Andy Semotiuk

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign. Welcome back everyone to the Tron podcast, the Red Missing Nothing. This show was designed specifically for guests like this. He's an author, an immigration lawyer that has the bar that he's able to use in Ontario, British Columbia. You are from California and human rights and immigration lawyer, Mr. Andy Semechuk. How are you, sir? [00:00:37] Speaker B: Hi, Rashad. Fantastic. How are you? [00:00:39] Speaker A: Good, good. I gotta tell you, like, your story is like a globe hopper, to be quite honest with you. I mean, not a lot of people. You have a very high level, specialized sort of skills in addition to you're an author. So please, just some background real quick to how you managed to accomplish things that you've done. [00:00:53] Speaker B: Okay, a little background. I was born and raised in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. But I spent half my life in Canada, the other half in the United States. [00:01:02] Speaker A: Okay. [00:01:03] Speaker B: As I was growing up. Edmonton's a far north city for people who don't know much about Edmonton. It's so cold there that like, you want to live somewhere else during the winter. Matter of fact, it was so cold when I was growing up that I remember, I think it was something like 53 degrees below 01 days. I was going to high school. [00:01:24] Speaker A: No. [00:01:25] Speaker B: Yeah. Somewhere like that. [00:01:26] Speaker A: Oh, my God. [00:01:26] Speaker B: And it was so cold that you could hear the SAP in the trees freezing. And if you, if you spit it would, it would freeze before it hit the ground. It was that cold. But still. Yeah, but school was still open back then. And even to this day you have to have a heater, a block heater in your car. [00:01:49] Speaker A: I've heard about that. Like places like Minnesota, Montana. Yeah. [00:01:52] Speaker B: And you plug it in at night so that when it, when you start up in the morning, it starts. Otherwise it's frozen. [00:01:59] Speaker A: You're done. [00:02:00] Speaker B: Frozen. You can't go anywhere. Yeah. So. So that's the kind of, you know, place that it was. But it was lovely for growing up. [00:02:06] Speaker A: Right, Right. [00:02:08] Speaker B: Kids, you know, like, you walk out of the house, you don't lock the door. [00:02:12] Speaker A: Right. [00:02:13] Speaker B: Lots of stuff to do. You know, hockey, you know, the bargaining, skiing during the winter, swimming, you know, tennis, basketball, whatever it was during the summer. [00:02:22] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:02:22] Speaker B: So I grew up there. [00:02:24] Speaker A: Beautiful. [00:02:24] Speaker B: But my mother had a sister, her name was Helen. She lived in Los Angeles with her husband. And my mother and my Aunt Helen came up with this idea that Andy needs to live sometime in the United States. So they sent me off to high school. [00:02:38] Speaker A: Oh, wow. [00:02:39] Speaker B: Los Angeles. Yeah. [00:02:40] Speaker A: Wow. [00:02:42] Speaker B: So I, you know, I went to school there. And that was actually every summer I was going back and forth to Los Angeles and Edmonton. [00:02:50] Speaker A: Huge culture shock, I'm sure. [00:02:52] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I lived near. I don't know if you know anything about Los Angeles. There's a place called Echo Park. [00:02:58] Speaker A: Okay. [00:02:58] Speaker B: Downtown. [00:02:59] Speaker A: I've been to San Diego, not Los Angeles, so. [00:03:02] Speaker B: And as a kid, I used to go swimming. Not swimming. No, no, no, not swimming. Fishing. [00:03:06] Speaker A: Okay. Okay. [00:03:07] Speaker B: In Echo Park. And catching fish, then letting them go. I. I remember one day I caught 13 fish with my friend. Wow. That's them go. [00:03:16] Speaker A: That's fantastic. [00:03:17] Speaker B: And he got more than I did. [00:03:19] Speaker A: Really? Really? [00:03:20] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:03:20] Speaker A: That's awesome. [00:03:21] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, so that's sort of life, early life. And it, as it turned out, that would be the pattern of my whole life. [00:03:29] Speaker A: Okay. [00:03:30] Speaker B: Half in Canada, half in the United States. So as you mentioned earlier, for example, I practiced law in Los Angeles for 10 years. And in New York, I was a. I'm a lawyer in New York. [00:03:43] Speaker A: That's amazing. [00:03:44] Speaker B: For five, you know, lived in and worked in New York for five years, but now I'm in Toronto, in Canada. I'm married. I have two children and two grandchildren. So that's the whole story right there in a nutshell. [00:03:56] Speaker A: In full