The US has blocked access to Canadian libraries across the Canadian border, drawing criticism from the town of Quebec, where people have long enjoyed easy entry into the space.
Haskell Free Library and Opera House are located between Stansted, Quebec and the Derby Line, Vermont. It was purposefully built to span the frontier between the two countries, a symbol of cooperation and friendship between Canada and the United States.
The library entrance is on the Vermont side. Previously, Canadian visitors could enter using sidewalks and entrances on the American side, but the library’s website encouraged them to bring documents.
Inside, the lines of electrical tape distinguish between international boundaries. Approximately 60% of buildings that contain books are located in Canada. At the opera house on the second floor, audiences sit in the US while they are in Canada.
Under the new rules, Canadians must pass through formal border intersections before entering the library.
“This closure not only compromises Canadian visitors’ access to historic symbols of cooperation and harmony between the two countries, but also undermines the spirit of cross-border collaboration that defines this iconic location,” the town of Stansted said in a press release Thursday.
US Customs and Border Protection did not immediately respond to questions raised Friday.
In a statement to Reuters, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security said the US is responding to drug trafficking.
“Drug traffickers and smugglers were exploiting the fact that Canadians could use the US entrance without going through customs. We are ending such exploitation by criminals and protecting Americans,” the statement said.
The department did not provide evidence of drug trafficking or smuggling and did not respond immediately to requests for additional information.
In 2018, a Quebec named Alexis Vlachos pleaded guilty in a Vermont court at least twice to accusations involving a conspiracy to use a library to smuggle a handgun-filled backpack to Canada. He was later sentenced to 51 months in a US prison.
Relations between the US and Canada’s longtime allies have deteriorated since Donald Trump annexed Canada as his 51st state and imposed tariffs.
Libraries are relics from an era where Americans and Canadians can cross the border with nods and waves of border agents, residents say. The gifts of local families in the early 1900s served nearby Canadian and American communities.
A small group of American and Canadian protesters gathered outside Friday.
Vermont’s democratic senator Peter Welch called for a nasty report of the closure.
“Vermont loves Canada. This shared cultural institution celebrates our partnership between the two countries,” Welch said in X.
