U.S. move on Haitian status puts Canada on asylum alert

Blindsided officials prepare as 60,000 face deportation

OTTAWA— A decision by the Trump administration to end a temporary residency permit program that has allowed almost 60,000 Haitians to live and work in the United States has the Canadian government on alert for a potential new surge of asylum seekers at the border.

The Homeland Security Department said late Monday that conditions in Haiti have improved significantly, so the benefit will be extended one last time — until July 2019 — to give Haitians time to prepare to return home.

Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said earlier in the day that his officials have been in close contact with their U.S. counterparts and were hoping for some advance warning of whether temporary protected status would be removed.

Haitians were placed on notice earlier this year, and, a few months later, waves of people began crossing illegally into Canada from the U.S. to claim asylum, catching the Liberals off guard when the crowds began to number more than 200 people a day.

In the aftermath, Goodale had asked the acting secretary of Homeland Security in the U.S. for a headsup on future decisions. He said Mon- day that she had agreed.

“We’re following it very carefully. In the meantime we have taken a number of steps to be as ready as one can possibly be,” he said.

Goodale said the physical apparatus required for the RCMP and border guards to deal with an influx is in place, as are contingency plans for a variety of “what if” scenarios.

The surge this summer prompted an outreach campaign to Haitian communities in the U.S. to counter misinformation about Canada’s immigration program circulating through social and traditional media channels and blamed for some of the new arrivals. The misinformation — and the government campaign to counter it — continue. Liberal MP Emmanuel Dubourg said the recent announcement that Canada will accept close to one million immigrants over the next three years ended up as a story in the Haitian press about Canada opening its doors to a million immigrants this year. It was framed as proof that Haitians were welcome.

Dubourg said he called the paper two weeks ago to clear things up but not before he realized the story had been shared hundreds of times on Facebook.

He said there is a great deal of uncertainty in the Haitian community, but the message needs to get out that Canada isn’t necessarily a default option.