Despite restrictions on cross-border travel, the number of asylum seekers who have recently entered Quebec irregularly via Roxham Road is unprecedented for the winter months. The most recent figures indicate that 2,367 migrants entered during a particularly cold month of January. Almost 3,000 migrants entered in December. At this rate, the RCMP will intercept a record number of asylum seekers at the US border this year.
Posted at 12:00 p.m.
We haven’t talked a lot about these irregular migrants for two years for a simple reason: the Trudeau government invoked public health protection from the start of the pandemic in order to prevent their entry. Yet he told us for the first three years of the Trump administration that it was impossible to block them at the land border. The decree adopted to “close” Roxham Road was lifted last November and the number of asylum applications immediately exploded.
We therefore return to the incoherent policy which had already created the controversy. If the migrants present themselves at the official post in Lacolle, the border agents invoke the Agreement between Canada and the United States on safe third countries in order to prevent them from entering to seek asylum. However, if the migrants go just a few kilometers west on Roxham Road, the RCMP allows them to enter under an exception in the Agreement. There is however no principle of protection which could explain a differential treatment which depends on the point of entry.
Instead of explaining the dilemma resulting from this exception, the Trudeau government could not resist easy moralism in a Trumpian context. It is necessary to underline the cynicism behind this superficial image of openness. Canadian asylum policy has always been based on the idea of preventing the arrival of asylum seekers. It is no coincidence that many migrants take a transcontinental flight to New York and then the bus/taxi to Roxham Road. They would never have been able to travel directly to Canada legally, because the Canadian authorities are stricter with regard to the granting of visas. Moreover, the recent decision to quickly issue visas to Ukrainians will eventually appear as a double standard.
A symbol
Except that Roxham has become a symbol: either we are pro-refugees, or we are against immigration and perhaps even racist. A deeper analysis nevertheless reveals that the Trudeau government has always insisted before the courts that migrants could be sent back to the United States, considered a “safe country” where their rights are respected. Of course, he doesn’t say it loud and clear, because it could harm the image he wants to project.
Similarly, the Trudeau government refuses to explain what it means by the commitment to “modernize” the Agreement that is found in the Minister of Immigration’s mandate letter. This would logically eliminate the inconsistent exception, but such a direct message would be inconsistent with the Trudeau brand.
Canada is not alone in facing asylum dilemmas. Even before the new flow of Ukrainian refugees, asylum applications were on the rise across the European Union. Despite the arrival of an administration in Washington that presents itself as pro-refugees, the problem at the Mexican border is getting worse. In a post-pandemic context that will be characterized by an increase in international mobility, all Canadians have an interest in refusing an asylum policy based on superficial imagery. The government could reassure the public by addressing the issue of Roxham Road with a new approach that emphasizes the consistent and transparent management of asylum applications.
*The author has taught refugee law in several countries and has written government and UN reports on refugees. He is also an associate editor of the magazine Global Brief.