‘You are a very bad minister,’ Conservative immigration critic says at tense committee meeting

2025/12/05 2 Comments

Watched this brutal exchange. Her name comes up periodically as someone who may be shuffled and her appearance yesterday may increase speculation. That being said, MP Rempel Garner is somewhat of a bulldog in her questioning.

As to DM Kochhar’s letter asking MPs to be more respectful of public servants in their questioning, and to be mindful of the risks of posting edited clips that target them, I recall former DM Fadden having the same concerns some 15 years ago or so, albeit in a safer social media environment:

Immigration Minister Lena Diab sparred with her Conservative critic at a tense House of Commons committee meeting Thursday as the two disagreed on everything from immigration levels and deporting non-citizen criminals to what kind of salad they prefer.

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner put Diab in the hot seat throughout her two-hour committee appearance, grilling Diab about her file and accusing her of being “a very bad minister” when she struggled to give a clear answer on whether she will use powers under the government’s pending C-12 legislation to mass extend temporary visas.

A section in that bill gives the government the ability to stop accepting applications or cancel, suspend or change documents for an entire immigration class — something critics on both sides of the issue say could be abused either to turbocharge the number of newcomers or cancel visas en masse.

Asked if she plans to use that power to keep more people in Canada rather than expelling them when their visas expire, Diab said “that’s not the purpose” of the legislation but wouldn’t say how it would be used.

A frustrated Rempel Garner interrupted Diab.

“When you ask a question I think you should be able to have decency to let someone respond,” Diab said.

“I don’t like your word salad, it’s true. You are a very bad minister,” Rempel Garner said.

“You know what, I prefer fattoush and tabouleh to your salad, at any time,” Diab said.

“That is the oddest thing any immigration minister has said at this committee. It’s very weak and will likely be added to your performance reviews,” Rempel Garner said.

“It’s my culture,” said Diab, who is Lebanese Canadian.

At one point, another Liberal MP, Peter Fragiskatos, stepped in as the two exchanged words.

Rempel Garner said she wasn’t speaking to him about these issues.

“He’s going to have your job,” she said to Diab of Fragiskatos, suggesting the minister was about to be shuffled out of cabinet. “I’ll likely be having this conversation with him in a couple of months.”

Rempel Garner also asked Diab about some recent non-citizen criminals getting more lenient sentences so they can avoid deportation.

Under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, a permanent resident or foreign national can be deemed inadmissible if they engage in “serious criminality,” which includes any crime that results in being sentenced to prison for more than six months.

In one recent case an Indian national paid for sex with what he thought was a teenager at a Mississauga, Ont., hotel. That teenage girl was actually an undercover cop.

The man was ultimately sentenced to a conditional discharge for committing an indecent act and was sentenced to 12 months of probation, including three months of house arrest. Rempel Garner said the man should have been dealt with more harshly by the courts and ultimately deported.

Asked if she will send a message to judges that are letting non-citizen criminals off easy to avoid being forced out of Canada, Diab said that’s not her role.

“Sentencing decisions are made independently by the courts,” she said, while assuring the Conservative critic the government will remove foreign criminals when appropriate.

“So, you’re pro-raper,” Rempel Garner asked provocatively.

“The courts have already indicated that serious offences will be dealt with seriously,” Diab said, while adding she wasn’t familiar with the case Rempel Garner raised.

“Can’t you just say it’s wrong and we’ll look into it?” Rempel Garner asked in return. “You just defended a guy who sexually assaulted somebody. It’s rampant in our justice system.”

“A wise person once told me you debate the issues and the policy and you don’t debase the individual,” he said, urging his colleagues to follow that mantra.

Deputy minister cites cases of bullying

The meeting started with the committee chair, Julie Dzerowicz, reading a letter from Diab’s deputy minister — the top bureaucrat in the department — saying some public servants have been subjected to bullying and intimidation after appearing before the committee.

That letter, written by Harpreet Kochhar, relayed that some unnamed politicians have posted videos of the public servants testifying at the committee, and they have been targeted online and in person as a result.

Dzerowicz said Kochhar was concerned about the “well-being” of these government workers who he said have endured “significant harassment and abuse” and “hostile emails.”

