Even as it has become a major bilateral issue between the incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump and the Justin Trudeau government in Ottawa, the border between Canada and the United States has seen a surge in illegal immigration by Indian nationals in recent years, according to official data.
According to data of encounters at the northern border from the US Customs and Border Patrol (USCBP), the number of Indians attempting to enter the United States illegally grew to 22% of the total number, which, in itself, has also increased.
To be sure, the data is limited to those who were apprehended by border officers and the numbers of those not detected are unavailable.
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USCBP provides data according to its fiscal year, which runs from October to September the next year. In 2022, of the overall 109,535 such attempted crossings into the US, Indians comprised nearly 16%. That percentage remained constant in 2023, though the figures rose sharply to a total of 189,402, with Indians accounting for 30,010. There has been a significant increase this year, with 43,764 Indians, close to 22% of the total 198,929 people, trying to enter the US illegally.
The border issue is among those Trump has already said Canada has to resolve if it is to escape a 25% tariff on its exports to America. This was among the issues discussed when Trudeau made an unannounced visit to Mar-a-Lago in Florida on Friday to join Trump for US Thanksgiving, according to Canadian media. Accompanying Trudeau was Canada’s minister of public safety Dominic LeBlanc, who is in charge of the USCBP’s counterpart, the Canadian Border Services Agency.
{{/usCountry}}The border issue is among those Trump has already said Canada has to resolve if it is to escape a 25% tariff on its exports to America. This was among the issues discussed when Trudeau made an unannounced visit to Mar-a-Lago in Florida on Friday to join Trump for US Thanksgiving, according to Canadian media. Accompanying Trudeau was Canada’s minister of public safety Dominic LeBlanc, who is in charge of the USCBP’s counterpart, the Canadian Border Services Agency.
{{/usCountry}}According to an analysis by the Washington DC-based think tank Niskanen Center in September this year, “Canada is increasingly a more accessible entry point for Indians.” That, it explained, was because the processing time for an average Canadian visitor visa was 76 days while the wait time for an appointment for a similar US document was nearly a year. “The US-Canada border is also longer and less guarded than the US-Mexico border,” it added.
The Khalistan issue may be a contributory factor, as it said, “Given that many recent irregular migrants from India are originating from the Punjab, a predominantly Sikh state, and are increasingly crossing through Canada while being granted asylum at high rates in the US, this issue has the potential to become a point of trilateral contention in the future.”
It added that for now “there appears to be a tacit understanding among Indian policymakers that most of these migrants are driven by economic motives and are unlikely to become seriously involved in separatist politics once they settle in the US.”