disclosure, it's funny. You're an immigration lawyer. [00:03:59] Speaker B: Right. [00:03:59] Speaker A: Because my wife's from Canada. Right. My kids. [00:04:01] Speaker B: Right. [00:04:01] Speaker A: But I have Canadian citizens. [00:04:03] Speaker B: Right. [00:04:03] Speaker A: So it's like, this is really personal on a personal level too. Right. So, you know, we. We live in Michigan. So, like, you know, I was like all the things that you could be talking about, like, I went through and like, I'll tell you, that process stinks, man. Like, it really. Process because you think because of proximity that there's some sort of, like. I don't want to say easy, but like, you think, like there would be something that would be smooth. No, it's not. It's not, you know. [00:04:29] Speaker B: Well, you gotta. It is what it is. [00:04:31] Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. So I gotta. So one of the things I was fascinated about, and I know that we're obviously going to talk about your numerous accolades, your Human Rights act lawyer activities, but I was very fascinated by the book that you wrote about your great aunt. Right. I thought that was very, very, very interesting. Opera singer, Ukraine, and then during the war and everything like that, you know, some circumstances beyond her control. And I thought that was beautiful that you wrote that. So can we talk about that? [00:04:54] Speaker B: Yeah. Thank you for doing this, Rashad. I really appreciate this. [00:04:58] Speaker A: Of course, of course. [00:05:00] Speaker B: Now it's a book. It's called Solomia. Here, I got a copy here to show you. [00:05:04] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:05:05] Speaker B: Looks like this. [00:05:05] Speaker A: I love that cover, by the way. [00:05:08] Speaker B: So now she was the greatest soprano in the world in the golden age of opera in the first decade of the 1900s. [00:05:18] Speaker A: Wow. [00:05:18] Speaker B: A lot of people. I imagine if you start talking about an opera star and then there's most people off. [00:05:25] Speaker A: Yeah, right. You know, it's a select group of people that want to talk about their topic. You know what I mean? [00:05:34] Speaker B: However. However. And I'm in that group. If, before I wrote this book, if you start talking to me about opera, I'd go, well, this is not for me. I have some things to do outside. But. But, But. But her story was very inspirational, and it's a rags to riches story. She rose from obscurity to international fame and stardom, being the best of the best. Now, for those who are in opera, I'll just mention this. Usually, like today, if you ask them, like, who was a big female star, they would say, Maria Callas was a big star. [00:06:10] Speaker A: Right. [00:06:11] Speaker B: She married Onassis. Yeah, she was in that category, you know. [00:06:14] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. It was Greek. Greek, right. Ship making. Yeah. Shipbuilding. [00:06:19] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. She. She was in there with him. But before her, there was Solomia. Her last name was Krushelnycka. Hard name to pronounce. [00:06:29] Speaker A: I was letting you do that because when I saw it, I was like, I got to be respectful. I can't even break that down. [00:06:34] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, that's fine. Yeah, that's fine. And in the male world, Varroti was a guy that many people in opera knew male. [00:06:43] Speaker A: Yes. [00:06:44] Speaker B: Before him, there was a guy named Caruso. [00:06:49] Speaker A: Okay. [00:06:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Caruso was the big star. And my aunt. Great aunt. So Lumia mentored Caruso. [00:06:58] Speaker A: Wow. [00:06:58] Speaker B: Yeah, she was. I like him. Anyway, the. Like, I'll just summarize in a few words, right. What the. Why should send. Why should you or anybody read this book? Okay, I'll give you two reasons. One, because if you want to make it in your field, no matter what the field is, if you want to be the best of the best, this is a good way to learn how to be the best of the best. She spoke eight languages. She knew over 50 operas by heart, the lyrics and the music by heart. In teaching kids about opera, she could phase into any area of any opera right on the spot and sing it out for them. As a teacher, she traveled all over the world, including all of Europe, North Africa, South America. North America. She was in. Are you close to Detroit? [00:07:49] Speaker A: Yes. Yes. [00:07:51] Speaker B: She was in Detroit in 1928. [00:07:53] Speaker A: Okay. [00:07:54] Speaker B: She was in New York. She was In Chicago. She was in Philadelphia. She was in Montreal. She was in Winnipeg performing beautiful in 