At elementary school in Michigan, I was taught two tricks for remembering the Great Lakes. The first was: The Great Lakes are where we have our HOMES, a mnemonic for the five lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, and Superior. The second was that Michigan is the only lake that does not touch Ontario, and Ontario is the only lake that does not touch Michigan. One teacher added: it can be Eerie down below, above the rest is Superior, and if you can remember that Hur-on to something. Corny and Midwestern, yes. But also, a happy memory of an analog upbringing in a wonderful part of the world.

These memorized phrases stayed with me, obviously. But they also helped me organize the world around me, make sense of it, and understand what it signified.

Against this backdrop, I read the news that President Donald Trump had signed an executive order renaming Lake Ontario “Lake America.” Absurd as the name-change edict seems at first, it had an effect. It drew attention from Americans and outrage from Canadians. There was a similar reaction in Mexico to Trump’s announcement that he was renaming the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America.” Does changing a name advance the national interest in any way? It can.

Like name-calling, name-changing might be intended to undermine a competitor’s confidence. Trump’s nicknames for rivals have had this effect, from calling former Florida Governor Jeb Bush “Low Energy” to dubbing Joe Biden “Sleepy Joe.” But ignoring Trump’s insulting nicknames has worked for some, including Florida Governor Ron “De-Sanctimonious” DeSantis and Secretary of State “Little” Marco Rubio.

Former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appeared to be rattled when Trump called him “Governor” Trudeau. His successor has not been given a nickname yet, and Prime Minister Mark Carney has stayed polite even as trade talks with the United States have broken down. Carney is also careful about criticizing Trump by name, avoiding making disputes personal. But he has found other ways to rattle Trump without mentioning him.

Earlier this year, Carney’s speech to the World Economic Forum won praise from world leaders who had little to say about Trump’s remarks at the same event. Trump’s angry reaction was taken as a sign that he did not like being upstaged, but it was worse than that: Carney outclassed him, delivering a withering critique of American leadership.

Citing a famous 1978 essay by Czech playwright and future president of the Czech Republic Václav Havel, Carney told his audience in Davos that they would be “living the lie” if they continued to pretend that the former world order was coming back. Here is how Carney summarized Havel’s essay:

Every morning, this shopkeeper places a sign in his window: “Workers of the world, unite!” He doesn’t believe it. No one does. But he places the sign anyway to avoid trouble, to signal compliance, to get along. And because every shopkeeper on every street does the same, the system persists.

Not through violence alone, but through the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false.

Havel called this “living within a lie.” The system’s power comes not from its truth but from everyone’s willingness to perform as if it were true. And its fragility comes from the same source: when even one person stops performing — when the greengrocer removes his sign — the illusion begins to crack.

Then Carney spoke about the lie that many were holding on to, even if they no longer believed it:

Let me be direct: We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition.

Over the past two decades, a series of crises in finance, health, energy and geopolitics have laid bare the risks of extreme global integration.

But more recently, great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons. Tariffs as leverage. Financial infrastructure as coercion. Supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited.

You cannot “live within the lie” of mutual benefit through integration when integration becomes the source of your subordination.

The breakdown of trade talks on August 21 was followed by a flurry of statements and social media posts from Carney and Trump, each attempting to frame the breakdown and the underlying nature of the bilateral differences. As Carney’s World Economic Forum address indicates, the current battle over perceptions is only the latest clash in an ongoing struggle.

Power and Persuasion

Both Trump and Carney understand that naming is an exercise of power. But they use that power differently. Trump attempts to change reality by imposing a name upon it: opponents acquire belittling nicknames; the Gulf of Mexico becomes the Gulf of America; and, on August 27, he ordered the U.S. government to call Lake Ontario “Lake America.” The executive order itself says that the lake “shall” be renamed and federal references changed accordingly. Carney, by contrast, attempts to change political behavior by supplying a name for a reality that people have experienced but perhaps not yet conceptualized.

In his August 22 remarks, Carney said Canada understood that Washington would use integration as a weapon and “that its signature was written in pencil.” Once you hear that metaphor, an American agreement that can be revised, disregarded, or superseded at the president’s discretion looks different. The metaphor supplies a category.

Marshall McLuhan, a literary critic and University of Toronto professor of English, was an early student of communication and culture. His work provides a way to distinguish between what Trump and Carney are attempting to do.