The letter, shared with CBC News, relays Kochhar’s fear that MPs posting “short, decontextualized clips of committee appearances” by bureaucrats could lead to violence.

“One of our colleagues was recently confronted in a public space by an angry individual referencing material shared online,” Kochhar wrote.

“I want to implore all committee members from all parties to be very cognizant of how we use the information from this committee, whether it’s online or offline,” Dzerowicz said, adding she doesn’t want appearing before a committee to be a “security risk.”

Rempel Garner said Kochhar was trying to “censor” Conservatives and stop them from questioning the department about what she described as a failed immigration policy.

“I will not be silenced,” she said, saying she will fight to get the government to “do the right thing” on this file.

“Giddy up,” she said.

Diab was ostensibly before the committee to talk about the government’s immigration targets for the coming years — figures that were included in the recent federal budget, an unusual move given they are generally delivered publicly by the minister….

Source: ‘You are a very bad minister,’ Conservative immigration critic says at tense committee meeting

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Conservatives plan to try and amend asylum system rules in border security bill

2025/11/21 Leave a comment

Will be interesting to what role the Bloc plays in committee. May well end up with the committee making amendments and the government and NDP rejecting all as was the case with C-3:

Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel Garner said Thursday she plans to try and “amend the heck” out of the government’s border security bill, Bill C-12, with a host of measures targeting the asylum system. 

Her proposed changes include disallowing asylum claims from people who transited through Europe or another G7 country on their way to Canada and denying access to social benefits, except emergency medical treatment, for those with a failed asylum claim.

“I think Canadians want some change in this regard. Canada’s system for allowing and accepting asylum claims is pretty generous,” Rempel Garner said at a press conference on Parliament Hill.

“So somebody who’s failed a review, I think it’s fair that the only federal benefits that they receive is emergency health care and I think a lot of Canadians would agree.”

Rempel Garner said she also plans to propose changes to speed up the deportation of non-citizens if they are convicted of a crime or if their pre-removal risk assessment isn’t successful.

This includes clarifying the definition of “serious criminality” in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to be a conviction of an indictable offence, or a hybrid offence where the Crown proceeded with an indictable charge. 

Rempel Garner also said she will propose a ban on repeat pre-removal risk assessments if the initial one fails unless new evidence of changed circumstances is presented. 

She said increased rates of permanent and temporary immigration, in addition to increased asylum claims, have “broken” Canada’s system and contributed to declining support for immigration.

“I think everybody in Canada, (of) every political stripe, should be deeply concerned with public polling data that shows that Canadians are losing faith in the immigration system,” Rempel Garner said. …

Source: Conservatives plan to try and amend asylum system rules in border security bill

Some initial reactions:

…Fen Hampson, president of the World Refugee & Migration Council, said “there are arguments to be made for tightening up the system to prevent abuses but by the same token you don’t want to swing wildly in the opposite direction.”

He said banning people from claiming asylum who had passed through an EU or G7 country would bar Canada from accepting people fleeing war-torn states who, for practical reasons, have to pass through Europe to get to Canada. 

“You are likely going to have to stop somewhere on your way to Canada and it may be a few days or it may be more than that,” he said. “Few asylum seekers can book a ticket to fly directly to Canada.”

The border and immigration bill – known as Bill C-12 – will be considered clause by clause next week by MPs on the public safety committee. 

Ms. Rempel Garner told a press conference on Thursday that her party will table their amendments then. One would end federal benefits for failed claimants of asylum, beyond emergency health care…

Source: Conservative amendments to borders bill would make sweeping changes to asylum system, I’m going to amend the heck out of C-12 to fix Canada’s broken immigration system. (Rempel Garner’s substack post)

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What happened to ‘click once for Canadian citizenship’? The government has (quietly) thought twice

2025/10/24 Leave a comment

Nice to see that all the efforts from many to stop this hair-brained initiative paved off (quoted):

The Immigration Department has quietly shelved a controversial plan that would have allowed new citizens to take their citizenship oath on their own with a click on the keyboard.