28. That's the roaring piece. [00:08:04] Speaker A: Yes, it is. [00:08:05] Speaker B: You know, like, just before the big collapse, right? [00:08:08] Speaker A: Goodness, yes. [00:08:09] Speaker B: Duke Ellington, you know, was big in jazz back then, right? [00:08:13] Speaker A: Of course, of course. [00:08:13] Speaker B: Harlem. [00:08:14] Speaker A: Yes. [00:08:14] Speaker B: That was like, now. She loved creative music. That was a big deal for her, I'm sure. She was like. Like in paradise for her kind of thing. [00:08:22] Speaker A: And this is before Chat GTP for people who will be hearing this, right? This is like, this. You can't. This is not like eight languages and doing an opera on the spot. There's no. This is the real raw talent involved with something like this. [00:08:34] Speaker B: You know, she was a athlete. She had to be an athlete. She was in perfect shape because she couldn't eat any desserts. Like, her whole life was about, well, you have a dessert, but I can't. I'll just have a tea. Because I got to keep, you know, like, I got to be good looking on stage. Of course, that's part of the story, but here's another part. I'll give it to you in a quick summary. She helped Puccini rescue the opera Madame Butterfly from a disaster at La Scala, which was the premier opera house in the world back at the time in 1904. He collapsed with that opera, and she brought it back to life with him working with him in Brescia in a Teatro Grande in Brescia, not far from Milan, in The same year, 1904, after working many months with him. [00:09:23] Speaker A: Okay. [00:09:24] Speaker B: Playing the lead role, which was a Japanese girl named Chiyo. Chiyo san. She was a geisha girl. [00:09:30] Speaker A: Okay, Wow. [00:09:31] Speaker B: A little bit about the opera. The story of the opera. Puccini had already reached world fame, as had she. 1904, and he, Puccini, the composer, traveled to London looking for a new opera to write. And he went to a play about this geisha girl, Chi. Chiyo san. And it was called Madame Butterfly. [00:09:52] Speaker A: Okay. [00:09:53] Speaker B: And it was a story about an American naval officer that came to Japan back, I think it was in the 1500s when they were opening up Japan because it was a closed society, right? Americans, Americans came in, they opened up Japan, and they met Chi. Chiyo san and this guy named Pinkerton, this naval officer, and they had a romantic relationship and a kind of a form of marriage in Japan that made it possible for them to live together for a while. [00:10:21] Speaker A: Oh, wow. [00:10:22] Speaker B: And then he declared, you know what? I'm going back to America. I'm being called back to America. I'm Sorry, but I'm going to have to go. And she said, well, what about this relationship? He said, well, I'll come back. So he left, not knowing that she was pregnant with his child. And she gave birth to a little boy, and she started raising him and waited for Pinkerton to come back. This is what the story of the opera is all about. And he comes back many years later, like four or five years later, a little boy is there with her. [00:10:55] Speaker A: Okay. [00:10:56] Speaker B: And when he comes back, the parents, Pinkerton and Chiu. Chiu's son, have a crisis. Where's this boy going to grow up with this geisha girl in Japan? Now, a geisha girl is someone who's kind of like a entertainer of men. [00:11:10] Speaker A: Right, right, right. Yeah. I've seen, you know, I've googled it, you know, before, if I watch movies and things. [00:11:15] Speaker B: Okay. Or is the little boy going to go back to America with her, his father? And they decide he should go to America. And before he leaves, little boy. There's a scene in the opera where she takes Chihu Qiu's son, who's played by my great aunt in restoring the opera, takes the boy off to the side, and she says to the boy, look at this face. It is the face of your mother. Remember it. You will never see it again. [00:11:46] Speaker A: Oh, my. [00:11:46] Speaker B: And the boy leaves with the father and she commits suicide. And that's where the opera died finishes. Yeah. [00:11:53] Speaker A: Wow. [00:11:54] Speaker B: It's a. It's a powerful opera. [00:11:56] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:57] Speaker B: And if you have an interest, you should go see the opera. It's, it's. It's really a great opera. It's one of the. Sorry. It's one of the most beloved operas to this day. As a matter of fact, I think it was only 120 years ago. We, we marked. I think last year we marked the 120th anniversary of. Of the opera. [00:12:16] Speaker A: That sounds beautiful. [00:12:18] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:12:19] Speaker A: So. [00:12:20] Speaker B: So anyway, to. To restore