GREAT ESCAPE

8 People Escape Border Patrol, Scramble Across into Canada

Reported to be refugees from Sudan.

Eight asylum-seekers fled U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents at the border with Canada on Friday, running straight to Canadian authorities on the other side who helped them scramble across. At least one of the asylum-seekers was carrying a Sudanese passport, according to Reuters. The incident reportedly occurred after U.S. customs agents began to question a man in the front seat of a taxi on the border in Champlain, New York. The U.S. authorities had already seized the passports of the taxi’s passengers when seven of the refugees made a run for it, climbing over mounds of snow as Canadian authorities helped them across. One man who stayed behind with the U.S. border control agents then told journalists at the scene that he and the others were from Sudan and had been working in the U.S. for two years, adding that “nobody cares about us.” He threw several large pieces of luggage into the snow along the border before running away from U.S. authorities and making his way onto Canadian territory, leaving one U.S. officer shouting at him from behind. The officer reportedly told the Canadian side that the man would have been detained for being in the U.S. illegally. The dramatic spectacle played out as President Donald Trump pushes authorities to crack down on illegal immigrants, with raids reported in various cities across the country in recent days. Reuters had earlier reported that nine asylum-seekers ran over the border.