Manitoba sending conservation officers to border to boost security in response to Trump’s tariff threat: Kinew
Manitoba plans to send conservation officers to the international border in an attempt to defuse U.S. president-elect Donald Trump’s trade tariff threats, Premier Wab Kinew announced Friday.
“Eyes on the border. Everyone has said we need a strong approach to border security here,” Kinew said.
“The federal government has announced potentially new resources coming with the RCMP. We’re saying, at the provincial level, we’re standing up a plan as well.
“This is a new direction we’re going in.”
Kinew made the surprise announcement during an event for the Christmas Cheer Board. He was asked about border security while answering reporters’ questions after the event.
Kinew couldn’t say how many officers will be part of the new plan, but said the government will roll out more details soon.
The usual job of conservation officers is to patrol and enforce the Wildlife Act in the province.
Kinew insisted the redeployment wouldn’t shortchange the Natural Resources and Indigenous Futures department — the umbrella under which conservation falls — of the officers.
“[We’ll be] making sure we have the COs in place to do the important work that they do during hunting season and the other jobs that would typically occupy their time,” he said.
Kinew’s announcement comes just over a week after Trump threatened to impose a 25 per cent tariff on all products entering the U.S. from Canada and Mexico after he takes office in January, unless those countries stem the flow of drugs and migrants across their borders.
“We want to ensure that some of our law enforcement resources here in the province are supporting the broader border security effort,” Kinew said, adding that in addition to deterring crime, “there’s a strong humanitarian argument to be made” for the change.
He cited the deaths in January 2022 of a family from India. The Patel family — Jagdish, 39, Vaishaliben, 37, and their children, Dharmik, 3, and Vihangi, 11 — froze to death in Manitoba while trying to walk through a field into the U.S.
Kinew also said if further steps are needed to ensure that jobs reliant on U.S. trade and the province’s economy are protected, “we’re moving in that direction.”
Concerns over staffing shortage
Greg Nesbitt, the Progressive Conservative critic for environment and climate change, said the party is in support of bolstering security at the border.
But he said conservation officers are already working understaffed, and relocating some of them to patrol the border will stretch the department’s resources “really thin.”
“We’re 30 per cent less than our 130 field officers that we should have. We have just around 90,” Nesbitt said. “I’m just not sure this has been very well thought out.”
Nesbitt is concerned Kinew’s plan will create a strain on the enforcement of rules around wildlife resources in Manitoba, which could ripple into an increase in illegal hunting.
The Opposition is also worried for the safety of conservation officers, who could be redeployed in a role they are not prepared for.
“Conservation officers are perhaps trained to use firearms but it’s not an everyday occurrence they’re dealing with drug smuggling and illegal immigration,” Nesbitt said.
Kinew said conservation officers would get involved in humanitarian situations and “more likely just be that additional eyes and ears to report things to the RCMP or to the Canadian Border Services Agency.”
“The idea is just to have more presence in the region, given the fact that our economic relationship with the U.S., which is so important, is going to rely on us saying, you know what, we are a trusted partner.”
Relocating officers ‘a workload issue’: union
The Manitoba Government and General Employees’ Union, said the province hasn’t communicated to them on how the rollout of conservation officers at the border will be carried out or specifics on what’s expected from them.
Kyle Ross, the union’s president, said recruitment efforts to onboard more conservation officers will be needed regardless if the government wants to implement its plan.
He said the department has been working short-staffed and with the hunting and fishing season approaching, along with the increased use of snowmobiles during the winter, resources for monitoring are already scarce.
“It’s a workload issue,” Ross said. “They have vast land to cover, so it’s as it is, it’s a taxing role for them and without hiring more and pulling some away potentially to do other duties, it’s going to be challenging.”
Carly Deacon with the Manitoba Wildlife Federation said assigning conservation officers to cover areas around the border is going to have a “detrimental effect” on enforcing wildlife regulations, and losing officers on the ground would ultimately take a toll on protecting the sustainability of resources.
“We’re already struggling in Manitoba,” Deacon said. “This decision is just implementing conservation officers at the expense of fish and wildlife and rural public safety.”
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