courtesy of Cagle Cartoons, Inc.
Reacting to President Trump’s announcement of the slapping of significant tariffs on a range of Canadian products, Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau disputed several key points that the Trump administration has used as rationale for imposing the tariffs.
One of the alleged reasons for the tariffs is, according to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, “the illegal fentanyl that [Canada, Mexico and China] have sourced and allowed to distribute into our country, which has killed tens of millions of Americans.”
Leavitt added:
Well, the tariffs are incoming tomorrow on Canada, and the reason for that is because both Canada and Mexico have allowed an unprecedented invasion of illegal fentanyl, that is killing American citizens, and also illegal immigrants into our country.
Trudeau addressed those vastly exaggerated, if not false, claims with regards to Canada head-on and forcefully during his address to the Canadian people Saturday evening.
Referring to the “safe and secure” U.S. – Canada border, Trudeau emphasized, “Less than one per cent of fentanyl, less than one per cent of illegal crossings into the United States come from Canada.”
Several other reputable and knowledgeable sources reveal that the Trump administration’s claims with regards to Canada are not supported by the facts.
Here are some.
• The scale of both illegal immigration and fentanyl trafficking from Canada pales in comparison to the same issues at the U.S.-Mexico border.
• In Fiscal Year 2024, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol seized 21,148 pounds of fentanyl at the southwest border, mostly smuggled from Mexico. In contrast, only 43 pounds were intercepted at the northern border. This means that less than 1% of all fentanyl seizures occurred at the U.S.-Canada border.
• In 2024, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) seized approximately 10.8 pounds of fentanyl coming into Canada from the United States…This suggests that the trafficking issue is not as one-sided as the administration claims.
• During Fiscal Year 2024, U.S. Border Patrol apprehended 23,721 people who illegally crossed the U.S.-Canada border, representing just 1.5% of nationwide Border Patrol apprehensions.
Furthermore, Forbes adds, the migration flow is not one-sided. In 2023, the last year for which we have statistics at the moment, more people crossed illegally from the United States into Canada than in the opposite direction.
• Congress in 2020 established a commission to look into ways to reduce the flow of the drugs into the country. The commission found that “Canada is not known to be a major source of fentanyl, other synthetic opioids or precursor chemicals to the United States, a conclusion primarily drawn from seizure data….
• Last year [2024], U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents intercepted about 19 kilograms of fentanyl at the northern border, compared with almost 9,600 kilograms at the border with Mexico, where cartels mass-produce the drug.
• …there were 43 pounds seized from people crossing the northern border in FY 2024 — and most of it was captured by Border Patrol, not at legal ports. That was up from just 2 pounds confiscated in FY 2023 and 14 pounds seized in FY 2022.
• For at least the last three full fiscal years, the amount of fentanyl captured coming from Canada has made up less than 1% of all fentanyl seized nationwide by the Border Patrol and the Office of Field Operations.
• The fact is, both migrants and fentanyl are crossing the northern border with Canada at significantly lower levels than at the southwest border with Mexico.
As previously mentioned, Press Secretary Leavitt claimed that illegal fentanyl “has killed tens of millions of Americans.”
While each and every death attributed to fentanyl is a tragedy, several data sources, including Statista, indicate that since 1999 approximately 600,000 Americans have died from fentanyl overdoses.
A grim toll, but one that should not be attributed in such an unjustified and callous manner to our neighbor to the North. A neighbor that is also “devastated by the scourge that is fentanyl, a drug that has torn apart communities and caused so much pain and torment for countless families across Canada, just like in the United States,” as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told his fellow countrymen last night.