the opera, she wore a kimono Japanese outfit for something like two, three months to get into the role, of course, because she was a great actor. [00:12:31] Speaker A: Right. [00:12:32] Speaker B: And now she was in her thes, and she was playing a teenager in this. In this opera. And when it failed in La Scala, the premier place for opera in the world, when he first tried it, the audience booed it down, they whistled, and they managed to get through the opera. But by the time they finished the opera the next day in the headlines in the papers were, puccini lays a Bomb. You know, it's a Catastrophe at La Scala, etc. [00:13:02] Speaker A: Right. [00:13:02] Speaker B: And he was crestfallen but he loved the opera, you know, so he said, you know, he thought, I don't know, what the heck? What should I do? So he had a friend named Arturo Toscanini, who was a great composer. Not composer, conductor. And this guy Toscanini ended up being. He moved later, much later, to New York and became the NBC Philharmonic. Philharmonic orchestra leader. [00:13:28] Speaker A: Wow. [00:13:28] Speaker B: In New York. Yeah. But back then, 1904, he was a conductor. So Puccini went to me, says, arturo, I don't know what to do. This opera is a disaster. But I. I love it. I want to rescue it. And he said, toscanini said to Puccini, there's only one woman who can help you rescue this opera. It's Solomia Krushenitzka. Go see her, get her to play the lead role, and you'll have a success. That's what he did. [00:13:55] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:13:56] Speaker B: And they rescued the opera together. [00:13:58] Speaker A: That's beautiful. That's wonderful. You know, that's absolutely a wonderful story. You know, and so when I. When I saw that, you know, I'm reading the details of it, and then at the bottom, it was like, great, you know, great aunt. I'm like, oh, wow. You know, because I was wondering, you know, why is he writing about this specific person? And I was like. And then all of a sudden, that's when it dawned on me about your lineage of that. And, you know, it's crazy. And also for people who didn't know, you know, when Japan was closed off, the US used, you know, gunboat diplomacy to open them up in, like, 53, 54, 55. Right. Because obviously they wanted trade route because the Portuguese were there before, you know, with Portuguese. Portuguese missionaries. So that's. That's such a great story. Just to pivot a bit. And I really appreciate the story of your aunt. That should be a movie, by the way. It really should. How did you get. How does immigration work? Obviously, it's a very complicated process. Your human rights activities. And then you were also a UN speaker, if I'm. If I'm not mistaken, as well, too. [00:14:50] Speaker B: You hadn't correspond. [00:14:52] Speaker A: Correspondent. Excuse me, I apologize. Let's dive into that, please. [00:14:55] Speaker B: Well, the three themes dominated my life. The first theme was immigrant experience. Not me. I'm not an immigrant. Well, other than going back and forth across the border to the US and you've already pointed out what kind of an experience that is. [00:15:10] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. [00:15:12] Speaker B: So that experience. But my family, like my mother, came after World War II to Canada. My father came before World War II to Canada. That shaped my interest in immigration and immigration law. A second theme is communication. I grew up. My mother was deaf. She didn't hear well. Yeah, she lost most of her hearing. She had 10% hearing in her right ear, I believe. But other than that, she had scarlet fever and then meningitis, and that just knocked it all out. So communication was very important subject in our house. You know, how do we communicate? And I had to learn how to, you know, say things clearly, concisely, concretely, you know, meaningfully, so that she could. And she read lips, so a lot of people didn't know she was, you know, deaf because she could. [00:16:01] Speaker A: She just flowed right through it. [00:16:02] Speaker B: Yeah. Read what. Whatever the guy was saying, she could pick it up. But, you know, that was a matter that was important in her life. And it became important for me, both for verbal and, you know, presentation, public speaking kind of things. And if you see over my shoulder up here, there's a plaque up there, that's a Toastmasters plaque. I belong to Toastmasters. [00:16:24] Speaker A: I saw that. I saw that. And you were also the. Let me. Don't. Let me. Don't get this wrong. You were also the administration, the administrator. [00:16:30] Speaker B: Yeah, I was an administrator. Yeah. [00:16:32] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:16:32] Speaker B: For. For the