In Understanding Media (1964), McLuhan observed that “[T]he name of a man is a numbing blow from which he never recovers.” Naming, in this context, pins a person to a fixed identity in the mind of a listener who has never met the person and likely never will. Name-calling among people who know each other is less effective than it is with a famous person because the name competes with a larger amount of fluid and changing information about that person. With politicians, names can organize the scant knowledge a voter has about another politician around an epithet that could become the dominant impression of a political rival, shaping how that politician is understood by a wider audience. Trump’s use of names is an attempt to drive Americans to adopt his perceptions of Canada, Carney, and Canadians.

Carney’s approach is closer to another of McLuhan’s arguments. In his 1967 essay, “The Museum as Large-Room Pinball Machine,” he wrote, “A name is, in a sense, a numbing of perception.” Here, McLuhan is writing about perception itself, not identity. Naming is treated as a cognitive shortcut: it allows a person to stop paying attention to the thing itself and rely instead on the label. McLuhan uses a museum as an analogy to illustrate the idea: museums organize perception through labels, categories, and frames. They guide us toward an understanding of what we are looking at as we pass through the galleries.

McLuhan knew how to use names and labels to persuade students and fellow scholars, too. Carney’s bold labels are powerful: Canada is a middle power; the rules-based world order is ruptured; when you are under attack, you are at war. Trump’s renaming and nicknames are powerful, too: Canada is nasty; Canadians are ripping us off; Canada wants the benefits of being a state without being a state.

But there is a difference between the underlying approaches of the two leaders. Trump says, in effect: I have the power to tell you what this is; Lake Ontario is now Lake America. Carney says: I can give you the words that allow you to recognize what this is; the United States’ commitments are written in pencil and cannot be trusted. These are profoundly different exercises of political power. The first relies principally on authority and repetition. The second relies on recognition: the formulation succeeds if listeners think, yes, that is what I have been seeing.

Neither is politically neutral. Carney is plainly trying to persuade Canadians and other middle powers to adopt his interpretation of American behavior. “Signed in pencil” is not an objective social-scientific description; it is rhetoric, and highly accomplished rhetoric at that. It may yet prove too sweeping. American commitments arise from institutions larger than any particular president, and there are costs to convincing Canadians that every American promise is inherently provisional.

Meanwhile, in both the United States and Canada, we are seeing a collapse of trust in institutions. With this loss comes a weakening of the authorities’ ability to define the truth for us and have us accept it unquestioningly. Yet most of us do not do the homework necessary to evaluate the truth claims asserted by authorities, either. What replaces trust is most often skepticism about political arguments or cynicism about political motives. Rarely, if ever, are we curious enough to research and weigh the arguments and counterarguments ourselves.

Trade Names

The U.S.-Canada trade talks collapsed: all sides agree about that. But why? That is what Trump and Carney are each trying to explain. Their diagnoses, expressed in names and labels and catchy phrases, drive us toward their favored prescription for action: tariffs, retaliatory tariffs, and then talks. But public perceptions of those talks if and when they occur will be preconditioned by Trump’s and Carney’s current messaging to voters before they start.

It is worth acknowledging that with their names and labels, Trump and Carney are trying to manipulate us as voters and concerned observers. In place of complexity and details about the U.S. tariffs imposed under section 338 of the U.S. Tariff Act of 1930, each offer a name or label to serve as a shorthand explanation. They invoke nationalism hoping that we choose the version from “our side”; for that reason, some of us who do not like our current leader will prefer the other side’s explanation. The truth is out there, somewhere, but will we bother looking?

For Havel, the dangerous act of the powerless is not opposing the powerful with superior force. The danger to those in power comes when the powerless hear a truthful description of what everyone around us has been participating in while pretending it is something else. Once the shop owner’s sign is understood as a ritual of submission rather than a spontaneous declaration of ideological conviction, you cannot look at it in quite the same way again. Yet, I worry that the lasting legacy of the Trump and Carney contretemps will be that we can never see U.S.-Canada relations the same way again, even when we have new leaders in both countries.

Here McLuhan’s distinctions may make a difference: Trump’s name-calling is an act of control, and when he is out of office and no longer in control, I doubt anyone will still call the easternmost Great Lake “Lake America.” But I expect that Carney’s memorable characterizations of the complex relationship between the United States and Canada will have a longer-lasting effect.

It has happened in this way before. Former President John F. Kennedy’s famous lines in his 1961 address to the Canadian Parliament, “Geography has made us neighbors. History has made us friends. Economics has made us partners. And necessity has made us allies” has become a rubric often used to sum up the relationship between the two countries. And American sociologist and political scientist Seymour Martin Lipset’s pithy formulations, such as that the United States is a country of revolution while Canada is a country of evolution, are still quoted today. Over time, our perceptions of the U.S.-Canada relationship can change and evolve, and pace Lipset, American views of Canada may be undergoing a revolution while Canadian perceptions of the United States evolve more subtly.