“There is no self-administration of the oath in Canada,” the department said in an email in response to a Star inquiry for an update about the plan. “Implementation of the self-administration of the oath is not actively being pursued at this time.” 

In February 2023, the federal government published the proposed change in the Canada Gazette as part of the modernization and digitalization of immigration and citizenship processing.

The self-attestation option was meant to reduce citizenship processing time and cost, and make it more accessible, because ceremonies are generally scheduled on weekdays during working hours. It was supposed to be launched in June that year. Unlike in a virtual citizenship ceremony, there would be no presiding official.

However, a chorus of prominent Canadian leaders, including former governor general Adrienne Clarkson, former Liberal immigration minister Sergio Marchi and former Calgary mayor Naheed Nenshi, came out to voice their opposition. Critics feared this would further dilute the meaning of Canadian citizenship.

“It’s a fundamental downgrading of understanding of what Canadian citizenship is about and how meaningful it can be,” said Andrew Griffith, a former director general for the federal Immigration Department, who had organized a petition to Parliament opposing what he calls “citizenship on a click.”

“It’s not a driver’s licence. It’s actually something that has some meaning. It gives very significant rights to people, so it shouldn’t be taken lightly.”

While Griffith welcomed the news, he is troubled that the government did not officially note in the Gazette that it had dropped the plan or at least publicly stated a change in policy. The Gazette is the official government publication to inform the public about new and proposed regulations, statues, orders-in-council and appointments. 

“There’s always that risk particularly at a time when the government’s trying to find money, that somebody might revisit it, we’ve got the authority here, we can do that,” said Griffith.

“At least have a press release saying that, ‘After thinking about it carefully, given the importance of the incident, blah, blah blah, we’ve decided against this approach.’”

During the pandemic, citizenship processing time doubled from the prior 12-month service standard, prompting immigration officials to bring in virtual citizenship ceremonies in April 2020. Since then, more than 20,600 virtual ceremonies have been held before a citizenship judge or a presiding official online; processing time is down to 13 months. 

Last year, 2,045 virtual and 1,417 in-person citizenship ceremonies were held. From January to August this year, there were a total of 2,382 citizenship ceremonies, including 1,162 virtual and 1,220 in-person events.

In its email to the Star, the Immigration Department said officials conducted an analysis after public consultation on the self-administration of the oath. It took into consideration the “client experience journey,” measures related to the integrity of the process and “commitment that citizenship ceremonies remain an important part of Canadian tradition.”

“The Government of Canada is committed to continue delivering meaningful, celebratory and inclusive in-person and virtual ceremonies while offering clients a choice” between taking their oath in person or virtually, it said.

The department said it has been moving toward a more “integrated and modernized” working environment to help speed up application processing. Expanding citizenship ceremonies, tests and interviews to an online format was part of its goal of bringing efficiencies and simplifying the citizenship program and process, it added.

The department also said it is “actively” working on updating its citizenship guide, a project that started shortly after the Liberals returned to power in late 2015 when Justin Trudeau became the prime minister. Liberal Mark Carney has been prime minister since March.

The current citizenship guide, last revised in 2012, still uses some outdated information about the country and is short on the Indigenous history and the information about residential schools that were promised. The guide is studied by citizenship applicants, who must pass a knowledge exam as part of the requirement to become naturalized citizens.

Officials said they have engaged a wide range of partners to ensure the revised study guide represents all Canadians and people living in Canada as best as possible, including Indigenous Peoples, minority populations, women, francophone and Canadians with disabilities.

“These extensive consultations will ensure that the guide is historically accurate, more balanced and inclusive of the people that make up this country and its history,” the department said, adding that it has not set a launch date for the new guide.

Currently, the Canadian citizenship application fee is $649.75 for adults over 18 years old and $100 for minors.

Source: What happened to ‘click once for Canadian citizenship’? The government has (quietly) thought twice

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What is birthright citizenship and what happens after the Supreme Court ruling?

2025/06/30 Leave a comment

Ongoing and further undermining of checks and balances:

After the Supreme Court issued a ruling that limits the ability of federal judges to issue universal injunctions — but didn’t rule on the legality of President Trump’s executive order on birthright citizenship — immigrant rights groups are trying a new tactic by filing a national class action lawsuit.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of two immigrant rights organizations whose members include people without legal status in the U.S. who “have had or will have children born in the United States after February 19, 2025,” according to court documents.

