One night while stationed in Hope, B.C., RCMP Const. Jack Van Steensel strapped himself to the boom of a large mobile crane and had it swing him over the raging Coquihalla River to rescue a freezing driver who had plunged his car into the tributary of the mighty Fraser.
His stressful job fostered eager appreciation of vacations.
In 2007, Jack and his wife, Rose, bought a motorhome, a 38-foot Newmar Dutch Star, drove it south across the border from Abbotsford, B.C., into Sumas, Wash.
“Everywhere we looked, we saw the American flag on so many homes,” said Rose. “The patriotism was so evident.”
They loved that trip and most years since, they’ve packed that motorhome, made room for Sangria, their rescue dog, and headed south from their home in Knutsford, on the outskirts of Kamloops. Their trips stretched longer and further, especially after Jack retired from the force.
“We’ve hit every state — other than Hawaii. We couldn’t pump those tires up enough to get to Hawaii,” Rose said. “We loved it. Wherever we went, we loved it. I loved South Dakota. It was so different. Maine was so beautiful in the fall, like nothing I’d ever seen in my life. We made friends in Florida, California, Washington State, Oregon and Arizona.”
They put 110,000 kilometres on their Dutch Star.
“We have such wonderful memories,” Rose said. “We are glad we have them, as we are not sure if we will return.”
Like many Canadians, Jack and Rose are falling out of love with America.
There’ve been rocky months recently in the long relationship between Canada and the United States, ever since the election of U.S. President Donald Trump. Even before his inauguration in January, Trump showed an unsettling attitude toward his country’s next-door neighbour and largest trading partner.
Trump’s insulting and belittling
musings
, threats of punishing economic warfare to push annexation, and aggressive tariffs on Canada’s goods are causing anger, uncertainty and fear. Anyone who has watched a relationship sour knows those emotions are a recipe for shattered trust.
Economic integration, trading partnerships, treaties and multilateral agreements all take time to untangle, but love can evaporate with an overnight tweet.
If Canadian feelings for America aren’t always love, exactly, there has been a broad affinity for the United States; for some, it’s been admiration, but for most there has at least been a sense of serenity that came from generations of close social and cultural integration.
That cosiness is suddenly endangered.
Interviews with people across Canada show that different folks are responding in different ways to the changes Trump brings, and they have different reasons for it, too, but empirical and anecdotal evidence suggest there is an unsubtle and unsettling trend: A cross-border social unravelling is underway as connections wilt and wither; a decoupling, in the modern language of relationship therapists.
The signs of a split are all around us, in politics, business, shopping, travel, sports, and in endless social niceties and interactions that were once routine.
Canadian flags have become so popular lately it reminded Jack and Rose Van Steensel of their first impressions of America when driving through the United States. Although Rose throws in an “elbows up” joke, they aren’t the most strident soldiers in this war. She said they don’t want their distaste for Trump’s policies to make them anti-American. She deplores when Canadian sports fans boo the U.S. national anthem.
“That is so not Canadian,” Rose said. “You’re booing the wrong thing if you’re booing the national anthem. If Trump walked out there, OK, boo him. He’s the one that’s doing this. But don’t boo the whole United States of America. Not fair, not fair.”
Americans, she said, are mostly wonderful.
“From our first trip into the States, we were treated kindly and learned to really respect the American people,” Rose said. “I don’t want to see those people lose their jobs. They didn’t all vote for him and lots of the ones that did are now regretting it.”
When shopping, she looks for products made in Canada but if she needs romaine lettuce and the only romaine is from the U.S., well, she’ll still put it in her cart.
Her travel plans are different. Trump’s actions are “a real slap in the face,” she said, but the major reason they don’t want to motor south is mainly because she’s no longer sure it’s safe.
“We’re scared to go down,” she said.
She doesn’t like what she’s heard of border scrutiny and new rules for the treatment of Canadian travellers, including fingerprinting. She’s afraid someone might see their B.C. licence plate and lash out. There is, she said, “fear of retribution because the MAGA people have heard nothing but negative things about Canada from Trump.
“It brings tears to my eyes when I think that the amazing country I loved coming to might no longer be safe.”
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Allan MacEachern has spent his life in St. Stephen, a town on the banks of the St. Croix River that separates New Brunswick from Maine.
