Item — HN Reader

Can a TN classification denial result in immigration detention? If so, how can I mitigate that risk?

For context, a Canadian woman recently tried to enter into the USA from Mexico and get TN-1 status. Instead of refusing her entry, officials detained her and she's been stuck for 10 days waiting for deportation.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-canadian-woma...

It's unclear to me how big of a risk this actually is for the average "Canadian goes to the USA" story because of her specific factual scenario. Presumably I don't want to enter from Mexico, but is it advisable to take flights from a TSA preclearance airport in Canada so I'm not actually in the USA if the classification is denied?

3 comments

That's extraordinarily unusual and in my experience has only happened when CBP believes that the applicant was lying or has a criminal record so I wouldn't base the decision on where/how to apply on this very low risk. Depending on the TN application, there are better and worse ways to apply for a TN and from an outcome standpoint, sometimes it's better to apply with CBP at the border or with CBP at a U.S. airport by flying directly to the U.S.

You don't think border processes are becoming uncertain now and relying less on precedence?

A land-border crossing in Mexico? 100%, yes.

With all respect, everything happening in the US at the moment is "extraordinarily unusual" today.

Tomorrow it will be the "new normal".

According to other sources, this was an unusual case. She was a Canadian trying to enter from Mexico, who had been told back in November that her visa was no longer valid.

According to this article, Canada rejected her entry as well. Maybe it's not just the US, but this person actually had a real issue with her visa and her travel plans were not prepared well.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c80y3yx1jdyo

"...when she reached the border [Canada], Mr Burke said the Canadian authorities denied her entry as they were concerned she may try to work illegally."

Different person. The person mentioned in the top-level comment is surnamed Mooney.

canada cannot deny canadian citizens entry

She crossed overland. Imagine you do pre-clearance out of a Canadian airport. Can they kidnap you out of country and ship you to a US detention center?

Canadians may be often unprepared and shocked how aggressive and militarized the southern border is, compared to crossing at northern border land entry points.

I rarely find the pre-clearance process to be all that nice when compared to internal clearance. When I traveled a lot to NYC I far preferred to fly out of Toronto island and do immigration at Newark vs flying out of Pearson. The tone was entirely different.

I personally am not sure that pre-clearance should even continue given current diplomatic tensions. Having an armed foreign police force from a country whose official head of state says it wants to occupy you... doesn't seem wise.

US airports love Canada pre-clearance because it allows them to assign planes to any gate. Might be an easy way to gum up the works as retribution.

It varies. In recent years (last decade or so) YVR has been pretty good. Historically there were ups and downs.

I doubt a few immigration officers with handguns (can't say for sure they even carry them or carry them out of the airport) are going to take over BC.

It's not that I think they're some sort of potential foreign occupation force. It's just oddly symbolic and weird, and their powers to detain people, etc. seem entirely problematic in the current context.

It is as bad as it has ever been………

But border patrol has always been a bunch of small dick assholes, all the way back to Obama.

My wife and I adopted a child from another country. He was 18 months of age at the time.

We flew into LAX. We were exhausted from a long flight. We got to customs. Agents approached us and said that they had a few questions and said that I (the father) needed to collect our bags and they would escort my wife(us citizen), my oldest son (us citizen), and my youngest son(adopted foreign national) to the waiting area.

I got our bags and tried to rejoin my family. They denied me entry. Said they had questions for “them”. After an hour I started to have to raise hell because I had all the supplies for my family. Diapers. Food, etc. I was told it obviously took us a while to adopt this kid so we can wait longer.

I eventually stated that they were illegally holding two us citizens and I was going to call 911 for them to take me serious.

They acted like they didn’t know my wife and oldest wee US citizens. Bunch of bullshit. Fuck those assholes and every one of them that continues to violate our constitutional rights.

Signed

12 year US Navy Civilian.

Did the adoption agency warn you about crossing borders?

Many families with recent adoptees have terrible experiences. It’s sad, but it’s important to prepare for it.

