WASHINGTON – While much of U.S. border security talk focuses on the southwest corner of the country, the U.S. Senate passed a bipartisan bill in June aimed at a different target —  growing migration along the U.S.-Canada border.

The legislation, titled the Northern Border Coordination Act, was co-authored by Sens. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, and Gary Peters, a Michigan Democrat. The measure would hire additional U.S. Border Patrol agents for critically understaffed areas of the northern border and establish the Northern Border Coordination Center at Selfridge Air National Guard Base near Detroit to coordinate border security strategy.

The Senate passed the measure by unanimous consent, but the House has not acted on it.

The northern border is the longest international border in the world at just over 5,500 miles, divided into eight patrol sectors comprising 49 official border crossing stations.

It is also largely undefended.

Much of the border is undefined and unobstructed, marked only by a 6-foot clearing, or vista, that follows the length of the border, hundreds of white markers, and naturally occurring boundaries like streams or lakes.

Illegal crossings up

There has been growing attention from northern-state lawmakers in recent years over increased attempted illegal border crossings as migration from Latin America grows due to economic and political conditions.

In 2023, CBP encountered almost 190,000 individuals attempting to cross from Canada to the United States. That’s almost seven times more than in 2021.

CBP encountered almost 2.5 million individuals on the southern border in 2023.

The Swanton Sector, a 24,000-square-mile area spanning the northern borders of eastern New York, Vermont, and New Hampshire, has seen the highest number of illegal crossings. From October 2022 to September 2023, CBP saw a 550% increase in apprehensions of people crossing from Quebec into the sector.

Encounters are when border officials catch individuals illegally crossing from one country to another either at or between ports of entry. Individuals can then be sent back to their country of origin, Canada, or released into the U.S.

Collen Putzel, an associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute, a liberal-leaning immigration policy think tank, said in an interview with States Newsroom that encounter numbers don’t perfectly reflect the number of people entering the U.S.

“The encounter numbers may be increasing, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that the number of people actually entering are increasing,” Putzel said.

Understaffed

Staffing on the northern border remains a critical issue in maintaining border policies and security. The U.S. Government Accountability Office conducted a study in 2019 and found there were “an insufficient number of agents that limited patrol missions along the northern border.”

GAO attributed many of the staffing shortages to be a result of “competing priorities along the U.S.-Mexico border.”

A CBP spokesperson told States Newsroom in a written statement that more congressional support is needed to address northern border issues.

“CBP continuously adjusts to shifting trends while continuing to call on Congress to provide the resources and personnel necessary to sustain and improve our border security along all our borders,” the spokesperson said.

Peters said his bill with Collins would help solve staffing shortages.

“This legislation will further cement the center’s role in coordinating border security efforts, supporting personnel training and conducting testing for new border security technologies,” he said in a press release from Collins’ office.

Routes set by smugglers

Most of the people crossing the border come from areas outside Canada. About half come from Mexico, CBS News Boston reported. Others are from India, Bangladesh and Haiti.

Many buy one-way plane tickets to Toronto or Montreal.

The increased movement of people through Canada could be fueled by smuggling operations, Putzel said.

“Oftentimes, migration routes are, in part, dictated by the smuggling networks that are controlling them,” she said.

In February, Canada changed a visa rule for Mexican nationals, requiring citizens to obtain a Canadian or U.S. travel visa before entering Canada. Previously, no visas were required.

Canada has seen an increase in Mexican migrants claiming asylum over the past decade. In 2015, only 110 people from Mexico applied for asylum. At the end of 2023, almost 24,000 applied, the majority filing their claims from airport offices, according to the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada Department.

National security vulnerabilities

With more people moving from Canada into the U.S., the situation at the northern border has grown more precarious, prompting bills like the Northern Border Coordination Act, which was introduced in July 2023.

In 2023, the CBP Office of Field Operations, which monitors the border at ports of entry, encountered 484 individuals on the terrorist watchlist attempting to cross into the U.S. from Canada. That’s almost nine times more than in 2021, according to CBP data. Officials on the southern border only encountered 80 people on the watchlist in 2023.

Authorities have also encountered more drugs being brought over the northern border. According to the CBP, drug seizures in 2023 were up by about 29% from 2021 levels. Marijuana was the most common drug officers found, with just under 3,500 seizures in 2023 compared to just under 2,000 in 2021.

But weapons and ammunition seizures have decreased in recent years. In 2021, CBP seized over 9,000 weapons, ammunition, and gun parts. In 2023, that figure was down to just over 4,000.

Rep. Shri Thanedar, a Democrat who represents part of the Detroit area along the northern border, said in a statement to States Newsroom that the Collins-Peters proposal “is essential to address the rising national security threat along the northern border.”

“I firmly believe this strategic investment will benefit the safety of communities within Michigan’s 13th Congressional District,” Thanedar said.

Economic factors push more migrants to U.S. 

The U.S. may be more appealing to migrants than Canada because of culture and the job market, Silvia Pedraza, a professor of sociology and American culture at the University of Michigan, said. Immigrants are more likely to get jobs in the U.S. than Canada, she said.

“In Canada, people (immigrants) don’t get decent jobs. They (Canadians) treat them nicely. They’re even, I would say, hospitable and warm,” said Pedraza. “The fact of the matter is that they don’t give them any jobs that are worth anything.”

“We (the U.S.) don’t give them papers, but we give them jobs,” she said, acknowledging the better job prospects immigrants seek to support themselves and their families.

But Pedraza also thinks that Americans should recognize the positive economic impact immigrants bring.

She said with U.S. citizens’ increasing levels of education, they are less willing to work jobs in the service industry, construction, and agriculture. In recent years, immigrant workers have begun to make up significant populations in these industries, according to a study by Pew Research Center.

“We don’t seem to recognize that we have a real need, a real lack of people in these sorts of jobs that are essential to the economy,” said Pedraza.

Pedraza emphasized that the U.S. is a country built on immigration and that intense media coverage of the southern border won’t help solve the crisis.

“It’s such a negative portrayal all the time that doesn’t see the value of what immigrants bring to a country,” she said.