Just as my understanding of the Great Lakes and Michigan’s place among them was shaped by mnemonics and memorable lines, perceptual shortcuts linger. My hope is that Americans and Canadians will re-establish mutual trust and admiration long after our immediate disagreements have been forgotten. For that to happen, U.S.-Canada relations will need Americans and Canadians to agree on the truth of the events now underway and recover mutual trust and respect that is at a perilously low ebb today.

The new phase in the U.S.-Canada trade war came like bankruptcy to Mike Campbell, a character in Ernest Hemingway’s 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises: gradually, then suddenly.

President Donald Trump imposed tariffs on imports from Canada, China, and Mexico under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA) in February 2025 and used the same authority for the “Liberation Day” tariffs on Canada on April 2, 2025. The administration’s use of that authority was challenged in court. After the administration lost and appealed, the case reached the Supreme Court, which ruled against it on February 20, 2026. The administration replaced the IEEPA tariffs with new tariffs under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, a time-limited provision. Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s opinion in the IEEPA case noted that tariffs under Section 338 of the Trade Act of 1930 were available as an alternative, and the administration announced that Section 338 tariffs on Canadian products would take effect August 19. A three-day reprieve and positive comments from President Trump raised hopes for a deal but talks broke down after markets closed on August 21 and the United States imposed the tariffs. Canada has pledged retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products beginning September 8, and the United States has promised additional tariffs in response. The gradual accumulation of U.S. tariffs on Canadian products became too much. For many people, the trade war began suddenly when Canada refused to accept U.S. terms for a deal.

The title of Hemingway’s novel comes from the Bible. Ecclesiastes 1:5 is rendered in the New International Version, common to both Canada and the United States, as “The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises.” It reminds me of the cycles of life and the natural order of things.

Trade talks have cycles, too. They flow from complaints and investigations to threats of trade action, which bring talks with trade partners. The closer the parties get to an agreement, the more dramatic the rhetoric becomes. There are walkouts, accusations of unfairness, and words spoken in anger that reflect frustration rather than considered judgment. Sometimes a deal follows: officials smile and accentuate the positive. Other times there is no deal, the situation worsens, until the sides reluctantly talk again.

None of this is surprising, nor does saying so trivialize the economic stakes. I offer it for the sake of perspective. Trade negotiations are serious and have serious consequences, but they also contain elements of theater, much like the courtroom dramas presented in documentaries and television shows. Focusing on dramatic language can make anyone lose the plot that matters most.

Trade talks between the United States and Canada are different now from when I was in college and the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement was being negotiated. Technology brings us closer to the action than ever before. The data one country gathers and presents to justify new tariffs are available online. Instead of occasional updates on talks, both sides issue a stream of media releases and social media posts. And, continuing a traditional practice, leaks from one side or the other drive headlines and sometimes markets.

This matters because the United States and Canada are democracies. Both governments work to convince voters that the negotiation is necessary and that their actions against the other country are justified. If voters think it is time to settle, holding the line can be difficult, and both sides know it. That is why terrible threats and insults have moved from behind closed doors onto our phones as news alerts, then to social media, where they are debated, dissected, and replayed. I have known many trade negotiators personally. They tell me the threats and harsh tone are not new; what is new is the public’s exposure to them and our struggle to make sense of them. More than ever, we need perspective.

History provides one source of it. The United States and Canada have fought over tariffs and trade for most of their history, just as domestic politics in both countries has long included debates over taxes. After World War II, the United States was the world’s leading producer of nearly everything, and U.S. policy shifted toward trade liberalization – tax cuts on trade – in global markets where Americans wanted to sell. Canada, like many countries, sought to protect jobs and industries through tariffs, government subsidies, and other measures. The United States fought those measures and gradually persuaded Canada to lower its tariffs. Now the Trump administration believes that removing U.S. tariffs left workers and strategic industries unprotected while China and other countries expanded production and attracted jobs in pursuit of “export-led growth”. It is reimposing tariffs to reverse those shifts. This is a change, but it is not U.S. hypocrisy. Although the administration brought tariffs back dramatically, tariffs and trade disputes also occurred under Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. Joseph Biden kept many of Trump’s first-term tariffs in place, particularly those on China. Gradual change, suddenly impossible to ignore.

