Why isn’t a wall along the Canadian border on the table?
Feb 7, 2017, 10:10 AM
Between April 2014 and August of 2016, far more people on watchlists tried to get into the U.S. through Canada than Mexico, according to The Daily Beast. (AP)
(AP)
During his testimony regarding border security, Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said: “We face diverse challenges and adversaries that do not respect our rule of law or our borders.”
There has been a lot of talk about President Donald Trump’s travel ban, and a lot of talk about securing borders.
Related: Historic line through the woods separates Washington from Canada
The word we haven’t heard much of yet is “Canada.” A transcript of Kelly’s testimony mentions Canada exactly once.
So what?
Well, The Daily Beast has been digging through FBI files about incidents at US checkpoints. They’re called “monthly domestic encounter reports,” and they match the names of suspected terrorists on various watchlists with the names of people who try to enter the country by air and by land.
Being on a watchlist doesn’t automatically mean that you can’t enter the U.S., and the FBI reports don’t say whether these individuals were allowed in or were turned away. But they do show that between April 2014 and August of 2016, far more people on those watchlists tried to get in through Canada than Mexico.
Data shows that Michigan is a busier crossing point for potential terrorists than Texas or Arizona, The Daily Beast reports.
I hesitate to bring this up because as it turns out, while the southern border is less than 2,000 miles long and is causing no end of controversy, the northern border is just over 5,500 miles long. I can’t imagine how expensive it would be to build a wall there.
On the other hand, Canadians are so nice they might actually pay for it.
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