EXCLUSIVE — Voters nationwide view the U.S.-Canada border as a neglected national security item, with a large swath willing to support increased federal spending to bolster America’s northern boundary, according to a new poll released Tuesday and first obtained by the Washington Examiner.

Seventy percent of U.S. voters polled between May 12 and 13 said they were concerned about the flow of illegal goods and drugs, as well as dangerous criminals, into the United States by way of the Canadian border, according to Building America’s Future, a political nonprofit group funded by Elon Musk that backs Republican candidates.

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Just 30% of voters said they were not worried about cross-border crime from the northern neighbor.

Respondents want to see the northern border treated with the same urgency as the U.S.-Mexico border, which the Trump administration prioritized upon taking office in January.

Approximately 62% of voters supported increased investments to improve homeland security and monitor the northern border, even if it costs U.S. taxpayers more money, while 38% opposed the idea.

The concerns come in the aftermath of Mark Carney’s election as prime minister, a brutal blow to the country’s Conservative Party. Nearly 2 in 3 respondents, 64%, said the U.S. could no longer count on Canada and should act on its own to enhance security at the shared boundary.

Nearly 4 in 5 voters, 79%, said that if more is not done to shore up the northern border, it will become even more of a major national security threat for illegal immigration, human trafficking, and money laundering.

Three-quarters of those polled said they would support a candidate who prioritizes federal spending on northern border security to stop the flow of fentanyl from entering the U.S.

In his first 100 days in office, President Donald Trump identified Canada as playing a significant role in the U.S. fentanyl epidemic that has killed a record-high number of people annually and imposed tariffs until fentanyl seizures dropped to next to nothing.

In the first seven months of fiscal 2025, 7,400 pounds of fentanyl were seized at the U.S.-Mexico border, the large majority of which occurred at ports of entry, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection statistics. Across the northern border, just 26 pounds of fentanyl were found in the same time frame.

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Canada’s inclusion in the executive order put border and drug experts at odds over how appropriate the action was, particularly given the unaddressed demand side of the epidemic.

The survey was conducted among 1,010 likely general voters across the country and had a margin of error of plus-or-minus 3 percentage points.