“I guess my arm’s not that good anymore, but I could almost throw a rock and hit the American soil from the shoreline. It’s literally right there. You could holler across,” he said. MacEachern was elected to St. Stephen’s town council in 2012, as mayor in 2016, and has been re-elected twice more since.
For as long as he remembers, for much longer, in fact, his town and the U.S. town across the water, Calais, Maine, have been like one community. They share a fire service, businesses, and genetics and have for generations.
When COVID-19 shut the border, people in both towns headed to the riverfront and stood on the shoreline waving to friends and family in the other town. And when a man from St. Stephen married a woman from Calais, lockdown meant most of the bride’s family couldn’t cross over for it, so MacEachern helped arrange their ceremony at the tip of the town’s wharf, with American guests watching from the shore of Calais, and from boats bobbing in the river.
Despite a population of about 8,500 in St. Stephen and 3,000 in Calais, there are three bridges with international border crossings connecting them. During the War of 1812, British soldiers delivered gunpowder to St. Stephen so residents could protect their town from the Americans across the river. The town instead gave the barrel of gunpowder to Calais to use in their Fourth of July celebration fireworks. Now that’s trust. Calais later replaced the gunpowder, and that barrel still sits in the St. Stephen mayor’s office, MacEachern said.
Tightening border controls after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States made it harder for people to flow back and forth, and the pandemic caused further division, but they kept their strong bonds. Now there is a new barrier: Donald Trump.
“It’s challenging because us in border communities are looking at our neighbours right in the eyes,” MacEachern said of the border tension.
Across the St. Croix River, which narrows to 40 metres in spots, MacEachern’s American counterpart is Marcia Rogers. She has lived in Calais for 35 years. For 11 of them, she sat on town council and, since November, has been mayor.
“It’s French,” Rogers said of her town’s name, “but it’s not pronounced that way here. We pronounce it callous.”
Border communities are different than other towns.
“Living on a border, people that have lived here for generations have family on both sides. It’s generations of families that have crossed the borders, so we’re not just talking about Americans and Canadians, we are family and friends that go back and forth,” Rogers said.
She owns horses and buys her hay in Canada. One of her horses is stabled in Canada. And across the river lies other enticements: “In St. Stephen, they have a Kentucky Fried Chicken and a Burger King that we do not have over here,” she said.
Rogers is worried. As soon as Trump started taunting Canada and threatening tariffs, Canadians began to stay away.
“We have serious concerns. Some of our businesses have taken a serious setback in revenues,” Rogers said. “Our general feed store, which also is the packaging hub for Canada, their revenues are down 50 per cent. The local IGA, the food stores, are down across the board. And you know, the tariffs hadn’t even gone into effect when those things started. It’s because our Canadian friends — rightly so — decided not to come across the border. I don’t think they want to be a 51st state.”
She keeps hoping it blows over, but it’s only getting worse. Friendships are fraying.
“I’ve seen it both ways, both Americans saying, ‘Too bad for the Canadians, you’re going to start paying instead of, you know, screwing us over,’ and Canadians saying, ‘We’re not coming over there if you think we’ll be the 51st state.’ But there’s also people that speak up and say, ‘Hey, remember that we’ve all been here for each other for years and years, for generations.’
“When this first started, I was nervous about going across the border,” Rogers said. “I was a little nervous about going over because I had an American licence plate.” When she crossed, she had no problems.
“What we keep reminding each other is, it’s not coming from our communities, it’s not our decision, it’s way above our pay grade. Don’t let one man divide us,” Rogers said of Trump.
MacEachern is full of sympathy for residents of Calais. He doesn’t want his neighbours to suffer.
“We’ve got businesses in Calais putting out ads saying, ‘We miss you, Canadians, we love you, please come back,’ and they’re even offering Canadian money at par at some of the restaurants. And that hurts to see. We went through that in COVID and it’s very upsetting,” he said.
MacEachern and Rogers encourage their communities to keep their cross-border bonds from unravelling further, but things are beyond their control.
Schools and sports teams around St. Stephen recently cut off travel to the United States, including for long-established cross-border leagues and tournaments. It was not done in protest: “Some of our school students are immigrants and they definitely don’t want to take a chance crossing the border right now, because they don’t know how that will be handled,” said MacEachern.
