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As an undocumented migrant living for so many years illegally in the United States, her application for a temporary Canadian visa would likely have been denied, Routley said.

“In the past, if someone had failed to comply with the regulations in another country, Canada was not willing to take a chance on them, to admit them and to ask them to follow our rules,” Routley said.

But over the last few years the Canadian government might have quietly revised its approach to some of these applications.

“There was a low-level rumour circulating that it’s possible to bring these people in both for study permits and job offers,” Routley said, which is why she moved forward with Sanchez’s application. She said she would not have taken the case in the past, given the low probability of success.

“I knew there was a chance that (Sanchez) could be refused, but there seemed to be a new willingness on the part of Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada to give preferential treatment to people who would otherwise do an irregular (border) entry, but were clearly trying to comply with the regulations and do it through legal pathways.”

In the past, if someone had failed to comply with the regulations in another country, Canada was not willing to take a chance on them

Routley had had success with another client, who also was living in the U.S. undocumented. He was able to use his unofficial work history in the U.S. to support his application for a temporary work visa in Canada. She said she has heard of other similar cases from 2017 from other lawyers.