Adoption and human trafficking can look very similar. And border guards are often assholes.

Lol they've wisened up to that, now they just take your phone in secondary. If you are a veteran they likely just see you as more of a threat.

Now imagine you had no recourse to citizenship and how terrified you would feel. Threatening to call 911 would lead to escalation of crisis rather than its opposite.

Having seen what the US gov't did to Maher Arar 20 years ago, I have never felt comfortable crossing that border since, despite being a white middle class Canadian of no suspect at all. Just place, wrong time, wrong person, and it can go so, so badly, without any recourse.

Were they doing it because they thought you were immigration illegally or because they thought this could be human trafficking situation?

I don't think either one is the case and obviously I know nothing of your situation besides what you've said, but I can understand why they might be suspicious if a couple of Americans leave the country and come back with an infant that was not part of their family when they departed.

Again, I'm not saying that I think that this is true or even that their concern is reasonable in this specific situation, just that there is another explanation for this other than power tripping racist border thugs, and depending on circumstances it may have been prudent.

Being snarky when you are holding all the power in a power imbalanced situation, is never prudent.

> all the way back to Obama.

I, a natural born US citizen, was a student in the Bush years and I'd drive up to Canada. Coming back, the US guys were always aggro and weird. I had one guy smelling my laundry.

At the time I figured it was some post 9/11 BS.

US citizen here in Michigan, grew up and currently live near the border with southwest Ontario.

For as long as I can remember it's just been known that going to Canada the border control folks are friendly, and coming back into the US is a mixed bag. Sometimes things are fine to cold, other times it's like the folks are having a bad day and taking it out on you.

And this is just me, rando US citizen without any criminal record, going to Canada for random couple-day touristy things. Seeing Toronto, Niagara Falls, hiking, etc.

I always had the impression that this is how they were trained. Like it's part of the homeland security/border agent training to act as hostile as possible. I've never had a positive interaction with an US border patrol.

Hope it wasn’t the underwear specifically.

Sexual harassment and assault, such as illegal strip searches and the conditions at women's detention facilities, is a common form of Immigration abuse. This comment is an important reminder of just one form of that.

I'm an American and I was annoyed at how aggressive and militarized the southern border is.

I was on a big road trip across the country visiting national parks. I went to Organ Pipe Nat. Monument in Arizona which literally touches the Mexican border.

On my way there I drove through a border patrol checkpoint 10 miles north of the border inside the US. They don't check southbound traffic, only northbound. I never entered Mexico. On the way back I had to stop at that border patrol checkpoint. The border patrol agent was basically yelling at me for my passport. I told him I didn't have it with me. He yelled to see my driver's license. I gave it to him and he yelled at me "Why do you have a North Carolina driver's license?" I replied that is where I live and that is my home address on the license. He then screamed at me "Don't you know this is a prime drug running area?!" I told him "I have no idea and I'm not interested in drugs. There is a national park area 5 miles away, don't you get a lot of tourists here going to see that?"

I then noticed in my rear view and side mirrors that another agent was going around my car with a dog sniffing around. After about 2 minutes I saw the dog agent give a thumbs up and the rude agent said "Okay, you can go but you should carry your passport"

I had less rude experiences in Texas and California but still overly suspicious border patrol agents. One guy asked me what all the stuff was in my car. I actually offered him granola bars and soda cans and then showed him landscape pictures on my cameras. He realized that I was really a tourist and not into drugs or helping immigrants cross.

> Okay, you can go but you should carry your passport

Funny, since half of U.S. citizens don't have a passport.

I thought you only need a passport if you're crossing international borders?

If you leave US mainland customs zone and go to saipan or Guam or something it will probably slow you down and they might claim you need it, even though you don't. Also Mexico never changed their law like US did, iirc you can still enter Mexico with a birth certificate.

