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Lissa Smith poses with lawn signs in support of Kamala Harris, and a pillow someone threw in her yard after several signs, previously displayed on her lawn, were taken outside her home in Indianapolis, Indiana, on Oct. 27, 2024.
Hard Numbers: Yard sign thefts rise in US, Canada’s defense pledges meet spending limit targets, Cocaine grapes cross border, Musk skips sweepstakes hearing, Who supports Trump’s tariff proposal?
10: About 10% of Americans put up signs supporting a presidential candidate on their property, according to one expert’s estimate. And with polarization and enmity between supporters of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris reaching fever pitch on the eve of the vote, people are turning to high-tech solutions such as cameras and tracking devices to prevent rising incidents of theft and vandalism of the signs.
2: To meet its stated goal of bringing defense spending up to 2% of GDP, Canada will have to nearly double its defense spending by 2033. But doing so could run afoul of new budget targets that aim to bind the government to reduce the national deficit-to-GDP ratio to below 1% within three years.
600: A case of vines and lines, you might say. Canadian authorities this month seized more than 600 kilograms of cocaine stashed in a shipment of grapes. The interdiction occurred earlier this month at the Ambassador Bridge, which links Windsor to Detroit. That amount of product would fetch more than $13 million on the streets.
1 million: Elon Muskskipped a hearing on Thursday about the legality of the sweepstakes in which he awards $1 million each day to someone who signs his online free speech and gun-rights petition. The Justice Department recently sent a letter to the billionaire warning him that giveaways like this might violate election laws. The case will now move to a federal court.
33: A new poll shows 33% percent of Americans support Donald Trump’s proposal to impose a 20% tariff on all imports, while 43% are opposed. Perhaps unsurprisingly, two-thirds of Trump voters like the idea, compared to barely one in 10 Harris supporters. When asked about specific countries, Canada comes out looking pretty good: Just 16% of Trump voters and 6% of Harris voters want to put tariffs on their northern neighbors.
A group of migrants who said they were from Djibouti and Somalia follow railway tracks towards the Canada-U.S. border as seen from Emerson, Manitoba, Canada, March 27, 2017. Picture taken March 27, 2017.
US deters asylum-seekers entering from Canada
The United States haschanged its northern border policy in a bid to limit the number of asylum-seekers crossing into the country from Canada as the number of migrants seeking shelter in the US continues to rise. Border Patrol has already detained 16,500 illegal migrants at the US-Canada border so far this year – up from just 10,000 last year and 2,200 in 2022.
The changes include a requirement that asylum-seekers come prepared with documents for review so that border officials can determine if they are eligible for entry or must be sent back to Canada under the joint Safe Third Country Agreement. Previously, migrants could request time to gather documentation while remaining stateside. A second change cuts the time migrants have to consult with an attorney, dropping the window from 24 to four hours.
Canada recentlyconcluded that the US changes are in line with the Safe Third Country Agreement, which the Biden administration claims will lead to a speedier and more “efficient” processing of asylum-seekers.
The updates brings US policy along the northern border in line with processes along the border with Mexico, with the Biden administration hoping it will bring down the number of asylum-seekers who enter Canada first and then seek to migrate to the US – particularly in an election year in which immigration features as atop issue of concern for voters.
Encounters along the US-Canada border have beenrising in recent years, hitting 189,000 in 2023, up nearly 600% from 2021.Canada's Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre speaks in the House of Commons.
Poilievre is polling well despite crying "terror"
The political exchange was sparked when a 56-year-old New York man set out to attend a Kiss concert, but instead ended up driving his Bentley at high speed into a barrier at the border crossing, going airborne and exploding on impact, killing him and his wife.
Fox News was quick to report that it was believed to be a terrorist attack, and Republicans were quick to link it to Biden’s border policies. On Twitter, Ted Cruz called it a terrorist attack, as did GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who has called for a wall along the northern border.
In Canada’s House of Commons, before the facts were established, Poilievre asked about reports that the incident was linked to terrorism. After it became clear it had nothing to do with terrorists, the Liberals accused him of jumping to conclusions. When he was asked about it, Poilievre berated the reporter who posed the question, which commentators, including this writer, thought went too far. He also came under harsh criticism for voting against a Canada-Ukraine free trade deal and delivering a misleading explanation for the vote.
