaps between New York state and the province of Quebec, and Michigan and Ontario, are similarly striking. Both Canada and the United States have a strong stake in reviving cross-border ties as soon as safely possible, and the platform for doing so already exists. The western region, in particular, has a long history of collaboration across various scales of government and industry. Recent initiatives like the Cascadia Innovation Corridor, spearheaded by former Washington state governor Christine Gregoire, are aimed at developing the Pacific Northwest as a global hub of innovation in health care, technology, and other sectors, leveraging the strengths of both the western states and British Columbia. This region is also widely viewed as an innovative border policy incubator for both Canada and the United States, serving as a testing ground for programs like NEXUS and Enhanced Driver’s Licenses, which are later implemented across the northern border. Such accomplishments are unparalleled in other cross-border regions between the United States and Canada. There is a reason that so much energy is invested in the cross-border relationship, and why so many in the region see the value of strengthening those ties. Families, businesses, tribes, and First Nations straddle our shared border, and the social and economic costs of prolonged restrictions are incalculable. If border restrictions persist, or become asymmetrical in nature, there will be long lasting damage, particularly to norther border businesses that depend on Canadian consumers. Such businesses may not recover, despite targeted economic assistance. There is another reason to include discussions with Canada as soon as possible. The pandemic has encouraged nations around the world to pull up their drawbridges, enacting not just sensible measures to restrict travel but harmful ones to restrict the flow of life-saving drugs, protective equipment, and other medical supplies. Even the close U.S.-Canada relationship has not been spared from such actions. As a region, we have proven that we can do better, and we have reaped the benefits of a collaborative approach, not just within our nation’s borders, but beyond them. A new west coast initiative on responsible reopening that includes Canada could become not just a model for the country but for the world in how countries can work together to restore their economies and enhance the safety of their citizens.

This blog post is part of the Women and Foreign Policy program’s interview series on Gender Equality in Foreign Policy, featuring global and U.S. officials leading initiatives to promote gender equality in the defense, development, and diplomatic sectors.

Those entering the United States at Peace Arch and other western border ports of entry are facing a stepped up enforcement regime that creates significant risks for all southbound travelers.