The border boycott hurts on both sides of the river. This is the gateway between Atlantic Canada and the United States. Most of the traffic comes from farther away and those travellers are steering clear of the border, which means they’re staying away from both towns.
“It’s also hurting St. Stephen because we rely on people and product crossing our border. I’m really concerned about tourist season coming. What’s that going to look like?”
Each summer for more than 50 years, the two towns have co-hosted the International Homecoming Festival, a summer festival celebrating their ties. A highlight is a parade that crosses the border. The towns are still planning to hold the August festival, this time with an eye to mending obvious fractures. A poster for the event says: “We are family … we hug it out.”
“We’ve been friends and allies for years and years and years — and they’ve been hurtful words that have been said and that’s pretty tough for Canadians to hear — but what we keep reminding each other is it’s not coming from our communities,” MacEachern said. “But that doesn’t make it easier. They’re still pretty angry.”
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Brian Rathbun is new to Canada. As an international relations and political science professor, he arrived in July from the University of Southern California to teach at the University of Toronto.
In his classrooms in the United States each year, he used the same example to help him explain the role of trust in diplomacy and the global realm.
“The example I always used when teaching this to our undergrads is the Canadian-U.S. relationship. It takes a tremendous amount of trust to have the longest undefended land border in the world,” Rathbun said.
“Why is it undefended? Because they entirely trust the United States and its motivations. They think that the United States, even if it were to have certain designs on things that Canada has, would not make use of that power, and that’s the assumption that you and I grew up with, and has probably existed for the last 100 years.”
He is looking at that differently now. One hundred years of trust jeopardized within 100 days of Trump’s second term.
“To shatter that with a couple of tweets, that’s quite a remarkable feat. It is so alarming and so radical that this trust is declining so quickly.”
Rathbun was at a Toronto Raptors game in March, a home game at Toronto’s Scotiabank Arena. As the only NBA team based outside the United States, the Raptors play both national anthems before tipoff. Rathbun was shocked to hear people around him booing The Star-Spangled Banner.
“I haven’t seen people booing the national anthem,” he said. “You hear the boos but then you also hear the loud cheers for O Canada, and everyone’s singing together, and that part was quite touching.
“If I had started talking to one of the fans near me at the Raptors game and I said, ‘Hey, I’m an American,’ that Raptors fan would have probably said, ‘I hate your government, but we love you.’ That’s my guess, that people are distinguishing between the government and the people.
“I don’t think people in Canada, when they’re choosing Canadian products over American products, are saying, ‘I’m going to stick it to an American farmer.’ They’re trying to hit the pocketbooks of Americans only because they feel that’s the only way that they can send a message to the administration. They want to do their bit to contribute to the welfare of their country that they feel is being unfairly picked on,” Rathbun said.
While Rathbun, the person, was startled, for Rathbun, the scholar, it made sense. When Canadians talk about falling out of love with America, he said it really means losing trust in the U.S. government.
“The multilateral world order is premised, to a large degree, on a trusting worldview that the United States had after the Second World War,” Rathbun said. The Western world had seen the might of the United States and the difference it made in the war. The United States showed itself to be the leader of a multinational ideology built on democratic principles. It valued that role and other countries learned to trust it.
“Most of what keeps international co-operation going is not hard law or hard security, it’s trust,” but Trump takes a different world view, he said.
The reaction from many around the world to Trump picking on Canada is similar to when people see a bully beat on a weakling, Rathbun said. “It’s precisely because of an asymmetry in power,” and a natural response to it is to try to punish the behaviour. “We’re still going to resist the bully, even if we’re very small. And I think that’s what you’re seeing.”
Typically, most Americans probably don’t think about Canada twice in the same year, and now suddenly they see Canadians booing their anthem, yanking their booze out of stores and, out of the mouth of Ontario Premier Doug Ford, threatening to shut off their lights in communities that buy electricity from the province. No wonder some return the social chill.
“What do Americans think about Canadians? We don’t think very much about Canada at all. That could lead to a certain amount of indifference. It creates a vacuum. We’ve seen how people can do 180-degree turns on their views. What if you only need to make a 90-degree turn?” said Rathbun. “I think that Trump could pretty easily turn Americans, or at least his supporters, against Canadians.”
