Letter to Joseph Biden, President - Tester Leads Letter to President Biden to Urge Opening of US-Canada Border to Vaccinated Canadians by October

Letter

We write regarding current Department of Homeland Security (DHS) restrictions limiting nonessential travel from Canada to the United States at land ports of entry along the United StatesCanada border. We appreciate the need to prioritize the health and safety of the American public
through reasonable restrictions on international travel. However, we believe that fully vaccinated
Canadians should be allowed to safely travel into the United States via land ports of entry. We
urge you to lift these restrictions before October, provide a plan for reopening land ports of entry
and appoint an interagency lead on U.S.-Canadian border restrictions related to the COVID-19
pandemic.
As Senators who represent states along the northern border, our communities have been deeply
affected by the restrictions on travel. Many of our communities maintain close professional and
personal ties with communities in Canada. Canadians come to our states to conduct business,
enjoy recreational opportunities, buy goods, and visit friends and family. The restrictions on nonessential travel across the border have greatly curtailed these activities and led to economic and
emotional strain in our communities. These limits on cross-border travel via land ports of entry
are still in place even though, under existing DHS regulations, fully vaccinated Canadians can
board an airplane and fly into the United States. We struggle to understand the public health
rationale for the disparate treatment in modes of travel.
As you know, fully vaccinated Americans have been able to enter Canada via land ports of entry
since August 9. This is true despite lower vaccination rates and higher per capita case rates in
America. As of this writing, 84 percent of individuals 12 years and older in Canada have
received at least one dose of the vaccine and the country is experiencing 10 cases per 100,000
people. Alternatively, 74 percent of individuals 12 years and older in the U.S. have received the
vaccine and we are averaging 44 cases per 100,000 people. Given that Canada has opened its
land border to fully vaccinated Americans, we feel that now is the time to open our land border
to fully vaccinated Canadians.
We also urge you to provide a public plan for reopening travel to fully vaccinated Canadians at
land ports of entry. Businesses in our states need to plan ahead, which includes an assessment of
the impact of ongoing travel restrictions on their operations. A plan with some indication of
when your administration would feel comfortable lifting border restrictions based on public
health data would provide clarity to businesses and families along the northern border. It is also
necessary to ensure that DHS personnel at land ports of entry in our states are ready to reopen to
fully vaccinated Canadians as soon as the restrictions are lifted.
Finally, we ask that you designate an interagency lead responsible for monitoring and eventually
lifting non-essential travel restrictions. We understand that decisions relative to restrictions on
travel at the border necessarily involve multiple federal agencies and executive branch personnel.
We also appreciate the efforts of the administration's COVID-19 task force to process and
evaluate the public health data and other information they receive from the various agencies.
However, naming an interagency lead on non-essential travel restrictions would give this issue
the attention it deserves and provide clarity to our offices and constituents. An interagency lead
would facilitate discussions between the administration and our offices and ensure that we are
able to effectively convey the concerns of our constituents as you evaluate the COVID-19
pandemic.
We know that vaccines work and provide the best opportunity to end this pandemic. We should
recognize their efficacy and stop penalizing northern border communities by lifting the
restrictions on non-essential travel for fully vaccinated Canadians. The COVID-19 pandemic has
already taken a devastating economic and human toll on our country. Vaccines offer us the
chance to mitigate and ultimately eliminate the spread of this virus. Allowing fully vaccinated
Canadians to travel freely to our states and others would reflect the public health data which
shows that vaccines work.
We appreciate your consideration and look forward to continuing our work with you on this
issue.