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The chances Rob Ford will ever successfully visit the U.S. now that Customs knows he smokes crack are slim.
Toronto mayor Rob Ford is a huge sports fan. This has been well-established by now. (He was wearing a fifteen-year-old NFL tie when he admitted smoking crack for pete's sake.) His sports fandom, while probably his purest quality, brought a whole new problem to the forefront over the last two days.
Ford's favorite hockey team, the Toronto Maple Leafs, play in the National Hockey League's annual New Year's Day outdoor extravaganza, the Winter Classic, against the Detroit Red Wings, in front of approximately 107,000 people at Michigan's Big House football stadium, this year. Ford told the Toronto Sun he "definitely" wants to attend the game, which means crossing the Canada-U.S. border. Thing is, people who admit smoking crack usually run into trouble at Customs. So the question presented itself: will Ford be allowed into the U.S.?
Considering the story involved Rob Ford, the Toronto Maple Leafs and American validation, Canadian media did a full court press to get the answer. “Under the law, (immigration officers) are supposed to bar, or at least ask him, because they’re now aware of it,” Henry Chang, an immigration lawyer at Blaney McMurtry, explained to the Toronto Sun. “My advice to Rob Ford would be, ‘Don’t leave town.’ The short version of a long story is yes, he has a border problem,” Joel Sandaluk, a lawyer with the Toronto firm Mamann, Sandaluk & Kingwell LLP, told the Toronto Star.