Building a nice Canadian border wall

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 21/12/2024 (318 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Canada faces a difficult future, given musings from the incoming Trump-administration about imposing across-the-board 25 per cent tariffs on all Canadian goods starting on day one. The term “existential threat” gets frequently quoted these days. It might not be quite that bad, but a sustained tariff scenario would devastate industries and essential supply chains. The toll would be huge, with severe collateral damage within the U.S. too.

The tariff move is utterly illogical. Rationality, however, has tended to mean little to Donald Trump. Tariffs thus likely represent our coming reality; one we will be forced to deal with and respond to. The Liberal government’s reactions so far, unfortunately, have been vague, especially regarding the border, and not inspiring either confidence or unity. They appear to have their heads stuck in the sand, not taking the pending economic malaise seriously.

A touted “Team Canada” approach certainly makes sense. That would require Mr. Trudeau to actively listen and to honestly adopt ideas from, and credit, others. Mr. Trudeau and his political circle, though, still cling to a belief that Team Canada merely means everyone jumps, without question, on his bandwagon.

Hardly likely, given his immense unpopularity. The prime minister himself appears a significant impediment to progress. His recent Mar-a-Lago trip was a dismal failure. Subsequent threats to Canada ended up escalating, not reducing. Trudeau is clearly no longer the “Trump whisperer.”

The prime minister also has been upstaged by premiers, including Wab Kinew, taking concrete actions to immediately address concerns at the border, not waiting for the feds. The pre-eminent national voice has become Doug Ford, now leading the Council of the Federation, a collective organization of provincial and territorial premiers. Ford has been forceful, his initial response a suitable combination of emotion, dismayed by betrayal from a close friend, and resolve to do what must be done.

These are sentiments many Canadians feel.

Premier Ford has since followed up suggesting the need to use “every tool in the toolbox,” including cutting off electricity to the U.S. if tariffs are imposed. Mr. Trump actually responded, but anemically, saying he “had many friends in Canada,” confirming there is little he could do to stop this. David Eby of B.C. now supports such a position, as does the Free Press (Turning off the lights on U.S. tariff threats, Dec. 14). U.S. media have paid attention too, at the same time exposing their most deep-seated fear, namely that Canada might cut off oil too! The latter would be devastating, comparatively as nasty as the tariffs. Such a threat regarding oil must not be considered lightly, but should never be entirely off the table.

In the meantime, there may be other less-than-nuclear options to explore, including building “The Wall.” Security issues at the border are two-way, with concerns from our side including illegal migrants and illegal weapons smuggled from the U.S.

On both issues, Liberal policies have been ham-handed. Their marquee firearms buy-back has been overly political, managing to offend everyone from lawful gun owners to gun-control advocates alike. Problematically, overall costs are now likely to exceed $1 billion, but do not address the pressing and difficult concern of cross-border gun smuggling. Like the president of Mexico, highlighting illegal guns could have been a strong first response by Canada too, but missed.

Think back to the Roxham Road refugee issue. Liberal handling of Roxham Road was appalling. Capabilities to handle refugee claimants in two provinces were overwhelmed. We ended up with the spectacle of refugee claimants sleeping on the streets in Toronto. The problems may return.

What about “The Wall?” I fully recognize the idea is deliberately outlandish, but why can’t we consider it? It need not be more than about a kilometre long, specifically located at Roxham Road, just on our side of the border. And it could be a nice wall. New York state residents and officials would be happy, given recent videos now show an awful eyesore. The cost could be pretty low too, say around $100,000. But can you imagine the impact?

It might act as a bit of a deterrent, but more importantly every major U.S media outlet would likely show up to see “The Wall” actually being constructed by Canada and ask questions!

That would give us a perfect venue to communicate directly to the American people: the importance of co-operation and good relations between our countries; our mutual need to address two-way border security; and the fact that lots of illegal guns and migrants come from the U.S. into our country.

While this idea might not be realistic, it emphasizes the need to identify ways to get the attention of our neighbour without creating a dangerous confrontation.

Robert Parsons teaches in the I.H. Asper School of business and was earlier involved with public policy.