Quebec Premier Francois Legault said on Wednesday that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau needs to let migrants and asylum seekers know that they can no longer come to Canada.
According to Legault, the prime minister bears the brunt of the responsibility for the influx of illegal border crossings into the province due to his 2017 tweet.
“It is time for Justin Trudeau to put out a new tweet to say not to come anymore, because we have exceeded our reception capacity,” said Legault.
“So, Trudeau has a responsibility in this, listen, we have problems with housing, capacity in schools, staff in hospitals, at some point, Trudeau has to send a new message.”
While former US president Donald Trump was clamping down on immigration in 2017, Trudeau controversially tweeted that Canada would “welcome” all those “fleeing persecution, terror, and war.”
Immediately after the tweet, Canada’s southern border saw a spike in crossings, especially at the Roxham Road makeshift crossing.
Earlier this week it was revealed that Ottawa has been transporting migrants entering into Quebec via the controversial border crossing into neighbouring provinces at the request of Legault’s government.
“We are starting to see results (of this new approach),” said Quebec Minister of Immigration Christine Frechette. “We’re very happy with that.”
As of June, over 5,300 migrants have been bussed out of Quebec. The bulk of them have been moved into Windsor and Niagara Falls, Ontario.
“I don’t have information about what happened on Monday, but we are expecting that this new approach persists,” said Frechette.
Quebec has requested that it only take in up to 23% of asylum seekers moving forward.