One of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs, William Powell, senior counsel at the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection at Georgetown Law, says his colleagues at CASA, Inc. and the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project think that, with the class action approach “we will be able to get complete relief for everyone who would be covered by the executive order.”

Source: What is birthright citizenship and what happens after the Supreme Court ruling?

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Inside Trump’s Extraordinary Turnaround on Immigration Raids

2025/06/16 Leave a comment

Another TACO moment, forced by reality and resulting political pressure by the base:

On Wednesday morning, President Trump took a call from Brooke Rollins, his secretary of agriculture, who relayed a growing sense of alarm from the heartland.

Farmers and agriculture groups, she said, were increasingly uneasy about his immigration crackdown. Federal agents had begun to aggressively target work sites in recent weeks, with the goal of sharply bolstering the number of arrests and deportations of undocumented immigrants.

Farmers rely on immigrants to work long hours, Ms. Rollins said. She told the president that farm groups had been warning her that their employees would stop showing up to work out of fear, potentially crippling the agricultural industry.

She wasn’t the first person to try to get this message through to the president, nor was it the first time she had spoken to him about it. But the president was persuaded.

The next morning, he posted a message on his social media platform, Truth Social, that took an uncharacteristically softer tone toward the very immigrants he has spent much of his political career demonizing. Immigrants in the farming and hospitality industries are “very good, long time workers,” he said. “Changes are coming.”

Some influential Trump donors who learned about the post began reaching out to people in the White House, urging Mr. Trump to include the restaurant sector in any directive to spare undocumented workers from enforcement.

Inside the West Wing, top White House officials were caught off guard — and furious at Ms. Rollins. Many of Mr. Trump’s top aides, particularly Stephen Miller, his deputy chief of staff, have urged a hard-line approach, targeting all immigrants without legal status to fulfill the president’s promise of the biggest deportation campaign in American history.

But the decision had been made. Later on Thursday, a senior official with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Tatum King, sent an email to regional leaders at the agency informing them of new guidance. Agents were to “hold on all work site enforcement investigations/operations on agriculture (including aquaculture and meat packing plants), restaurants and operating hotels.”…

Source: Inside Trump’s Extraordinary Turnaround on Immigration Raids

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May: Transition How-Tos [Zussman]

2025/03/17 Leave a comment

Good list, drawing from Zussman. Rings true from my experience under the Harper government (Policy Arrogance or Innocent Bias: Resetting Citizenship and Multiculturalism):

Here are a few do’s and don’ts from seasoned bureaucrats who’ve weathered many a transition:

This is a test of impartiality and neutrality. Many public servants have only worked for a Trudeau government and this will be their first transition. A new government, especially under a new party, may want to undo, change or scrap policies, programs and your pet projects. Don’t be attached to the programs you worked on — it’s not your role.

Zussman argues deputy ministers must ensure employees are prepared for these shifts and get “past the mindset that they have formed over the last decade and to think in different terms.”

Time for the PS to shine. Be well-prepared, do your homework, know the platform, and show you’re a committed, non-partisan public service that can be relied upon. That builds trust. Have some “early wins” ready for them. Don’t say things can’t be done.

Keep it professional. Don’t greet a new government like an overeager puppy. Don’t try to be their best friend or badmouth the outgoing one. Your role is simple: work with them, understand and implement their agenda, and recognize the legitimacy of their agenda. (They are elected. Public servants aren’t.) If you can’t live with that, it’s time to move on and leave.

Let them lead. Some incoming governments have been watching, planning, and know the system better than public servants assume. Treating them like rookies can backfire — especially if they’ve seen the bureaucracy in committee, dodging questions. “Let them lead the dance,” said one bureaucrat. They know what they want, and the public service’s job isn’t to teach them “government 101” but to deliver.