It seems to already be happening.
Joe Rogan, an influential American commentator among young conservatives, might be a barometer on the issue. At first, he expressed derision at Trump picking a fight with Canada: “Why are we upset at Canada? This is stupid,”
he said
on the March 14 episode of his podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience. “It’s the dumbest f-cking feud.”
On his
March 22 podcast,
though, Rogan’s stance seemed to have changed. When a guest mentioned an upcoming event in Montreal, Rogan said he wouldn’t be there: “I don’t go to Canada anymore,” he said. “Nor should you,” his guest replied.
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Falling out with the United States is not confined to progressives, or those opposed to Trump or Elon Musk or Trump’s Make America Great Again ideology.
A couple from Saskatchewan spent many years globe-hopping for work. They have lived in six countries through 10 international moves in their careers in the energy-technology sector, including in the United States.
“Living and working in the U.S. twice over a total of 10 years found us very fond of the U.S.A., to the point of having almost a split Canadian-American identity,” the husband said. They asked for their names not to be published because of pending real estate deals and unresolved business relationships.
Some years ago, the couple bought property on a ski hill in Montana with plans to build a retirement home there. Recently, with the husband retired but his wife still working, they hired an architect and had house plans drawn in anticipation of starting construction on a lavish home.
It was during a conversation with the proposed builder, who was their friend, that their plan started to fall apart. They were talking about hockey. In February, after hockey fans in Montreal booed the U.S. anthem at the 4 Nations Face-Off game between Canada and the United States, their builder said how unacceptable that was.
“I tried to point out how upset Canadians must be to act so uncharacteristically rude, given our collective politeness. I tried to explain that threats on our sovereignty were extreme and perhaps good reason for Canadians to become uncharacteristically rude to our neighbours,” the husband said. “My argument fell on such deaf ears that the conversational door was slammed shut. I began falling out of love with America.”
At the same time, they were hearing from friends and family still in Canada about a shift to patriotic shopping.
“That opened our minds to reconsidering Canadian ski hills after a decade and a half of focusing on our plans to build in the U.S.,” he said. They shelved their Montana land development and made an offer for a lot on a ski hill in British Columbia.
“We are buying Canadian,” he said. “We have chosen to direct our capital and future back into Canada.” He said the decision cost Montana between $3 million and $5 million for the house alone, plus lost future revenue from their spending.
The couple, though, are not liberals or Liberals. He complains of “woke benevolence” spoiling Canada.
“We think highly of the work Trump and Musk are doing in the U.S., although we could do without some of the shock negotiation strategies,” the husband said.
“Recent political and social shifts have made us well aware that we are not Americans,” he said. “We aren’t down on America as much as we are aware that we are guests in the United States and that our welcome can be withdrawn at any point. We see that risk as ultimately a reason to favour the certainty of always being able to live in Canada, regardless of how broken it is.”
It isn’t just one family in one house on a ski hill that unwinding social ties has cost. Across the United States, many Canadians own vacation property and second homes where they live part-time, and some of those Canadians are calling it quits.
“Canadians are half the reason we are what we are,” said Melanie Pritchard, a real estate broker in Ellicottville, N.Y., a town famous for its skiing that’s an hour’s drive south of the Peace Bridge border crossing between Fort Erie, Ont., and Buffalo, N.Y.
Canadian skiers started buying holiday homes in and around Ellicottville decades ago and have become an important part of the community. Many of the region’s events are timed for Canadians: A summer festival is over Canada Day and a fall festival over Canada’s Thanksgiving.
“I can’t tell you the number of Canadians that have become our friends, very good friends,” Pritchard said.
Wrinkles and tears are now in that social fabric. As a Realtor, she sees the damage firsthand: there has been a sudden and unusual increase in Canadians selling their homes. She has several on the market now.
“They do express concerns about the situation, not only with the tariffs, per se, but just the general environment,” Pritchard said. “A lot of them have expressed dismay with the rhetoric that’s been going on from our country’s leaders. You know, taking Canada over, making Canada the 51st state — none of that goes over very well.”
