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'I'm not comfortable living here': More Americans did actually move to Canada since Trump's 2016 election
Sep 12, 2020 2 mins, 42 secs
When Donald Trump won the presidential election in November 2016, many Americans threw up their hands and threatened to flee north of the border to live out the rest of their days in chillier climes.

Canada saw an uptick in Americans trying to move to Canada following Trump's win, according to the new figures from Immigration Canada.

In 2015, a little over 6,800 Americans tried to apply for permanent residency in Canada, followed by just over 7,700 in 2016.

Chantal Desloges, a Canadian immigration lawyer, says the modest increase "doesn't surprise" her — though she said it's not an "extreme" trend.

are so restrictive that Canada is a much more attractive destination," Desloges told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview.

Desloges said that after Trump was elected, she got a number of inquiries at her firm from Americans considering taking the jump.

"This happened at our firm when Trump was elected as well — you get a lot of consultations, right?

Andrew Carvajal, an immigration lawyer who works at the same firm as Desloges, said he received similar calls — and a lot more of them, compared to the pre-Trump days.

"They would basically make comments, 'I'm really concerned about what's going to happen now,' and a lot of the people just, it was just obvious from that, what they were saying," Carvajal said.

Carvajal said he also recently got a call from an American pastor who had been living in Canada for two years

"During the consultation, he really said, 'as a Black person in the U.S., I just don't want to go back.' This was within the context of everything that's happening right now, he’s just like 'I really want to stay in Canada, I want my children to stay in Canada,'" Carvajal said

Desloges noted, however, that for someone to pull the trigger and actually pack up to move to Canada, there usually have be other factors at play

"We haven’t found a great deal of just random Americans saying I'm getting out of here, I want to go somewhere else

The month that Trump won the election also saw a little bump in applications from Americans looking to start fresh north or the border

While a month-by-month breakdown of 2015 and 2016 permanent residency applications from Americans to Canada saw an absolute high of 694 applications, that changed in November 2016 — a day when American politics also experienced a shockwave

In the month of Trump's election, Canada received 829 applications from U.S

citizens trying to move to Canada

Desloges explained that any reading of these monthly figures should be tempered by the fact that Canada has a system where it controls the flow of economic immigration applications by telling prospective applicants when they can apply — not the other way around

Still, Desloges says her firm has felt an increase in inquiries from Americans toying with taking the big jump across the Canada-U.S

with Trump, like they'll complain about that, but I mean that is a big step, to actually leave a country and go to another country over a guy that might not even be there next year," Desloges said

Still, according to the figures from Immigration Canada, enough Americans felt that push to establish a trend of increased applications

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