If you're near a port of entry, you actually can be stopped at any time to be asked for proof of citizenship/visa/etc. See also https://www.aclu.org/know-your-rights/border-zone There are plenty of border patrol stops along highways that never cross a border where you'll be routinely stopped.

In practice, that means "near the border with Mexico" where there are border patrol stations along highways well inside the US that do routine stops, but technically it applies to any port city as well.

_Technically_, if you're a US citizen, you're not required to have proof of citizenship on you. But a drivers license in the US does not show that you are a citizen, and they absolutely can stop you from leaving (at least long enough to mess up your day plans) if you cannot actually prove citizenship in practice. It's just a _lot_ easier to have a passport on you. Passport cards exist mostly for this purpose.

E.g. I lived in Texas for a long time and have a passport card for that specific reason. Driving down to the beach or just going on random trips involves passing through border control stations even though you never leave the US or even get particularly near the border. Your chances of just going to visit a friend in south Texas and winding up needing to pass through a border control checkpoint due to unplanned road closures/etc are pretty high, so it's best to have a card in your wallet at all times that counts. Most remote highways have them as soon as you get back near a town. Most of the time, they'll wave you through pretty quickly, but it's just a lot faster process if you have a passport card and not only a drivers license.

Side note: A friend of mine was a park ranger at Carlsbad Caverns. He picked me up at the El Paso airport and we were driving to Carlsbad. We went through a border control checkpoint. They threatened to arrest him on the spot because he had his park service uniform hanging up in the back, but no employee ID or other proof that he actually was a ranger. They said he was impersonating a federal officer. They made a big deal of it and made us wait while they called the park to verify he was employed (and that didn't work because it was about 8pm). We eventually got let go with a warning after he found random online photos of him giving cave tours and convinced them that he couldn't possibly have staged a ton of random folks on the internet to have him in the background of photos.... But still, it was kinda nuts...

It is insane to travel without a passport. How is it even possible! Americans are living in some weird timeline.

It cuts both ways. Many American friends have told me that they were treated aggressively at the Canadian border as well.

If you get to chatting with a CBSA officer (Canadian version of CBP), they'll have plenty of stories for you about Americans who want to drive from WA to Alaska with all of their guns in their car and not declare it, or try to bring all kinds of absolutely ridiculous stuff into the country without declaring it. The people who cross the border on a regular basis, like a dozen times a year or more, know the system and policies.

It's the tourists and people who rarely cross that have never encountered CBSA that try to treat Canada like some kind of theme park. They're also often unprepared with appropriate ID, documents, receipts and stuff and get weird when CBSA starts asking them exactly the same nature of questions that CBP asks of people going southbound.

I would also emphasize that CBSA knows how often you cross, through a US-Canada data sharing agreement. An ALPR system takes a picture of your license plate on your car and very quickly queries a database, for information presented to the question-asking-person, as your vehicle approaches the window. This is assuming you're driving northbound of course. Even if that doesn't happen, they'll ask to see your drivers license along with your passport and immediately know you don't reside anywhere near the border.

They know immediately if the zip code where your car is registered is somewhere close to the border, or is very far away from the border. And if you have, or have not, crossed the border recently. It's people from very far away from the border that rarely if ever cross who also think they can take their guns, drugs, etc into Canada and won't get questioned about it.

In '09, after getting laid off I did a road trip around with provisions for "I could go camping if my road trip took me that way." No fire arms or criminal record.. but I'm getting to that.

So, going from Seattle up to Banff by way of the Sumas / Huntington crossing...

I went in and was asked for the purpose of my visit ("tourist"), duration of stay ("one to two weeks, no more than two"), for my occupation ("I am currently unemployed") and my permanent residence ("I am currently without a permanent residence")... and the officer looked at my car with camping equipment for more than two weeks... and I was sent to have a bit more of a discussion with an agent.

Parked my car and went in and waited. While waiting, another family was moving from Washington to Alaska... and they were having difficulties. Three vehicles, four possible drivers, though one was an older woman. One car contained a rifle and one of the drivers had a criminal record.