Both incidents gave Liberals the opportunity to attack him as dishonest, mean, and a Trumpy northerner, perhaps hoping for make a comeback in the polls. So far, that has not happened. The most recent poll from Nanos shows the Liberals so far behind that they are tied with the NDP, which could put pressure on the smaller party to force an early election. Seat projections show that the NDP would pick up seats if there was an election today, but that’s no guarantee since their voters might not like to see the NDP bring down Trudeau, opening a path to a Poilievre government.Migrants share space at a makeshift shelter in Denver, Colo., on Friday, Jan. 13, 2023.
Migrant and housing crises hit both sides of border
The city has more than 1,868 migrants in shelters – a big jump from July and August, when numbers were in the 400-500 range.
In May, Title 42 expired. US officials expected a sharp, sudden rise in the number of immigrants entering the country from the southern border, and that is exactly what happened, though numbers later declined. The immigration policy had been in place since the Trump years, keeping hundreds of thousands of would-be newcomers, including some asylum-seekers, from entering the country.
The change prompted some states to ask the Biden administration for funds to help house migrants, but support has been insufficient. Now, as Politco reports, a broader battle over “NIMBYism” (not in my back yard) is playing out. Some officials, including Democrats, worry about how a rise in migration is affecting housing – many cities and states are already in crisis as shelters exceed capacity – and whether it might produce a local backlash. Massachusetts alone has upwards of 22,000 people in shelters, roughly half of whom are migrants. That’s a 100% rise since January.
National, state, and local support has been unable to keep up with the rise in newcomers, and migrants are finding themselves caught in the middle of a partisan political struggle ahead of the 2024 election. This comes as the US faces a growing housing crisis.
Meanwhile, in Canada, government under-funding and finger-pointing in this summer led to an emergency in which civil society groups and churches stepped up to feed and shelter migrants who were sleeping on the streets of Toronto. In September, the migrants moved to a shelter. The federal and Ontario governments eventually stepped up to offer funds to supporting asylum-seekers, refugees, and at-risk people. But the money won’t be enough for long, especially since Canada’s housing crisis shows no signs of abating.
With elections around the corner for both countries, leaders on both sides of the border will be under pressure to speedily address housing prices and growing shelter occupancy, particularly as migration picks up. We’re watching to see how national and local leaders navigate this growing crisis and fight to resist a local backlash.
Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott speak during the FOX Business Republican presidential primary debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum.
Sound and fury, signifying nothing — the second GOP debate without Trump
“Every time I hear you, I think I get a little bit dumber.”
That was former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley’s big hit on Vivek Ramaswamy at last night’s GOP debate in the midst of just one of many chaotic verbal scrums. She was attacking Ramaswamy’s Ukraine-skeptic position, a subject that divided the stage sharply. But Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis used his promise to tighten up the purse strings around Ukraine aid to pivot to a subject the candidates were much keener on: border security.
DeSantis said America was being invaded by migrants and promised he would militarize the border and defend national sovereignty. North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum said he’d already put his money where his mouth was and deployed his state’s national guard to the border. Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) said he would address the flow of fentanyl into the US by freezing the financial assets of drug cartels. Haley went a step further and said she would straight up conduct military special operations targeting cartels in Mexico. But Ramaswamy took by far the most radical position, saying he would end birthright citizenship in the United States, which is enshrined in the 14th amendment of the Constitution.
In fact, the border and accompanying issues of drugs and migration seemed to be what the candidates turned to most readily when asked about one of those pesky subjects they’d rather not touch. You know, like healthcare, gun violence, or how any of them think they have a snowball’s chance in hell of beating Donald Trump.
Not a single question was asked about the former president being found liable for fraud this week, or about any of his many legal imbroglios for that matter. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie took the strongest shots at Trump, looking into the camera to address him directly at one point and later mocking him for “ducking” the debate. (I won’t subject you to his Donald Duck quip).
Trump, for his part, spent the evening addressing autoworkers at a factory in Michigan, after President Joe Biden joined a United Auto Workers picket line there on Tuesday. Trump swore not to allow “the American auto industry to die” and promised if the workers could “get your union leaders to endorse me, I’ll take care of the rest.”
There was just one problem: The workers he was speaking to don’t have union leaders, because they don’t work in a union shop. At the height of the largest auto industry labor action in recent memory, Trump was talking to at-will workers. It’s the kind of Veep-esque gaffe that might negatively impact any other candidate’s primary campaign, but with Trump polling a cool 40 percentage points ahead of his closest rival … he has little reason to worry.