Another source of perspective comes from paying attention to how things are made. “Supply chains” may be a fashionable new term, but the practice it describes has been standard for more than a century. Firms make components of other products, just as a dairy farmer produces milk used in ice cream. Through innovation and specialization, firms become very good at making one thing. Businesses that need that thing for a more complex product seek out those excellent producers. The relationships among these firms form a production or supply chain.

Technology has changed how supply chains form. Today it is easier to find the best producer of something you need almost anywhere in the world. “Best” is subjective, though it is reflected in prices. A low price can signal efficiency or shoddy quality, even the use of forced labor – modern slavery – to reduce costs. This is where government regulations and standards matter. If you produce to a high standard at a higher cost, tariffs can protect you from unfair competition. But what constitutes “unfair” competition? Lower taxes in some countries, or government subsidies to businesses? Such questions are debated in trade disputes and accompanied by drama, but trade between jurisdictions has always raised questions of fair competition, as it should. Unless we live under one world government with uniform rules, those differences will be debated. Our ability to follow the debate more closely than ever does not mean things are worse.

A third source of perspective is one I am only beginning to develop in my own thinking: the effect of technology on trade debates. There is an enormous amount of trade data, along with a growing movement to use artificial intelligence to make supply chains more efficient. Just as online data changed trade by helping firms find the best suppliers for the components they needed, rapid analysis of available data could allow supply chains to adjust in seconds for peak efficiency. But in those same seconds, AI could judge a small business or a factory in your town imperfect, exclude it from supply chains, and effectively starve it to death.

Now consider data integrity. Could a hacker alter a number that prompts an AI system to eject a firm from supply chains? Yes, with devastating consequences. The hacker might own stock in a rival firm and profit. Hostile governments might also manipulate data to remain competitive or to do what Trump has warned about: shift strategic industries away from the United States and Canada, weakening us while they grow stronger.

As frightening as that scenario is, our intelligence agencies warn that hostile foreign governments are already sponsoring social media campaigns to influence political debate. When the drama of a trade negotiation sweeps across news feeds, falsehoods, exaggerations, and passionate feelings are turbocharged; algorithms do the rest. We lose perspective on the trade issues themselves and focus instead on the survival of our countries and communities.

During the Cold War, the United States used disinformation to destabilize authoritarian countries such as the Soviet Union. Our intelligence agencies spread rumors of rebels in the countryside or disloyal generals around dictators to keep adversaries off balance. Dictators depend on control to remain in power, so rumors of emerging opposition were effective.

The American and Canadian governments worry about public opinion because they depend on winning elections to remain in office. Hostile countries can now use technology to keep us divided and off balance. Some will say this is only fair – that we deserve it – but I believe we are the good guys because we value individual freedom and liberty. If we want to keep those things, we must be smarter about what we see online and what we believe. This, too, is why perspective matters.

Each of these cycles – trade-negotiation theatrics, supply chains and government interventions, democratic debate and foreign manipulation – has changed dramatically with technology, yet we rarely recognize it. For younger voters, new technology and its effects are more familiar than the trade debates of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. That brings me back to Ecclesiastes and Hemingway.

Ecclesiastes 1:5 reminds us that life moves in cycles that ebb and flow naturally, and that we should focus on God and what does not change. It underscores the difference between our short human lives and the infinite nature of God. In today’s terms, we go to school, start a family and a career, put down roots and take on a mortgage, grow old, navigate health problems, and then pass on.

But Ecclesiastes assumed a slower progression through the seasons of the year and of life than the one we experience now. Technology reshapes our lives around ever-shorter news cycles. The noise and anger conveyed by news sites and social media have led many of my friends outside Washington, D.C., to unplug from it all. It is exhausting even for me. In a week like this, they might send me a message and ask how I am doing, expecting me to be busy but caring more about me than about my latest policy paper or hot take on whatever President Trump has just posted.

Many Canadians far from Ottawa politics and trade talks are not unplugging, they are angry. They are angry at President Trump because of what he has said and done, but they are also angry at the United States and even at Americans. It starts with Trump, but they ask: How could so many Americans have voted for him? Trump insults Canada and says it should become the 51st state, yet most Americans are silent. Some Americans say they do not take Trump seriously; others excuse it as his poor attempt at humor.

Over the past twelve months, as U.S. tariff actions advanced through the political process and the courts and the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) underwent its six-year review, Canadians gradually grew angrier. Many stopped coming to the United States. Others sold property, skipped family and college reunions, or chose to follow U.S. sports teams online rather than attend games. The effect of these boycotts is noticeable in many communities where Canadians had been regular visitors and customers.