I got to the counter after an hour, explained, was denied entry but that could be rectified if I came back with proof of ties to the United States and proof that I had sufficient funds to be able to stay the duration of my stay without needing any employment.

So, got back in my car, got in line to go back to the US and called my parents on my iPhone (still a rather new tech). They happened to have been at the insurance company when I called, and so got insurance for the car that I was driving for Canada - and sent a photo of that insurance and their drivers licenses with the address clearly visible. Got to the US border agent who was confused that I hadn't entered Canada but was clearly coming from Canada and sat in that office for a little bit while they looked to see that yes, I was an American citizen.

After half an hour there went to the ATM and got a balance of my accounts. I had more than sufficient funds in the account, and then went back to the border crossing. It was the same agent at the crossing so I didn't need to explain again, but said I had the necessary proof (which surprised him that I got it that quickly) and had me park again and go in to the office.

In the office, the family was still trying to figure out what to do. An hour later after they decided that the brother with the criminal record was going to walk back to the US side and that they were going to pay an arm and a leg to register the rifle I got to the counter, showed my parents drivers licenses ("this is where I am going, I had some time without any responsibilities and so decided to tour North America"), the photo of the car insurance for Canada (they called that one in and verified it... again, surprised that I was able to get it so quickly), and matched the account on the ATM receipt with the account that I had for my card... and let me in with some paperwork in my passport noting that I needed to provide that paperwork when leaving the country otherwise entering again could be problematic.

Anyways... I had a great time in Canada. Loved Banff and later Waterton. Handed over the papers to ensure I was leaving at Chief Mountain. I'd love to do it again some day... the drive from Kamloops to Banff was one of the most enjoyable "just driving" days I've done.

It took a while, but trying to cooperate to the best of my ability and that new "sending pictures around" technology really helped.

Only negative border patrol experience I’ve ever had was crossing the Canadian border.

They gotta keep the criminals out somehow. I know quite a few well to do white men with DUIs that kept them out of Canada and I can't blame Canada for it. I think any Felony will keep them from letting you in.

Which is why Trump should be banned from entering as he is a convicted felon.

It’s a bit more complicated than just “any felony” - among other factors, Canadian immigration law considers how Canadian criminal law would treat the offence, as well as how long it’s been since the sentence was completed. And there are discretionary provisions to allow ministerial overrides, as I’m sure they’d do for Trump during his presidency if he would otherwise be covered.

But you’re right, it’s absolutely true that Canadian immigration law treats DUIs by foreign nationals far more harshly than US immigration law does (assuming simple DUI in each case and not something with complications like someone getting hurt or killed).

I got lots of questions going from the US to Canada. But we were just waved through going in the other direction.

I am Canadian and I have always had an easier time crossing Into the US. I have been detained multiple times from the Canadian side.

I took an espresso repair course just across the boarder in Washington and on my way back I was detained for hours and questioned very aggressively because "there is no such thing as an espresso machine repair course".

That being said, I don't doubt the American side can be tough too, though I have never experienced it.

She crossed overland from Mexico for some reason, not from Canada. The linked article says: "Then they came back and told her that, because they were denying her, that they have to send her back to Canada."

Is there a policy that requires that people denied entry be returned to the country they are citizens of?

Mexico would have to officially accept her as a deportee. I’m sure it’s possible, but they “can’t” just let her walk back across the border.

From what I read, the Canadian consulate can't do anything for her.

They have her in their system, and she has no rights.

I read that she was scheduled to be released (sent back to Canada) today, but I can't find any more recent news either way.

In a way it's a story only notable because she's middle class and white. These kinds of things happened routinely to people with Arabic or "Muslim" names for a disturbing amount of time after 9/11. Maher Arar being the most famous case.

Preclearance locations have more traffic and so tend to have more nasty interviewers and more random denials. TN interviews elsewhere are much friendlier. Choose a land crossing if possible.

I’d rather be told “no” than end up in detention.