In his first trip to Canada as president, Joe Biden held bilateral meetings Friday with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and will address the nation’s Parliament in Ottawa.
The two world leaders were expected to discuss China, instability in Haiti and NORAD vulnerabilities, and announce a plan to turn away asylum-seekers who cross U.S. and Canadian borders without authorization.
Biden said in brief remarks ahead of one of his meetings with Trudeau that the U.S. is lucky to have Canada as its neighbor because both countries share the same values. “We disagree in degree on things occasionally,” he said, “But there’s no fundamental difference in the democratic values.”
Trudeau also touted his country’s relationship with the U.S., saying Canada has “no greater friend and ally than the United States.”
Biden spent the morning participating in an official welcome ceremony and book signing, and then held a pair of bilateral meetings with Trudeau.
At the other bilateral meeting, Biden sat at a long table with key members of his administration — including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, national security adviser Jake Sullivan, and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm — across from their Canadian counterparts.
In the afternoon, Biden is expected to deliver a speech to the Canadian Parliament, which first lady Jill Biden will attend, and then will hold a joint news conference with Trudeau, according to the White House. Later, Biden and the first lady will attend a gala dinner hosted by Trudeau and his wife, Sophie Grégoire Trudeau.
Biden was expected to address several issues that divide the two neighbor nations during the trip, including his administration’s call for Canada to spend more money to upgrade the NORAD early warning system, whose vulnerabilities were exposed when a Chinese spy balloon crossed into both countries this year.
The U.S. would also like Canada to assume a leadership role in stabilizing Haiti, a cauldron of gang violence and political instability.
Trudeau wants help from the Biden administration to stem the flow of migrants into his country from the U.S. who are claiming asylum.
Their deal to allow both countries to reject asylum-seekers who cross without authorization, which will likely be announced Friday, would apply to people caught within 14 days of crossing the U.S.-Canada border without citizenship in either country. It was reported Thursday by the Los Angeles Times.
Canada will also commit to taking in an additional 15,000 migrants next year from the Western Hemisphere on a humanitarian basis, a U.S. official has said.
Illegal crossings into the U.S. from Canada have climbed to historically high levels, although they are still a fraction of the crossings into the U.S. from Mexico.
Peter Nicholas and Julia Ainsley contributed.