Pritchard is worried about the finality that comes with Canadians selling rather than just renting the house to someone else for a while.
“We understand their concerns and we just hate to see it become too much of a thing.” She said the town has called a meeting to discuss the change.
Not every Canadian has come to the same conclusion.
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Lyle Zdunich had only been back in Saskatoon a week after flying in from his winter house 3,100 kilometres from the gnawing bite of Saskatchewan’s winter. He had time to talk about it while waiting for the Winnipeg Jets to hit the ice.
A retired chartered accountant, Zdunich has owned property near Palm Springs, Calif., since 1998 and has spent the last 21 of his 75 winters there. He and his wife, Arlene, fly down to their condo in a gated community each October.
“As soon as we get off the plane, it’s like we’re at home down there,” he said. “We’ve met tons of people. Between golf and tennis and whatnot, and we know other Canadians down there, so it’s been a very enjoyable experience.”
The Zdunichs are among thousands of Canadian snowbirds who arrive each winter in Palm Springs. The desert city’s population triples come November and deflates back to about 45,000 in March. Most of that surge comes from Canada.
“I am definitely not anti-American,” Zdunich said.
“If you get away from Donald Trump and some of the things he’s said, the Americans are still our allies and friends. Having lived in the States for just about half the year, whether somebody’s from Saskatchewan or somebody’s from Palm Springs, to me, they’re all the same.”
For sure, he doesn’t like what he’s hearing about Canada from the White House, but he considers it to only be Trump’s ranting, more publicity than policy.
“I’m of the point of view that I think it’s totally an unfortunate situation, but in the short term it’s not going to change my view of going down there. Forget all the noise going around, it’ll get sorted out. Do I want to forgo the friendships I have formed just because of something that may or may not occur?”
He said he hasn’t experienced animosity from people down south. “Absolutely zero negative response from the Americans towards Canada — if they felt that way, they sure would be willing to say it, but nobody does.”
Zdunich said he hears people in Canada talk about boycotting the United States, but that’s not for him.
“I agree with most people, that if (Trump) would just not say a lot of things he does, it would be a lot better. But I’m not going to sell my place. It’s a welcoming environment from everybody I know down there.”
Businesses in Palm Springs will love hearing his response.
Tourism from Canada
is way down across the United States. Border crossings from Canada dropped by close to a million travellers this March compared to last, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. It’s the biggest decline since COVID-19 shut down travel.
Flight bookings from Canada to the United States have collapsed. In March, advanced airline bookings were down more than 70 per cent for each month April to September compared to last year, according to airline data from OAG Aviation.
There has been less traffic going the other direction as well, with the number of trips by U.S. residents driving to Canada down 10.6 per cent this March over last.
While Canadians are falling out of love with America, Palm Springs wants them to know the feeling isn’t mutual. In April, the city hung banners from downtown street-lights and put up billboards at the airport saying: “Palm Springs ♥️ Canada.”
Photos of the signs in the airport with few passengers in sight attracted harsh comments on Facebook: “Are all the passengers detained in facilities? It’s really empty there,” said one. “They’re on a connecting flight to El Salvador,” came a reply.
All of California is feeling the impact of being spurned by Canadians, and its governor, Gavin Newsom, knows why his usual flood of tourist is drying up.
California launched a statewide campaign
to lure Canadians back, and Newsom’s pitch is to distance California from Trump, physically and ideologically.
“The state of mind in the United States of America has dramatically changed as it relates to the approach to Canada, and we want to make sure we send a message to our Canadian friends up north to come to a state where two million Canadians visited last year,” Newsom said in a promotion.
A video ad makes a sharper point.
“Sure, you know who’s trying to stir things up back in D.C.,” the ad says, and then cuts to a photo of a tilting White House, “but don’t let that ruin your beach plans. California’s the ultimate playground, 2,000 miles from Washington and a world away in mindset … We’ve got plenty of sunshine and a whole lot of love for our neighbours up north.”
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Statistics back up anecdotes of a broad social unravelling.
A recent
YouGov survey
of Canadians found a remarkable decoupling: 44 per cent said they consider the U.S. to be unfriendly; 20 per cent said it was an enemy. Only 15 per cent said it was an ally and 10 per cent said friendly, with 11 per cent saying they weren’t sure.