Toastmaster organization up here in Toronto. I belonged to Toastmasters for 35 years. [00:16:38] Speaker A: That's amazing. [00:16:38] Speaker B: And every week I went to a club meeting for an hour where we would listen to someone present and then give feedback. Say, like, you know, it's very good, but you don't look at your audience or, you know, too many. Or, you know, like I'm saying right. [00:16:53] Speaker A: Now, well, you know, even when I do this show and then, you know, I. I do my editing, I'm like, I didn't realize how many times I said, you know, and. And, yeah, all the things that you don't even think you do. And when you speak, until you hear yourselves talk, you know, it's. It's a very humbling experience to realize, for all intents and purposes, you know, it is. How hard it truly actually is. [00:17:11] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:17:12] Speaker A: You know, so. [00:17:13] Speaker B: So I learned that. And then the third theme was law. And law came about because I, you know, as I was growing up, I saw these problems. Ukraine, you mentioned already, there's a war on right now. And there was before the Soviet Union, there were dissidents. And I got involved in defending people who were, you know. Dissidents. [00:17:31] Speaker A: Yes. [00:17:33] Speaker B: You know, and I admired people like Nelson Mandela and, you know, Dr. Martin Luther King. I met Coretta King, Andrew Young. Yeah. Yeah. [00:17:43] Speaker A: Amazing. That's Amazing. [00:17:45] Speaker B: And I spent a half hour with them talking and. [00:17:50] Speaker A: Precious time. Yeah, precious time. [00:17:52] Speaker B: It was not so much what they said, it was the mere fact that I was able to, of course, spend time in their presence that made such a difference for me. So these were the three themes that went through my life that shaped, you know, why I wrote these books and how I ended up at the UN in New York. See, I thought, this is a quick story. I thought given my, you know, personal situation with my mother and so on, I should learn how to be a great presenter. Oral presentation, public speaking. So I went to Toastmasters. As I mentioned, 35 years. But the world didn't want me to be a speaker. The world wanted me to write. [00:18:30] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:18:31] Speaker B: Much to my chagrin, because when I was in university, I took English 101 and I barely, barely passed because the professor took pity on me and gave me a 50%. Just terrible writer. Terrible. And, and, you know, so I wrote some articles in student newspapers and things like this. And over time, little by little, I became better and better to the point where I ultimately ended up in New York at the UN as a UN correspondent. And I wrote for a newspaper chain called Seldom News Services, which was a English language newspaper chain across Canada. [00:19:09] Speaker A: Beautiful. That's wonderful. [00:19:11] Speaker B: And some other publications that I was involved with. So that's how I got there. [00:19:15] Speaker A: Right. And so obviously one of the things that. When you're an immigration lawyer, and that's wonderful with your background, I'm glad we got some clarity on that because that's. I'm sure there's a lot of information also when it comes to what you did in the UN and displacements of people. So when people, when you're doing your work as an immigration lawyer, like whether somebody's trying to immigrate to the US Or Canada, or coming in for a familial family. Excuse me. Or students. What are the different levels that people have to understand about that process when they're trying to move from locations to the US Or Canada? [00:19:45] Speaker B: Okay, well, a good primer is just to realize what kind of people there are in a country. So if you're born in the country or, you know, generally you're a. Let's take the U.S. for example. You. You are a U.S. citizen by birth, or you can become naturalized and become a citizen because you went through the immigrant process and became a citizen. [00:20:08] Speaker A: Correct. [00:20:08] Speaker B: So that's the most solid level of existence in the United States. There are permanent residents, people who are not citizens but who came to the United States and got permission to stay permanently, such as by sponsorship from a family member, a husband sponsoring a wife, or through work or through education or whatever. But they have permanent resident status. Then there are what are called non immigrants who are in the United States, for example, students who are studying at universities or visitors who are there for a brief period of time. [00:20:45] Speaker A: Seasonal workers. [00:20:46] Speaker B: Yes, seasonal workers, Temporary workers. And then there