Expect skepticism. New coach, new game. One former deputy minister likened a newly elected government to a new coach who comes in because the previous leadership was seen as not delivering. So, expect the new government to be skeptical that the public service is up to the job and can execute its agenda. This skepticism is justified. Acknowledge and adapt to it. Demonstrate you can work under the new leadership and deliver its priorities.

Don’t assume you know what the new government’s relationship with stakeholders will be.

Don’t recycle the last government’s or minister’s contact list of stakeholders to call. That could backfire.

Be cautious.

Let the incoming team define its own relationships without speaking for the stakeholders.

Source: May: Transition How-Tos [Zussman]

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Wright: Canadians don’t want to be the 51st state – and Americans don’t really want us

2025/03/11 Leave a comment

Another cathartic column for Canadians:

Canadians owe Donald Trump a debt of thanks. His musings about Canada becoming the 51st state have reminded us why we are Canadians in the first place and why we want to remain Canadians.

Still, it’s worth thinking about some of the legal steps to, and political implications of, a possible Canadian statehood.

First, Canada is a constitutional monarchy. To join the United States, it would have to become a republic. While that’s not impossible, it wouldn’t be easy. Amending the Canadian Constitution in relation to the King or Queen requires unanimous provincial consent. When was the last time all 10 provinces agreed on anything?

And what about Indigenous Peoples

Meanwhile, there are 634 First Nations governments – each with their own relationship with Canada or the Crown. Indeed, one of the mandates of the Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs is to recognize and implement “treaties concluded between the Crown and Indigenous Peoples.”

If it’s difficult to imagine Indigenous Peoples agreeing to give up their treaty rights, it’s equally difficult to imagine the U.S. negotiating new treaties and nation-to-nation relationships with 634 First Nations.

For its part, Quebec will never agree to give up the substantial power and real sovereignty it has as a province, even if every other province agreed to – which they won’t. In defence of their borders and the French language, Quebecers would likely secede from Canada long before any serious move towards Canadian statehood – and who could blame them?

Of course, this assumes that American lawmakers want a 51st state – and they don’t. Certainly, Republican lawmakers don’t, for the same reason they don’t want Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. to become states.

Each state has two senators and it’s a safe bet that both Canadian senators would be Democrats or be from a separate party that would caucus with the Democrats. The GOP cannot risk becoming a minority in a closely divided Senate.

When Hawaii joined as the 50th state in 1959, there was a lot of handwringing, especially in the Jim Crow South. For example, a Mississippi senator insisted that Hawaii’s admission would mean “two votes for socialized medicine, two votes for government ownership of industry, two votes against all racial segregation and two votes against the South on all social matters.”

Canada: A potential Republican wasteland 

Republican senators have similar arguments against admitting Canada – two votes for universal, single-payer health care, two votes for abortion rights, two votes for LGBTQ+ rights, two votes for multiculturalism, two votes for science, two votes for vaccines, two votes for climate policies and two votes against tax cuts for the wealthy.

Each U.S. state also has members in the House of Representatives, according to its population. If Quebec doesn’t secede, Canada would be the most populous state in the U.S., giving it as many as 55 seats in the House which, with Canada’s admission, would have about 490 seats. If Quebec does secede, Canada would be the second most populous state, giving it as many as 45 seats.

Not all Canadian representatives would be Democrats or from a party that would caucus with them, but the majority would be, providing the Democratic Party with control over the House of Representatives into the foreseeable future.

Finally, the White House: Does anyone really think that Canadians would vote for the Republican Party in its current incarnation? Some would, but the majority wouldn’t.

In the last federal election, about 60 per cent of Canadians voted for the Liberals, the NDP, the Bloc Québécois or the Green Party – all centre and centre-left parties. Even if Quebec secedes, most Canadian voters still lean centre or centre-left.

In America’s winner-takes-all presidential election, Canada’s roughly 50 electoral college votes would go to the Democratic candidate, not enough to guarantee a Democratic victory when approximately 590 electoral votes would be up for grabs, but enough to permanently narrow the GOP’s path to victory.

If Canada does become part of the United States, it won’t be as a state. It will be as an occupied territory and occupations never end well for the occupier – something Americans understand after 20 years in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Bottom line: Canadians don’t want to become the 51st state and the Americans don’t want us anyways, which leaves us with Donald Trump, a troll with a large following on social media trying to own the libs and get under our skin.

