What They Are Saying

"We share the longest secure border in the world".

"It is not made secure because we have extensive physical barriers. It is because, in large part, our peoples are peaceful and law-abiding and because we have focused, risk-based and highly professional policing, intelligence and immigration teams working effectively behind our borders. Canada and the U.S. will continue to ensure that we have a safe and secure border. The question before us today is how best to do that, given the particular nature of the Canada-U.S. relationship and the complexity of our economic relationship."

"The management of our joint border is an extremely important element of the Canada-U.S. trade relationship. This must be done carefully. It is absolutely essential that the proper balance be achieved between economic and security objectives, between legitimate and illegitimate travel, between our joint border as a gateway and a checkpoint."

"There is no one in Washington, no one in the United States that wants to impede or do anything detrimental to this wonderful trade relationship we have with our friend Canada. The largest trading relationship the world has ever known. We don't want to do anything to impede tourism between our two countries...But what we need to do, I believe, is all get onboard and work toward a smooth implementation."

"We want and are very attentive to the issue of keeping an open border where commerce can take place. I'm very aware that it's not just commerce, but you know little kids go to play hockey in the United States and vice versa, and we want to keep that kind of openness among people."

"We tend to forget how daily and in some ways ordinary the U.S.-Canada relationship is. Our people are always going back and forth. We're in constant trade. It is just the most active of relationships at the level of people to people, not just government to government."

"If the fight for security ends up meaning that the United States becomes more closed to its friends, then the terrorists have won."

"I would hate to see a law go into place that has the effect of not just limiting or endangering trade or tourism, but endangering all those thousands of social interactions that occur across our border every day and are the reason why Canada and the United States have the strongest relationship of any two countries, not just on the planet, but in the history of mankind."

"We in Canada share the United States' security concerns and objectives. It's been brought home to all of us that we face exactly the same kind of security threats and are defending exactly the same kinds of values."

"If the Congress provides flexibility, of course we will work with the Canadian government to extend deadlines. If the Congress says, 'No, this is what our intent is,' we will work with the Canadian government to make the law work."

"When I first read that in the newspaper, about the need to have passports ... I said, what's going on here. I thought there was a better way ... to expedite [the] legal flow of traffic and people ... if people have to have a passport, it's going to disrupt [the] honest flow of traffic. I think there's some flexibility in the law. And that's what we're checking out right now."