are two other categories. One are asylum seekers, like refugees who come and are fleeing persecution abroad and trying to gain permission to stay in the United States. And then there are what they're referred to as undocumented immigrants. That is to say, immigrants who are not legally present in the United States either because they snuck in going across the border or because their temporary status expired and they did not renew it and they did not leave after or when they were supposed to. [00:21:24] Speaker A: That is correct. That is correct. [00:21:25] Speaker B: Yeah. So that's the sort of playing field that you're in generally. I mean, it's a big topic. But just to share a few things, obviously you want to get in legally without question, if you can, right? Without question, yeah. And so most people either apply. There are five ways. Let's deal it with it this way. There are five ways to immigrate to the United States or indeed to Canada or many other places. So let's cover the five ways. Number one is you can marry your way in or have a family member sponsor you, brother, sister, you know, father, mother. Right. Or marry someone who sponsors you. That's a way in to get a green card, permanent residence. Second way in is you can study your way in. You go to college, let's say you finish college, you get a graduate work permit after college for one year. It's called optional practical training. And then from there you have to transition into temporary worker, usually H1B. And then from there to green card. [00:22:29] Speaker A: Right. [00:22:29] Speaker B: It's a way in. [00:22:30] Speaker A: Right. [00:22:30] Speaker B: A third way is to invest your way in. For example, there's a program called the EB5 Investor Immigrant Program, where if someone has $800,000, that they can invest in a project for five years and get their money back after five years, they can get permanent residence, provided that money employs at least 10 people, 10Americans, as part of the deal. So that's another way you can come in. Another way is you can claim asylum, as I mentioned before. Let's say you're from a country that's sinking or in bad straits, such as a war in Ukraine, for example, and you're escaping. [00:23:10] Speaker A: Right. [00:23:10] Speaker B: Or Gaza or wherever. So you're claiming asylum that is to say you have a well founded fear of persecution based on one of the traditional grounds such as political race, religion and the other grounds that are the. [00:23:24] Speaker A: Environment that's taking place in the respective location. [00:23:27] Speaker B: Yes, yes. Yeah. And then finally, what's the final one? Invest. I'm missing one, but there's one. [00:23:33] Speaker A: I think, I think I thought you said five. But you know, I know that there's level, levels of pillars of it and you know, I think the most interesting. [00:23:40] Speaker B: Part about it is work your way in. [00:23:42] Speaker A: Okay, sorry, got it. [00:23:43] Speaker B: Yeah. You get a job. Let's say for example, you're an engineer and you can get a job offer. Say you're a Canadian, you're an engineer, you can come in under the Free Trade Agreement and start work and then over time get permanent residence. [00:23:56] Speaker A: You know, one of the things I've always been fascinated about and I've never had a chance to go to Europe, but I was always curious how the US and Canada, because the proximity never had some sort of reciprocal, easier way to go about because of the trade involved, the proximity that it's still a complicated process if somebody wants to either A work B, go to school. I mean not so much school because a lot of the education is very similar. But I always thought that there would have been some sort of easier, streamlined process if only just because of natural proximity. I mean 80% of Canada lives within 100 miles. [00:24:27] Speaker B: You and my friend have just hit on what's coming in the future, I think. Yeah, between Canada and the U.S. right. Trump has said we're going to get, you know, 51st state that's not going to go anywhere. But what could be possible is exactly what you're describing. An agreement between Canada and the US for a free trade zone between the two countries, like the Schengen Zone in Europe where people can travel, work, live, study whatever it is throughout the whole area without going through borders and all that. [00:25:02] Speaker A: It just, you know, because anybody who's like when I went through Vancouver, right. And you don't even trust a bridge to like to, from Washington to Vancouver. It's a park. It's a park. You go through it. I was like, it was like houses, like it literally looked like a suburb. And you're just, just right. And you're just like, you kidding me? You