SHORT ANSWER: as
@Ponga and
@akbardxb assured you, and to some extent
@yyzstudent, there should be NO problem as along as you present documentation of identity (travel document used to travel to U.S.) and some other documentation connecting you to being Canadian. CoPR is just one among various documents that will facilitate positively identifying you as a Canadian, the IRCC client who was a PR and who was recently granted citizenship.
My sense is that there is a very good chance that presenting an Ontario drivers' license or Ontario government ID (or other official government photo ID from another Canadian province), in conjunction with the passport you are using, to the PIL officer (Primary Inspection Line officer), will get you waived through without delay, but even if referred to Secondary, this documentation should easily suffice to make the Secondary examination go smoothly without much of a delay.
If you are making this trip driving your own vehicle, registered in Ontario (or elsewhere in Canada), that should facilitate things even more so.
Longer Explanation With Additional Observations:
As a Canadian you are entitled to enter Canada EVEN if you do not have formal documentation showing authorization to enter Canada. (I will revisit this distinction below.) This is true whether you are a Canadian by virtue of PR status or citizenship status.
So, if you reach a Port-of-Entry into Canada and present sufficient documentation to positively identify who you are, sufficiently to connect you (the traveler applying for permission to enter Canada) to your client ID in GCMS, border officials will be able to readily verify who you are and your status as a Canadian. And that entitles you to enter Canada.
No particular documentation is necessary. That said, the more your documentation positively identifies you and connects you to residential status in Canada, the easier and faster the PoE screening will go.
Thus, as
@Ponga suggested, your CoPR is among documents that will facilitate your entry. Just a Canadian drivers' license in conjunction with your passport, however, or any other Canadian government ID (especially if it includes your photo), should make things go smoothly. Thus, as
@akbardxb suggests, "
be armed with whatever document that will show your connection to Canada," noting that is in addition to your primary travel document, presumably another country's passport (what was needed and used for entry into the U.S. for example).
If all the attendant circumstances are consistent (your photos, passport and other ID, look like you for example), depending on what documentation you hand to the PIL officer, there might not even be a referral to Secondary at all. If, for example, you are driving your own vehicle and you present an Ontario drivers' license with your passport, and explain that you very recently took the oath of citizenship, so your PR card was duly destroyed and you have not yet been able to obtain a Canadian passport (but will soon), the odds are probably very good the PIL officer waives you through.
Again, depending on what documentation you hand to the PIL officer, you may be referred for a Secondary examination which will focus on verifying your identity and Canadian status. Whether or not that takes much time, as
@akbardxb suggests is likely, will depend on how well your documents verify who YOU are.
UNLIKELY, but somewhat possible, emphasis on NOT likely . . . (a
just-in-case this might apply observation)
:
Of course there could be a snag in verifying your identity and status
if for some reason CBSA has concerns about when you were last IN Canada. Worst case scenario (absent crazy
stuff) is if completing the PoE examination is slowed while CBSA goes through the process of verifying your departure from Canada, which would involve access to U.S. entry records (which CBSA has, but how this is done in real time we don't know much . . . maybe it just involves keying a query into a particular database, taking almost no time, or perhaps there is a more formal protocol which could take time).
This is NOT much likely. And there should be no need to explain, why this could raise concern, but just for clarity, just in case, I will: obviously, if there is something about you or your information that suggests you were outside Canada at the time of the oath, that could trigger problems. Nonetheless, as long as you are positively identified, you will eventually be allowed entry into Canada . . . even if subject to some inquiry or procedure to follow-up on concerns related to the formalities of the oath, which will happen later.
Right of Entry versus Documentation Showing Authorization to Enter:
I mentioned this at the outset:
As a Canadian you are entitled to enter Canada EVEN if you do not have formal documentation showing authorization to enter Canada.
This is a distinction discussed in many topics here. Seems to surprise many. See for example a discussion posted just this past Monday here:
https://www.canadavisa.com/canada-immigration-discussion-board/threads/land-border-entry-without-citizenship-certificate-and-some-rants-about-discrepancies-between-government-agencies.800722/
Apparently
@harrysummer overlooked the scores of topics and posts here, in both the forum for citizenship and Permanent Residency Obligations, which have again and again not only referenced how the rules should work, but scores of anecdotal experiences which, like that related by
@harrysummer, illustrate this is how things really do work in practice.
So, to be clear . . .
Right of Entry . . . Canadians (both those who are PRs as well as those who are citizens) have a legal entitlement to enter Canada. So, when a Canadian arrives at a PoE (which constitutes making an application for entry into Canada), they must be allowed to enter Canada . . . all that is necessary is that they be sufficiently identified to verify their status as a Canadian.
In contrast, regarding
documents demonstrating "authorization to enter" Canada, there are regulations governing commercial carriers (like airlines) that require them to allow boarding only for those passengers presenting documents showing authorization to enter Canada, and the particular documentation that is acceptable is specifically listed. So to board an airline flight to Canada, for example, there are very specific documents that must be presented in order to board the flight, official documents that show authorization to enter Canada. For PRs, ONLY a PR card or a PR Travel Document is acceptable proof of "
authorization to enter" Canada; for Canadian citizens, ONLY a Canadian passport or a special Travel Document is acceptable proof of "
authorization to enter" Canada. (As almost always, there are exceptions; Canadians who are U.S. citizens, for example, are allowed to board flights to Canada if they present a U.S. passport.)
Note: a certificate of citizenship is NOT such documentation showing authorization to enter Canada. A certificate of citizenship is not enough to be allowed to board a flight to Canada. Only a Canadian passport or special Travel Document will work.
Technical Nuance As to Right of Entry:
Might as well fill in whole picture . . . The nature of the right of entry is a little different for Canadians with PR status versus those who are citizens. PRs have a statutory right of entry, or "
entitlement." In contrast, the mobility rights of citizens as protected by the Charter means it is a fundamental right for citizens.
This distinction has little import, if any at all, in regards to PoE examinations and permission to proceed into Canada. It can have a huge impact, however, in regards to certain aspects of laws and rules that govern PRs, most notably in regards to when PR status can be terminated or taken-away, and thus looms large in the enforcement scheme for the PR Residency Obligation. One of the more salient differences in impact is illustrated by the presumption that a PR abroad who does not have a valid status card (PR card) does not have valid PR status. So, for such a PR to obtain a Travel Document, in addition to proving they have PR status they must also prove they have met the PR RO.
