Canadian Border Agents Deny Controversial Figure Bill Ayers Entry Into Country

Bill Ayers, who became a controversial figure in the 2008 presidential campaign, has once again garnered some unwanted attention. Was this a matter of politics? After all, he’d been in Canada many times before.

By Marina Jimenez

Toronto Globe and Mail

An American academic and former 1960s radical accused by U.S. vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin of being a “terrorist” friend of Barack Obama’s has been denied entry into Canada to speak at an education conference.

William Ayers, a distinguished education professor from the University of Illinois at Chicago, said he was perplexed and disappointed when the Canada Border Services Agency declared him inadmissible at the Toronto City Centre Airport on Sunday evening.

He said he has travelled to Canada more than a dozen times in the past.

“It seems very arbitrary,” he said. “The border agent said I had a conviction for a felony from 1969. I have several arrests for misdemeanours, but not for felonies.”

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