'Manufactured crisis': Fentanyl seized at Canadian border by U.S. authorities plummets

As the U.S. government appeared in court Wednesday to defend its use of emergency powers to impose a sweeping, global array of tariffs, the alleged “emergency” presented by Canada appeared to be shrinking by the month.

President Donald Trump cited what he calls a “flood” of fentanyl from Canada when he invoked an emergency-powers law to circumvent Congress and impose 35 per cent duties on goods imported from here.

But the latest U.S. statistics add to existing questions around that allegation. After a brief spike in the volume of fentanyl that American authorities seized at the Canadian border in April and May, the numbers have plummeted to their lowest level since July of 2023.

In September — the latest month for which there are figures — only 1.4-tenths of a pound of the drug were found by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at the northern frontier.

The seizures have definitely increased in the last two years — from two pounds in 2023 to 43 pounds in 2024 and 77 this year by September. And Canadian police are battling across the country to find and shut down fentanyl “super labs” that can rapidly produce large quantities of the narcotic.

But the amount of it going south still represents well under one per cent of the fentanyl entering the States, the vast majority coming from Mexico. The latest figures — though representing a relatively small snapshot of four months — suggest that Canada’s contribution is, if anything, diminishing.

“It’s a manufactured crisis,” says Laura Huey, a criminology professor at Western University. “Is there fentanyl going across the border? Yes. Is it an orders-of-magnitude threat? No.”

If Canada were exporting large volumes of the drug into the States, threatening the Mexican stranglehold on the market, violence between crime gangs would ensue, she said. But that hasn’t happened.

“The Mexican cartels have had very well-established markets (in the U.S.) for decades and decades,” Huey said. “How on earth would the Canadians be able to disrupt this? It makes no sense.”

That said, the Supreme Court will likely not be debating whether Canada’s dribble of fentanyl into the States constitutes an emergency.

The challenge of Trump’s use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose tariffs on almost all his country’s trading partners is considered a monumental case, potentially setting new limits on presidential power and reversing tariffs that have already brought billions of dollars into government coffers.

But the case centres on whether the legislation allows presidents to impose tariffs, which are not specifically mentioned in the act, not on what defines an emergency, said Wolfgang Alschner, a University of Ottawa professor of business and trade law.

And even if the court strikes down Trump’s IEEPA tariffs, the effect on Canada will be limited, Alschner said.

Canadian exports covered by the Canada-U.S.-Mexico free-trade agreement are exempted from those duties. Trump imposed the most damaging tariffs — on Canadian steel, aluminum and automobiles — under different legislation and they would not be affected by the court’s ruling, he said.

Still, Trump’s use of IEEPA to impose any tariffs on Canada was always an eye-opener.

He even increased them to 35 per cent from 25 per cent in July, suggesting Ottawa was doing little to stymie fentanyl smuggling.

“Canada has failed to cooperate in curbing the ongoing flood of fentanyl and other illicit drugs,” the president said in an executive order, accusing Ottawa of “continued inaction and retaliation.”

By then his own agency’s seizure numbers had already been falling for two months.

There was a brief surge in Fentanyl smuggling late this spring, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection . The seizures soared from less than a tenth of a pound in March to 27 lbs in April and 32 lbs in May, before falling back to 3.6 pounds in June, with a further decrease in July, a slight bump up in August and another steep drop in September.

Kevin Brosseau, Canada’s new fentanyl czar, declined to comment in a statement on the American seizures, saying he would leave that to U.S. authorities. But he said Canada is working hard to secure the border, both for contraband leaving this country and entering it.

“Canada takes the fentanyl threat extremely seriously and we continue to strengthen our ability to detect, disrupt, and deter criminal activity,” he said. “We are also working closely with partners in the U.S., who have expressed appreciation for the clarity, scale, and intensity of Canada’s efforts and with whom we share Canada-U.S.-related enforcement intelligence in real time.”

U.S. Customs and Border Patrol representatives could not be reached for comment, as the American government shutdown continues.

• Why more fentanyl production could be moving to Canada
• How Canadian fentanyl smuggling to the U.S. really works and who’s behind it

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