Republicans Obsess Over Mexico, but Cops Just Busted Someone for Smuggling People Into Canada

One person has been arrested, while three others are facing deportation, after cops busted a human smuggling operation that crosses a "common" trafficking route through Mohawk territory.

The arrests come as candidates for the Republican primary raise fears the Mexican border is allowing a flow of illegal immigrants and security threats into America — but it's a stretch of water that cuts through the Akwesasne First Nation that police, Aboriginal leaders, and even military intelligence analysts say has become a frequent path for criminals running cigarettes, drugs, guns, and people both ways across the Canada-US border.

The Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) confirmed that they've laid charges against a resident of Cornwall, Ontario, which sits on the Canadian side of the St. Lawrence River, for his attempt to sneak three others across the border.

Chris Kealey, a spokesperson for the agency, said the Cornwall resident was helping the other three people cross the border from New York state onto Cornwall Island, Ontario, which is in Akwesasne Mohawk territory.

The Cornwall resident has been released and will see the inside of a courtroom on March 15. The other three aren't facing charges. Instead, they're being held at a detention centre in Ottawa, and will be deported by the CBSA "as soon as they can arrange it," Kealey said.

Officials aren't saying what the purpose of the smuggling was.

The arrests stem back to February 11, when US Customs and Border Protection officers told the CBSA's intelligence unit they had spotted three foreign nationals in Massena, New York who were "acting in a suspicious manner," according to the CBSA release. The Canadian agency says it put them under surveillance after that.

Brad Brant, operations officer with the US Border Patrol, told VICE News the three foreign nationals were driven to a hotel in Massena, NY, and left there until the Cornwall resident picked them up. They stayed in a hotel room only long enough to order food.

"That's often an indicator that someone will be smuggled across the border into Canada," Brant said.

From there, the Cornwall man drove them north toward the border crossing between New York and Ontario. Brant wasn't able to say how they crossed the river to Cornwall Island, where Akwesasne police arrested all four.

While far more attention is paid to smuggling operations along America's southern border, the route that crosses Cornwall Island has long been identified as a well-trodden path for smugglers.

"Human smuggling both ways is definitely common in both directions," Brant continued. "Tobacco smuggling is normally just into Canada."

But when lawmakers in Congress met to discuss the issue of northern border security in January, the focus was on the perceived threat of Syrian refugees and Islamic terrorism rather than on border communities like Akwesasne.

Related: US Senate Hears That Terrorists Are Coming From Up North; Canada Shakes Its Head

Law enforcement, and even the Canadian military, have watched the area particularly closely in recent years for smuggling activity. A heavily redacted Canadian Forces documentobtained by VICE News shows Akwesasne itself is under surveillance for weapons and drug smuggling. The document, from the National Counter-Intelligence Unit, lists Akwesasne under the heading "sabotage by criminals/terrorists."

"At this time the Akwesasne First Nation located on Cornwall Island are engaged in smuggling various contraband items (ie counterfeit cigarettes and weapons)," the document states. The First Nation is also a hotbed for marijuana and ecstasy trafficking.

Its location makes it easily exploited for running illicit goods. Akwesasne territory stretches across the St Lawrence River, crossing Ontario, Quebec, and New York — including a small strip of Canadian territory on the south side of the river that is surrounded by American soil. Given its location, there has long been tension between the various American and Canadian governments, who want to increase border controls in the area, and the Akwesasne nation, which has asserted its sovereignty and the ability of its citizens to cross freely in their own land.

"It's kind of a hard place to understand where Canada starts and stops," Brant explained.

In an interview with VICE News, Akwesasne Grand Chief Abram Benedict, who was elected last June, acknowledged that weapons, drugs and even human smuggling is an ongoing issue on Akwesasne territory — and one that's linked to organized crime.

"Some people exploit the fact that we've got a border running through our community," he said.

"There's some people smuggling happening, based on the police briefs that I see and stuff like that," he said. "But according to the RCMP and our other agencies and, I guess, internally too, organized crime exploits our community, so … all of the organized crime that they reference is external to our community — they just so happen to use our unique border location as one of the spots."

Benedict said cracking down on smuggling is "absolutely" a priority for him, but that Akwesasne police are struggling due to lack of government funding. "Resourcing is always an issue for our police force…We've been pushing our federal and provincial partners for additional funding for a marine unit and some additional staffing," he said.

It's not news that people, drugs and weapons are smuggled across the border — in fact, it happens all the time.

On January 6, the Cornwall Regional Task Force (CRTF) spotted people off-loading garbage bags full of "contraband" fine cut tobacco and cigars from a boat onto the shore of the St. Lawrence River. Two people, 35-year-old Gerald Hannaburg and 29-year-old Rachel Simon were charged with possession in relation to smuggling, the RCMP said in a release.

"It's not a new issue and it's not only happening here," Benedict said, referring to smuggling across the Canada-US border. "There's a social impact and there's a perception impact also. When people tell you you're from Akwesasne, they immediately think of these documents that the government released, or a vehicle seized with tobacco in it, never mind the fact that our Pow Wow keeps getting bigger and that the Mohawk Council has a huge delivery into education [and] healthcare services in two provinces."

With files from Ben Makuch.

Follow Hilary Beaumont on Twitter: @HilaryBeaumont