Avi Lewis holds the most expansive open-borders position of any current federal party leader in Canada. In a March 2026 interview with the immigrant-focused publication New Canadian Media, Lewis laid out an immigration platform that would reverse virtually every recent Canadian government effort to restore order at the border.
According to the National Post's reporting on the interview, Lewis proposed:
— Restoring annual immigration to its post-COVID benchmark of 500,000 per year, reversing Prime Minister Mark Carney's reductions ("We will reverse Prime Minister Mark Carney's cuts to immigration levels," Lewis said).
— Granting mass amnesty to between 500,000 and 1.1 million illegal migrants currently living in Canada, citing Spain's recent regularization program as a model: "We should follow countries like Spain. We need to be clear that newcomers should be safe and welcome here."
— Bringing in "many more" international students, after a federal cap was introduced in response to housing pressure.
— Ending the Safe Third Country Agreement with the United States — the bilateral treaty that prevents asylum-shopping at the Canada–U.S. border.
Of these, the demand to scrap the Safe Third Country Agreement is the most consequential. Without that treaty, anyone present in the United States could simply walk across the border at Roxham Road, or any other crossing, and lodge an asylum claim in Canada the moment they arrived.
Lewis's defense of the policy package is summed up in a single line: "Immigrants are part of the solution, not the cause of problems." Working Canadians who can no longer afford rent, a family doctor, or a daycare spot may disagree about whether the answer to a housing and services crisis is more demand on the system, or restored capacity within it.