VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – High traffic may have brought down Canada’s Citizenship and Immigration website after results of last night’s US election came in, but interest won’t translate into an influx of former Americans to our country. It’s actually quite difficult to become a Canadian.
We’ve heard the threats from American friends and celebrities. If Donald Trump becomes president, they’ll move to Canada. The federal government confirms temporarily went down due to a sudden increase in traffic.
Immigration consultants we’ve reached say they have had more interest from Americans. Matthew Sell with Canada Immigration Partners says the inquiries have been fairly superficial. “There was a fair amount of people from south of the border who were interested to know the steps in the process and to know how it would go if they wanted to make the move to Canada. But I would say that a lot of people might get to the consultation stage, but really in a sense, it’s just people who are just researching their options.”
Their dream of moving to Canada is often smashed early on when these potential new citizens realize how high standards are. Alex Khadempour with CICS Immigration Consulting says the vast majority who apply will be rejected. “We have such a strict immigration program… We usually just let them know here are the rules if you would like to fill out our assessment and see what your chances are. Go for it, but the majority of the people who contact us whether they’re from the States or from around the world are not qualified. We have people who have post-secondary education, Bachelor’s degrees, Master’s, even PhD’s who don’t end up being qualified for our immigration programs.”
Others say we could see more interest from well-educated immigrants from other countries who might’ve chosen the US first before Trump’s election.