Asylum applications at Lacolle border in Quebec increased in 2025

The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) is reporting a significant increase in asylum applications at the Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle border crossing in Quebec.

From Jan. 1 to Dec. 14, they processed about 14,900 asylum applications compared to just over 7,700 for the same period last year.

Loujin Khalil, an immigration consultant in Montreal, says that a number of factors such as certain American policies and increases in raids by the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE), could explain why more people tried to cross into Canada from the U.S. at the Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle border crossing this year.

“The main reason to think about Canada is these extreme policies and non-controlled ICE raids that removed everyone,” said Loujin Khalil, Immigration consultant, LMRT Immigration Services. “Increases in ICE raids in January 2025. These raids were escalated from May to June 2025. They established more camps in the U.S.A.”

Adding, “Orders by Trump and the administration it was not enacted into laws, but to suspend immigration from third-world countries, and recently, the ban on 39 countries, even temporary visas. This reflected into fears inside people who are looking for safety.”

Frantz André, the coordinator of Comité d’action des personnes sans statut, said, “It started as early as last year, October, when Donald Trump was already talking about deporting 11 million people, and it’s going to get worse [I believe].”

Alejandro Hernandez, an assistant professor of sociology and anthropology at Concordia University, added, “In the United States, there have been a number of programs that have been slashed or frozen by the current administration, by the Department of Homeland Security, which is the one that oversees a number of other agencies such as ICE and Haiti, Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Honduras, Guatemala, I mean all of these countries or citizens of these countries in the United States have been affected.”

The rise in asylum seekers at the Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle border crossing are however, in contrast to the downward trend of people seeking asylum in Quebec and Canada.

In total, Quebec has seen about 21,100 asylum applications so far this year, compared to more than 30,500 for the same period last year. And Canada overall has seen a 43 per cent drop in asylum seekers compared to last year, with about 32,700 applications this year and just over 57,000 in 2024­.

The country of origin with the most asylum applications to Canada at CBSA land border ports of entry in 2025 is Haiti followed by the United States and Venezuela.

“I think the figures are showing that it’s many Haitian people. They’ve been in the past always attracted to come to Quebec because it’s a French province,” said André.

Khalil adds, “This is the first time this year I had consultation of American citizens seeking asylum in Canada.

“Mainly, there are two groups, LGBTQ community and people of colour, of colour black, brown people. And LGBTQ, I had many of them because they feel increased aggression inside the US communities by their neighbours, government policies, and so on.”