My advice? Ignore him and get on with the related tasks of peace, order and good government and managing the economic fallout of his tariffs.

Source: Canadians don’t want to be the 51st state – and Americans don’t really want us

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Immigrants Didn’t Steal the Election After All

2024/11/07 Leave a comment

Yet another myth questioned:

Among the rampant absurdities about immigration that spread from both the obscure and prominent corners of the Internet, the idea that the Biden administration was “importing” voters from abroad to help Kamala Harris win was simultaneously the silliest and the most common. Setting aside the conspiracy theories, the 2024 election provides the best evidence to date that Republicans can compete when immigration is high.

For reasons I can’t appreciate, many Republicans act as if they cannot do well if there are many immigrants in the electorate. Vice President-elect JD Vance saidrecently that immigration would permanently tilt the balance of power in favor of the Democrats. He said this even as his running mate was poised to make historic gains among Hispanic voters, many of whom are immigrants or children of immigrants. Regardless, the historical evidence shows that GOP performance improves with more immigration, so there are no data behind Vance’s fears.

The immigrant share isn’t associated with a stronger performance of either party in presidential elections. But there is a relationship between stronger Republican performance and a larger immigrant share of the US population. The Democrats controlled both houses of Congress for 83 percent of the years from 1935 to 1994 when the immigrant share of the US population was below 10 percent. Since 1995, Democrats have not controlled either house of Congress 53 percent of the time.

https://e.infogram.com/3b1be832-bfdb-442b-976a-d354eccf75b2?src=embed&wmode=transparent&auto=1

Republicans have performed much better during the high immigration periods of US history. Why? Not only do new populations assimilate, but the more Democrats compete and cater to the votes of naturalized citizens, the more US-born voters drift toward Republicans. An additional factor is that the immigrant share has been high when the unionized share of the labor force has been low, possibly because immigrants undermine unionization. 

Unions were historically the base of the Democratic Party until recently. Any benefit from naturalized citizens did not outweigh losses among the unionized population.

Does this mean that Democrats needed to be even more anti-immigrant to win? That was Kamala Harris’s assessment of the situation. But my view is that her (and Biden’s) immigration gambit backfired. Polls show that from 2019 to 2023 the share of voters saying immigration should be decreased grew just 6 points. Even though illegal immigration fell sharply in 2024, the share of Americans saying that immigration should be restricted suddenly jumped 14 points in June 2024.

Here’s what happened: Harris and Biden endorsed a bill to “shut the border” in 2024, which they reiterated as their position repeatedly before finally acting unilaterally to ban asylum in June 2024. It’s no surprise that when the heads of both parties endorse immigration restrictions, more people move toward that position. We have seen similar swings on other issues, like trade, when the head of a party (Trump) suddenly endorses a different view. Rather than neutralizing Trump’s immigration attacks, Harris’s flip validated them.

Source: Immigrants Didn’t Steal the Election After All

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Haitian immigrants helped revive a struggling Ohio town. Then neo-Nazis turned up

2024/09/16 Leave a comment

Sigh:

While Donald Trump made baseless, dangerous claims that immigrants in Ohio were eating people’s pets in front of millions of viewers at Tuesday night’s presidential debate, Johnson Salomon, a Haitian man who moved to Springfield in 2020, was watching cartoons with his kids before putting them to bed.

He got a text from a friend telling him to turn on the debate. When he saw the headlines about what the former president and Republican nominee in November’s election had said, he was in total shock.

“This was a false claim. I couldn’t believe that such a high official could make such a claim,” Salomon said.

Trump’s running mate JD Vance, Elon Musk and prominent Ohio Republicans had already spread the false rumors, lying about how Haitian immigrants had been killing and eating people’s pets in Springfield, a blue-collar town of 60,000 people in western Ohio. But the rumors, leaving Salomon and other Haitians in fear of being targeted for violence and discrimination, didn’t start with them.

They were initially spread online in August on social platforms used by far-right extremists and by Blood Tribe, a neo-Nazi hate group.