That’s a huge tumble since the
same question was asked in 2020
, when 18 per cent described the United States as unfriendly and only four per cent said an enemy.
The survey also found 61 per cent of Canadian respondents were already boycotting American companies. The most boycotted items were fruits and vegetables, booze, personal care items and household goods.
A survey of American citizens
by the same research company found U.S. citizens’ view of Canada was also deteriorating. In late March, 16 per cent of Americans polled said Canada was an enemy of the United States. That seems low, but it’s the highest level of animosity since data started in 2017, when only five per cent said it. The same poll showed 73.7 per cent of Americans said Canada was an ally, a drop from almost 86 per cent in 2017.
It’s hard to trust an enemy, so this is a big problem.
In our personal lives, trust is an important part of how we interact with others. It’s how we choose whom to leave a spare house key with, whom we invite to our party. It is how we decide whom to loan money to or accept a ride from; whom to date and whom to dump; whom we share secrets with and whom we believe.
It’s similar on the world stage. What country is trusted to come to your aid and to hold up their end of an agreement? Where do you feel safe visiting? What country do you want to succeed?
Tuuli-Marja Kleiner researches why nations trust each other at Germany’s Thünen Institute of Rural Studies by analyzing cross-country survey data.
She said that at its heart, international trust means belief that expectations and commitments will be fulfilled, or at least not purposely violated. As a starting point, she said, similarities in cultural values fosters familiarity, which can trigger trust because similarity suggests each group can predict how the other will act.
Familiarity and similarity describe Canada and the United States; despite many differences, both have similar historic, demographic and religious roots, with population growth through immigration. Both have democratic governance and English as an official language. Once differences over connection to the monarchy in Britain settled down, the two countries have been close allies.
Until 2009, Canadians didn’t even need a passport to drive into the United States. Generations of cross-border social and cultural connections solidified the affinity.
“My analysis showed that cultural proximity between nations increases trust but only if their proximity is a qualified one,” said Kleiner. Her study of Europe, which she thinks is likely the same across the Western world, showed the biggest qualifiers for trust were democratic values and global reputation.
“So, if there’s a violation of those as massive as under the Trump administration, then the relationship is effectively harmed or even terminated, because what he is saying is, you and I do not belong together morally any longer.”
What is going on in Canada in reaction to Trump — more public patriotism, boycotts, reduced U.S. visits — is a natural response, Kleiner said. “If you no longer see the other as part of your cultural similarity and no longer trust them, you don’t want to co-operate with them and you don’t want to live among them.”
How much the friendship between Canada and the United States unravels, and how long that will last, is impossible to know.
Is it divorce, separation or a few nights spent sleeping on the couch?
As breakups go, Canada is in an awkward spot. It can date other people, sure, but can’t pack up and move. It is forever stuck living beside an ex — one who regularly points at your house saying you’re a cheater and a freeloader and your house really should be their house.
Can they get back together?
Kleiner is pessimistic, at least in the short term. “Once the trust is destroyed, it is very difficult to rebuild,” she said. Canadians now know that extending trust automatically based on similarities doesn’t always work.
Rathbun, the American professor living in Canada, is more optimistic. He believes broken trust can mend as circumstances change, but perhaps not quickly and it won’t be as deep as it was. Trump won’t be in office forever; maybe the next president will view Canada differently, or maybe Trump will change course.
While many Canadians said they will never feel comfortable with the United States again, Rathbun thinks feelings will improve over time, though he predicts countries will retain a “hedging strategy.”
Jack and Rose Van Steensel, the motorhome couple, are applying their own version of a hedging strategy to their relationship with the United States.
They’re watching and waiting to see if things get better, if Trump settles down, if a deal can ease tension. They made a tentative reservation for their motorhome in Arizona for November, in case things improve. Rose said the woman who runs the RV park understands their position.
Over on the banks of the St. Croix River, the two cross-border mayors hope their joint festival lights a path to keeping their communities united, despite what swirls around them. Maybe, said Mayor MacEachern, getting through this will eventually make their bonds even stronger.
”There’s always good things that come out of bad,” MacEachern said.
“I think it will take time to get us back, but I think we’ll get back. I hope so. But I think it depends where it goes with Trump.”
