A border wall in the north? Republicans want to argue.

Former President Donald J. Trump paved his way to the presidency in 2016 by calling for a “big, beautiful wall” along the United States' border with Mexico.

His rivals in the 2024 Republican primaries, which scrapped any advantage against him, looked north.

Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, has often told voters that it's not just the southern border that needs increased enforcement — “it's the northern border, too.”

“I think we're doing everything we can to keep people out,” she told reporters on Saturday when asked if her comments meant she supported building a wall. “If that's what it takes to keep them out, we'll build a wall and do whatever border patrol we need.”

Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, who ended his bid on Sunday and endorsed Mr Trump after battling Ms Haley for second place behind the former president, had recently proposed building a wall along some troubled areas on the US-Canada border . Vivek Ramaswamy, a tech entrepreneur, dropped out of the race last week, but not until you've gone up to Pittsburg, NH, a small town that sits just below the jagged 5,500-mile line dividing the United States and Canada, with a camera crew in tow. Him later drew criticism from Canadian journalists and experts when he proclaimed that the United States should build not just one wall, but two.

In Pittsburg, where residents like Beverly Martin, 79, and Chip Jones, 74, sat at the bar in an eclectic, barn-like restaurant on a recent snowy afternoon, the idea of ​​a border wall along New Hampshire's northernmost border, an isolated, forested area. was an abomination.

“Then you have this armed national army that can be used against you and your rights,” Mr. Jones, a Republican and retired fire chief from Massachusetts who winters in the city, said in an interview at Full Send Bar and Grill off Route 3. He paused for a moment and thought about it, “A border wall in Pittsburg—doesn't that just feel right?”

“That's not true,” replied Ms. Martin, who is also a Republican and has taught home economics for 18 years at the Pittsburg School down the road. “A lot of people in Pittsburg have relatives on both sides of the border, and people from the border towns in Canada come here to work.”

Mr Trump himself is not talking about that northern dividing line. But he has pledged to revive some of his most criticized immigration policies and has escalated his rhetoric, echoing Adolf Hitler's racial hatred when he said undocumented immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country.”

The country's southern border looms large in the psyche of the American electorate. The issue has contributed to President Biden's low approval ratings and threatened his foreign policy platform. It has also ensnared Congress and burdened mayors and local leaders struggling with overcrowded shelters and strained social services as more and more migrant families have been bused to cities across the country.

The now-shrunken Republican field united behind calls for an end to sanctuary city policies, advocating militarized action against drug cartels and mass deportations of millions of people who entered the United States under the Biden administration.

Republican warnings against terrorists, criminals and human traffickers have put a spotlight on places like the northern edge of New Hampshire, frustrating some of the people who live there. Unlike the largely Latino communities along the U.S.-Mexico border, they are not used to being such a prominent part of the national immigration debate.

Pittsburg, with a population of 830 people in the most recent Census Bureau report, is the largest township by area in New England and is known as a destination for snowmobile and ATV enthusiasts, hunters and fly fishermen. Longtime border residents may remember when the dividing line in the north was, as their counterparts far south like to say, just “a line in the sand” – or the snow. As in the border towns of states like Texas and Arizona before barriers were erected, it was not uncommon to see migrants walking or wading across the border, according to some Pittsburg residents.

And like those southern border towns, Pittsburg sits on land that was once hotly contested—first between the French and the British and the Abenakiwho used the wilderness of the north as their own hunting grounds, and later between the British and the Americans. The Treaty of Paris, signed in 1783 and ending the American Revolution, left the dividing line between what is now Quebec and New Hampshire unclear. Frustrated by the disagreement, the residents, caught between two nations, set up their own government, the Indian Stream Republic.

In October, Governor Chris Sununu of New Hampshire, who has supported Ms. Haley and toured the state with her in recent weeks, and other state officials announced a tenfold during patrols along the northern line. “The vast majority of border crossings come from the southern border, but the majority of border crossings of people on the terrorist watch list come from the northern border,” Mr. Sununu said in an interview.

The latest statistics from U.S. Customs and Border Protection show that last year's apprehensions of people illegally entering the sector, which includes New Hampshire, Vermont and parts of New York state, reached the highest level in at least 16 years. Between October 2022 and September 2023, agents intercepted 6,925 people crossing the border illegally, up from 1,065 in that period a year earlier.

Around the shops along Route 3, several clerks said they noticed a few people walking through who didn't look like locals or typical winter tourists. But the crossings elicited a shrug from many. “People always come through Canada,” said Carolyn Therrien, who called customers at Young's General Store. “I don't think the residents are really concerned.”

Inside the Pittsburg city government offices on Main Street, a long, wood-paneled building with a sloping roof that also houses the police department, Linda Clogston, the tax collector and treasurer of the local historical society, has been working with community leaders and officials on both sides of the street. border to erect markers commemorating the Indian Stream Republic and other historical sites. Across the street, the Pittsburg Historical Society Museum houses canoes, drag saws, pointy boots and other artifacts from the days when people flowed more easily through the frontier wilderness.

On a recent afternoon, she said Pittsburg residents seemed more concerned about rising real estate prices than about who was crossing the border.

In town, there is anecdotal evidence of the Trumpian wave that has hit other rural parts of New Hampshire and the United States. Pro-Trump flags and signs hang from the walls of some homes and protrude from outdoor yards. On the side of the road, a “Build the Wall” sign was taped to an evergreen tree. With the primaries approaching, immigration was cited by several voters as a top election concern — but they mostly pointed to the southern border.

Wayne Dorman, 71, a conservative Democrat and owner of a concrete company, said he was not opposed to the administration increasing resources along the northern border. But he claimed the harsh wilderness was enough to keep people out. “I mean, we're not Texas,” he said.

In New Hampshire, the immigration issue has gripped the Republican electorate ever since Patrick J. Buchanan, a conservative commentator, won an embarrassing primary victory in 1996. Mr. Trump won in 2016 with views on the issue that appealed to the party's base of white, working-class voters who felt alienated from the political system. A recent one Boston Globe/USA Today/Suffolk University Survey found that a majority of the state's Republican voters said it was the most important issue facing the country.

“It could be the biggest issue before us in this election,” rivaled only by the economy, said Chris Ager, the chairman of the Republican Party of New Hampshire.

But almost two-thirds of respondents were not concerned about the state's northern border with Canada.

Since polls showed Ms. Haley narrowing Trump's lead in New Hampshire, he and his allies have gone on the offensive — particularly by going after her record on immigration as governor. Ms. Haley, who was asked during a campaign stop in Peterborough, N.H., on Saturday whether she would support a wall along the Canadian border, was noncommittal.

“Whatever it takes to keep people out who are illegal, we will do it,” she said.

Nicholas Nehamas contributed reporting from Manchester, NH