Springfield officials and police say they have received no credible reports of pets being harmed by members of the immigrant community, instead suggesting the story may have originated in Canton, Ohio, where an American woman with no known connection to Haiti was arrested in August for allegedly stomping a cat to death and eating the animal.

Haitians and immigrants from Central American countries have been in high demand at Springfield’s Dole Fresh Vegetables – where they’ve been hired to clean and package produce – and at automotive machining plants whose owners were desperate for workers due to a labor shortage in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

New Caribbean restaurants and food trucks have opened across south Springfield where once abandoned neighborhoods are now bustling with residents. A popular Haitian radio station has been broadcasting for several years. And every May, thousands turn out for Haitian Flag Day that’s celebrated at a local park.

But the glut of new arrivals has also stretched hospitals and schools in the area, angering many locals who resented their presence. The outrage reached a crescendo last August, when an 11-year-old boy was thrown from a school bus and killed after its driver swerved to avoid an oncoming car driven by a Haitian immigrant who didn’t have an Ohio driver’s license.

The child’s death fueled anger and racism on Facebook and at Springfield city commission meetings, where public comments about immigration have often run for more than an hour. Locals upset by the growing immigrant community wondered if they were being taken over – if Springfield had become ground zero for the baseless “great replacement theory”.

Soon, rightwing extremists seized on Springfield’s unrest.

Armed neo-Nazi members of Blood Tribe – a hardcore white supremacist group, according to the Anti-Defamation League – flew flags bearing swastikas and marched through a prominent downtown street while a jazz and blues festival was taking place nearby in August.

One witness to the march, who declined to be interviewed by the Guardian due to fearing for their family’s safety after being doxed by rightwing extremists online, reported that members of the group pointed guns at cars and told people to “go the fuck back to Africa”.

A Springfield police representative, however, appeared to downplay the scene, telling local media that the hate group’s march was “just a little peaceful protest”.

Several days later, a leading member of Blood Tribe who identified himself as Nathaniel Higgers, but whose real name is Drake Berentz, spoke at a Springfield city commission meeting.

“I’ve come to bring a word of warning. Stop what you’re doing before it’s too late,” Berentz told Springfield’s mayor, Rob Rue. “Crime and savagery will only increase with every Haitian you bring in.”

Berentz was promptly kicked out for espousing threatening language. Nonetheless, on Thursday morning, a bomb threat prompted Springfield’s city hall, a school and other government offices to be evacuated.…

Source: Haitian immigrants helped revive a struggling Ohio town. Then neo-Nazis turned up

Filed under Multiculturalism, Racism Tagged with , ,

Immigration experts say Trump’s ‘mass deportations’ pledge could cause surge in illegal border crossings into Canada if he wins back the White House 

2024/08/26 Leave a comment

Opinions of note, generally reasoned and realistic:

…Michael Barutciski, a lawyer and associate professor of international studies at York University’s Glendon College, says the situation will depend on how the Canadian government responds to Trump and his immigration policies.

“If there’s a general sense that people who are not legally in the U.S. will be removed or deported, it’s logical that anyone unsure about their status in the U.S. will think it might make sense to go north to Canada,” Barutciski said.

Barutciski noted that the key question is: “What does the government do?” which he sees as “an indication of how this potential flow will be handled. Will it be stopped or will it be encouraged?”

He warned that “If Canada sends a welcoming signal—tweets about how everyone is welcome here—we’ll get tens of thousands, maybe 100,000 or even millions.”

Christian Leuprecht, a professor at the Royal Military College and Queen’s University and a Munk senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, also said a Trump presidency could result in an uptick at Canada’s southern border but does not think it would go beyond the tens of thousands.

“The bulk of people who presented irregularly at the border [during Trump’s first term] were people who always intended to cross into Canada and were not fleeing the Trump administration,” he said.

That being said, he explained that if Trump is re-elected, “the small portion of people fleeing the Trump administration would likely increase, but that increase would not be particularly significant, possibly in the thousands, possibly in the tens of thousands.”

Like Barutciski, Leuprecht said the way the Canadian government handles the situation will impact our borders. He said there is a risk the Trudeau government will forgo the rule of law in an attempt to turn the border issue into an American-style wedge for domestic political gain.

