People around the world need to understand that the United States is not a place to which they can flee. These stories that you are about to read are true.
It is my understanding that over 200 Americans have fled to Canada alone, but not a
single one of them has obtained Refugee status. This is due to the fact that the Canadian government has an unwritten agreement with the United States government to not allow
any American refugee into Canada. This violates Canadian immigration law, but that
government doesn't seem to care.
My Story
As an American citizen by birth, I made the decision to emigrate from the United States
to Canada in January 2002. I asked my then husband if he would like to move to Canada since he despised what America stood for long before that time. He said, "No." So I proceeded to move there without him later that year.
I made the decision to leave the United States because I had read that the government was planning road blocks and Martial Law, and I didn't want to be caught in any road block, and knew we would be especially since we lived on a peninsula.
I knew I had time because I knew that it would take the government a good deal of time before it could establish these road blocks around the country, so planned on moving later.
In August 2002, I wrote a letter to the Canadian consulate in Seattle in which I stated that I would like to immigrate to Canada. However, they never answered that letter, so on December 17, 2002, I attempted to cross over into Canada at 12:15 am. The border guard asked "What is your status?" I was struck silent for a few moments, but then answered "refugee."
She requested that I go into the office. I did. After more than 2-1/2 hours, I was told that I needed to drive back over the border to Washington state, something that I wasn't willing to do for two reasons. First, I was terrified of my government, and secondly, I was dead tired. When I told the officials these reasons, they contacted their RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) who proceded to handcuff me and take me to their jail where I
was able to obtain a few hours of sleep. I will say that they didn't abuse me, and didn't violate my person. They just violated my rights.
I commented to the RCMP when they handcuffed me that this is what you get for telling the truth. They didn't answer.
Before all this took place, I had occasion to speak with Legal Aid in British Columbia. The lawyer advised me to be sure to have a lawyer present when speaking with the authorities, so the next morning when I finally was able to have "the interview" I immediately requested a lawyer. The Senior Immigration Officer, a man named Richard, badge number 1999, told me that would be impossible, so I condescended to speak with him without one.
Richard knew that I was moving because a van load of my furniture was with me, but he told me to "go back to the United States, pay rent, get rent receipts, and forget about Christmas with Brenda" my friend who wanted me to live in her city in Canada, Saint John, New Brunswick, and wanted me there for Christmas.
Richard even spoke with Brenda by phone, and she assured him that she would never force me to leave, but it wasto no avail because of this unwritten agreement between the United States and Canada which I had no idea existed when I planned to move to Canada.
Richard, #1999, who admited that he had been a psychologist in a previous career, told me that if I continued to talk about political issues that they would seriously consider that I needed to be evaluated by a psychologist. So I didn't say one more word.
Violating my rights, Richard forced me to return to Washington state, where I planned to stay with friends who had no telephone. But, before I arrived there I knew that I had to call my friend Brenda to make her aware just what had happened, so stopped at a Motel 6 just south of Seattle to call her. In the course of the conversation she and her fiance suggested that I go to the consulate for their help. When I did, however, they told me that I should go up to the border and talk with them, that they couldn't help me.
Since I knew that this wouldn't do one bit of good, I made the decision to simply drive across the United States and rent an apartment in Calais, Maine and drive across with a rent receipt in my hand so the border authorities would allow me in for Christmas.
On Christmas Eve at around 12:30 pm I did just that, and remained there until January 11, 2003, but because my rights had been violated by Richard, #1999 Saint John Immigration told me that I had to return to Maine, and so I did, but not by choice.
When I finally had 65% of the money from the sale of my home, I purchased two Air Canada tickets for a trip for Brenda and I to go to Germany. It was March 13, 2003 when I was able to cross over the border into New Brunswick at Saint Stephen. The border guard thought that I would return to Calais on April 4, 2003, but I knew that they had lied to me and violated my rights as well, so I didn't tell him that I would not be crossing over the border to go back the United States.
I had submitted a claim which was registered on January 28, 2003, so that claim was in process whenthe trip was concluded on March 30, 2003. When the plane landed in Toronto from Munich, Germany, something I wrote on the Customs form triggered the gate official to tell me to go to Immigration. So I did.
There they confiscated my passport and told me that I could not leave Canadian soil not even for my divorce trial which would have been held in May 2003. So I didn't because I didn't want to risk not being able to attend the joint American Library Association/Canadian Library Association conference which was going to be held in Toronto that June as a vendor.
We waited for the hearing which we thought could take place in November 2003, but never heard when it would be. At some point in time, I became aware that no American refugee had won their claim because of this agreement between the two governments, so on December 8, 2003 when I fell on the ice in the first snow we had for that season, I made the decision to give up my refugee claim because I knew that I would never win it anyway with a lawyer or without.
On December 23, 2003, I received a certified letter from my divorce attorney. It stated that the divorce trial would be held on March 8, 2004. So since I knew that I would never get refugee status in Canada, made the decision to go back to Washington state to get out of the fraudulent marriage which wasn't based on love at all, so crossed over the border on Friday, March 5, 2004 to consult with my attorney before the trial would take place.
After obtaining my freedom, and on my birthday, March 18, 2004, I was finally able to cross over the border into New Brunswick because I told the border guard that he was breaking the law. He seemed to feel that I would not leave Canada even though I had a letter from my MP requesting the border bureaucrat to allow me in until the weather was suitable to take my parakeets out.
The border bureaucrat even had the audacity to tell me that they would deliver my birds to me in the United States, but when I told him he was breaking Canadian law, he changed his mind and decided not to press that issue. So he finally condescended to let me back in, the best birthday present I could have received.
On May 2, 2004 I left Canada. I had a form that Saint John Immigration person, Donna, gave me to hand in before leaving the country in Toronto, but I waited until I was in Italy to mail it because I didn't want anything to go wrong. Saint John Immigration thought I was going to leave on May 1st, but due to circumstances, I couldn't go on that flight, so reserved another flight for May 2nd instead.
Before I moved to Canada, one of my supporters invited me to move to Norway. I told him that I wanted to live in Canada because the language is common, but it just was not to be.
But I ended up in Norway anyway because of three factors:
I'm safe here in Norway from my government;
I have family here;
People understand that I publish the truth here due to their press.
And, so ends the saga of trying to live in Canada, a beautiful country, which, however, violates peoples' rights if they are American, and even if they aren't.
Peace,
Arlene Johnson
Please read this PDF file