know, like this is, this is, this is so, it seems so integrated that something like that would make sense. Right? Some places share fire department now funny. [00:25:26] Speaker B: You should say that. I wrote a Forbes article about this, but it wasn't very popular. Because at the time, Trump was, you know, threatening to come into Canada and take it over. So the readership was very low. But it's out there. And what I suggested is a perimeter, a security perimeter around North America, that is to say Canada and the U.S. so if someone's coming into that area, you have to go through customs and, you know, security check and everything like that. But once you're in the area, you can freely move around. That's doable. But it depends in large measure on what's going to happen in the US with the politics in the US of course. [00:26:07] Speaker A: Of course. [00:26:08] Speaker B: If they're, if they're bent on destroying the country and become. Forgive me. [00:26:14] Speaker A: No, no. That's why this is your forum, this is your level of expertise. I don't like, way I look at it, is you're the expert in the topic. I don't tell people what to say. I just don't do debate shows like, you know what I mean? So. But this is your. This is for your chance. Yeah. [00:26:26] Speaker B: So my sincere hope is that we can re. Establish the good friendship we've had and as two countries, that we not be threatening each other or economically undermining each other, trying to work together like friends. [00:26:41] Speaker A: Of course. Of course. [00:26:42] Speaker B: And, and if we can return to that kind of a relationship and that the hostility that that has been through tariffs and threats of invasion like the Greenland and Canada and stuff like that, if that is all taken away and if there's some kind of return to normalcy, then this, this, I think, could work. Yeah, it would be great for everybody. [00:27:03] Speaker A: You know, and it's just as many times as I traveled across, you know, because the proximity from Detroit to Windsor and, you know, Ontario itself, it just, it always kind of blew my mind that, you know, I get, I do get the bigger picture. It's just my opinion. But I said, hey, this would. Economically, you go to, you know, you go to Detroit hospitals, a lot of the nurses are from Windsor. You know, that's true. It's just a fact, you know, it's just. Yeah, it is true for unadulterated fact, you know. You know, as far as the process is concerned, the timing is concerned, the cost is concerned, it can be very astronomical and cost prohibitive for a lot of people. And so, yes, anybody who's. That's a whole nother section unto itself when it comes to the immigration process. So where can people find. [00:27:43] Speaker B: Let me just throw this. [00:27:44] Speaker A: Go ahead. [00:27:44] Speaker B: Before we go, let me just say this. A lot of people don't know, like, if you have a sore tooth, you know, you go to a dentist. If you got a sore foot, you know, go to a doctor, Right. If you need a repair of your toilet, you phone the plumber. [00:27:58] Speaker A: Right. [00:27:58] Speaker B: A lot of people don't know that immigration lawyers or attorneys are who handle immigration matters, Right? So if you need an immigration matter, you phone an immigration attorney. [00:28:08] Speaker A: Of course. Just of course. [00:28:09] Speaker B: An extra insight, no doubt. [00:28:11] Speaker A: You know, this you got. You guys have a specialized set of skills. And let me tell you, that paperwork was like, this thick, man. It was horrible. You know, and then when my kids got their Canadian citizenship certificates, you know, they're asking for stuff from grandparents, right? And you're just like, really? But it is what it is, you know? And so where can. People like you don't need me to find you. People don't need me to find you because your accolades speak for themselves. People who are going to listen to this, where can they find you? [00:28:35] Speaker B: Okay. I work for Pace law firm. P A C E law firm. So pacelawfirm.com look for Andy. I'm there. [00:28:42] Speaker A: Fantastic. And you know, you're author of four books. Your accomplishments speak for themselves. Honestly, I don't think I did justice to the time that we have with all your accomplishments. It's hard to compartmentalize all you do in just this short amount of time. So I want to thank you and this what the Tron podcast all about, to find those global travelers, thinkers, doers, creators, and people like yourself. And I'm very honored to have carved out a moment of your time. [00:29:03] Speaker B: Thanks for having me. [00:29:04] Speaker A: Absolutely, sir. You have a wonderful day. [00:29:06] Speaker B: You, too. Take care, Rasha. [00:29:20] Speaker A: It.