“The risk is not actually masses of people showing up on the border here, because Canada can simply invoke the rule of law and say that the better part of 90 percent of the people who would show up would not qualify,” he said. “The risk here is that the Trudeau government will actually violate its own provisions and the rule of law for political reasons so that he can use it as a wedge issue.”

The Trump refugee narrative “is one that the current federal government loves to propagate.”i

Muzaffar Chishti, a lawyer and senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute, an American non-partisan pro-immigration think tank, casts doubt on the American government’s ability to deport people en masse.

“There are legal impediments that the former president seems generally unaware of. There are constitutional provisions of habeas corpus and due process of law, which strongly impede removing anyone without sending them to a court,” he said.

“Second, there are operational realities—they are not all in one place, not in a camp where you could just extract them. They are intermingled in communities across the country, and getting them out is very, very operationally difficult. Third, there will be a political backlash. Almost all of them are employed, and if they are taken out of their jobs. There could be outcries even from Trump’s own base.”

Chishti also noted that he doesn’t think that the goal of a potential second Trump administration would necessarily be to successfully deport 11 million people, it would rather be “to instill a sense of fear,” which one assumes would discourage other border crossers.

“I think people who respond to that instinct of fear may want to move to Canada. There’s a real possibility of that happening,” he said, given Canada’s reputation as being more receptive to asylum seekers.

What about the Safe Third Country Agreement?

In March 2023, Canada and the U.S. modified the Safe Third Country Agreement so that individuals could no longer make asylum claims from unofficial ports of entry, closing the loophole used by asylum seekers.

However, experts consulted by The Hub said the new March 2023 deal is not a silver bullet and could lead to new problems.

Leuprecht said those who qualify under the exemptions will take advantage and apply, leading to an increase in legal asylum claims.

“We will see a small increase in people who have a legitimate claim to refugee or asylum status, who will present at ports of entry,” he said.

He is also concerned that those without legitimate asylum claims will attempt to cross into Canada illegally at unsupervised, unofficial ports of entry, similar to how illegal immigrants enter the United States from Mexico.

“We will see a small increase in human smuggling across the border.”

Chishti echoed this sentiment, which he said will be a concern of the Canadian government.

“If there is a Trump administration, you could see much more of a commercial enterprise, where you’ll have criminal ranks getting involved,” he said.

“That, I think, will create a sense of chaos and disorder when you will see people being caught in the woods, you know, trying to sneak through, and then you will see the people’s private farms being encroached on, and all that.”

He added that this “is the kind of disorder that creates a political backlash.”

…Experts told The Hub it was crucial for Canada to be prepared and take a series of actions to promote the rule of law and orderly legal immigration, in light of a possible second Trump administration.

“We actually have to start controlling the border with more resources,” said Barutciski. “More border control sends the signal that there are rules to get into Canada.”

“Don’t give off the image to the earth that the integrity of the system has been undermined. That you’re generous and that you don’t really control this. You can’t continue like that.”

He also urged Canada to address its immigration policy issues regardless of who wins the U.S. election. “The current numbers and the way people are coming here is not sending a good signal. It’s a system that is losing credibility. Even if Kamala Harris wins and Trump isn’t President, Canada still has a very difficult situation.”

Leuprecht said Canada needs to be willing to deport those who are not in this country for the right reasons. “We want to make sure we send the right message: “[That] Canada is not the country to go to unless you have a legitimate claim and that you will be deported if you show up here if you do not qualify under the rules.”

He noted that this “would be a significant change in narrative, because, in Canada, we traditionally do not deport people, even when they don’t qualify under the rules. The deportation numbers are tiny in Canada.”

Chishti meanwhile stressed that Canada must do its best to avoid a chaotic situation like the one the U.S. has faced at its southern border.

“The sense of disorder never works, even if it’s a small number of people,” he said. “People like immigrants, but they don’t like chaotic scenes about immigrants, because it creates a sense that we no longer have control.”

Source: Immigration experts say Trump’s ‘mass deportations’ pledge could cause surge in illegal border crossings into Canada if he wins back the White House

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