U.S. delivers reality check: New border deal with Canada not top priority

The premier of Quebec wants a new migration deal with the U.S. He wants it urgently. He wants the prime minister of Canada to negotiate it. The prime minister? He wants it too.

It's become a pressing political priority and major federal-provincial irritant, with Canada eager to slow the flow of migrants entering on foot from the U.S. at unofficial points of entry, such as the contentious one at Roxham Road, south of Montreal.

There's one small problem. The Americans get a say here.

For years, the U.S. has been conspicuously tight-lipped on the topic, and this week offered new — and rare — public insight into the American perspective.

Newsflash: A country dealing with millions of migrants per year is not in a major rush to reclaim Canada's thousands.

U.S. Ambassador David Cohen told CBC News irregular crossings into Quebec are a symptom of a broad global migration challenge; and he'd rather address problems, not symptoms. 

He wouldn't even acknowledge the countries are talking about Canada's desire to extend the 2002 Safe Third County Agreement to make it easier to expel migrants who cross between regular checkpoints.

Conversations with officials in both countries make clear no agreement is imminent. Whether President Joe Biden's trip to Canada next month changes anything is an open question.

Two sources say that, to date, there have been constructive talks with U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, but the issue is far from settled.

Here's an assessment in blunter language from an immigration expert in Washington, who also happens to know Canada very well.

"There is zero incentive for the United States to reopen Safe Third Country right now. Zero," said Theresa Cardinal Brown, senior adviser on immigration at Washington's Bipartisan Policy Centre, who once led Homeland Security operations at the U.S. embassy in Ottawa.

In its current form, the Safe Third Country Agreement says asylum seekers who enter the U.S. or Canada must make their claims in the first country they arrive in, but it only covers official points of entry.

Canada wants the agreement extended across the entire frontier, so it applies to migrants who use irregular entry points like the now-famous Roxham Road.

To Canadians wondering why it's taken years for the U.S. to prioritize these negotiations, Brown said: "Because our house is burning right now on the other border.… Sorry."