And yet this Canadian response was the international-relations equivalent of giving a trade partner the silent treatment. When you give someone the silent treatment and they do not notice, the situation can escalate quickly. Gradually, ordinary Canadians became angry first at Trump and then at ordinary Americans for failing to see how hurt they were. Suddenly, we are in a trade war. Hemingway would not be surprised.

The breakdown in U.S.-Canada trade talks brings together all the factors that shape how we perceive tariffs and international trade disagreements, understand the roots of our prosperity as countries and individuals, and talk with one another about public policy. Canadians who lament American disengagement may be mistaking Americans’ withdrawal from the melodrama for indifference. Political leaders in Washington and Ottawa who try to repair their relationship after the trade war ends will discover that the relationship between Americans and Canadians must be repaired first.

Canada and the United States are sovereign equals while also possessing different endowments of population, wealth, and military might. Washington has encouraged Canadians to become an equal partner in many contexts, but at other times has thrown its weight into the relationship to compel Canadian cooperation. When U.S. leaders set aside equality and emphasize power asymmetries between the two states, Canadian reactions are swift and negative, viewing the move as a violation of an understanding between the two countries.

Anthropologists have long understood that status is not something individuals or communities can simply claim for themselves; it must also be recognized by others. The late British social anthropologist and ethnographer Julian Pitt-Rivers, in his classic work on honor and social status, described honor as both an aspiration to status and the social validation of that status. The gap between the two, between the standing we believe we deserve and the standing others accord us, is a recurrent source of friction in human societies. That insight offers a useful way to understand one of the persistent paradoxes of relations between Canada and the United States.

From the American Revolution through the early 20^th century, U.S. foreign policy opposed European imperialism. Domestically, the U.S. constitutional design replaced colonies with states, and created a path for new territories to join the United States as equal to all other states. The American federal system offered an alternative to imperial hierarchy in a manner that contained a rebuke to the early British Empire, which treated its American colonists as subordinate to British citizens in England, and granted them no seats in Parliament; the United States recognized new states sovereignty under state constitutions and granted them two senators and representation in the House of Representatives based on population with revisions based on the decennial census. British North American colonies were combined into the Dominion of Canada in 1867 adopting federalism in a manner like federalism in the United States, the first instance of federalism adopted within the British Empire.

Alaska, Vimy, Versailles, and Balfour

The Dominion of Canada, as part of the British Empire, was both a less populous and powerful neighbor of the United States and the British presence on America’s border and as such, a Great Power. Canadian statesmen attained political and economic space for autonomous action in the late 19^th century by playing London against Washington and vice versa. However, this came to an end early in the 20^th century.

The trouble started with the Alaska Boundary dispute, resolved by an arbitration panel that included three U.S. members, two Canadians, and one British representative. The panel resolved the dispute in 1903 when the British panelist joined the Americans in resolving the dispute in favor of the American claim. Canadian popular outrage over this finding was quick and ferocious, and U.S. leaders saw in this sentiment the potential for Canada to develop a nationalist sentiment that could see it split from the British Empire. The United States encouraged Canadian nationalism while offering closer economic ties to make a break from the British Empire seem less risky.

Canadian nationalism led in a different direction, as Canadians began to see themselves as a potential country. The First World War drove Canada further in this direction. As part of the British Empire, Canada entered the war along with Britain and showed its mettle on the battlefields of Europe. The Battle of Vimy Ridge in which four divisions of the Canadian Corps took a fortified German position with the loss of more than 3,500 dead and 7,000 wounded became a moment of national pride that historian Pierre Berton called the birth of the Canadian national identity. Canadian contributions and sacrifice in the war drew praise and respect across Britain.

U.S. President Woodrow Wilson championed the cause of the Dominions of the British Empire, arguing that their sacrifices had earned them the right to sign the Treaty of Versailles in their own right. In the 1920s, nationalism gained strength in all of the British Dominions until 1926, when the Balfour Declaration acknowledged that the Dominions were “equal in status” and “in no way subordinate one to another” in their domestic or external affairs. This paved the way for an exchange of letters between London and Washington and the establishment of direct diplomatic relations between the United States and Canada and the exchange of diplomatic representatives in 1927. The Statute of Westminster in 1931 gave Canada and other Dominions the right to set independent foreign policies from Britain.

While Canada had become a sovereign equal of the United States, recognized as such by both London and Washington, the United States was emerging as a Great Power and would become one of two world superpowers by the 1950s. Columbia University’s Annette Baker Fox wrote that American diplomacy after 1945 reflected the parochialism of Americans of that era. Presidents treated the international system like a variation of American federalism, particularly in their treatment of smaller countries. U.S. presidents understood that New York and California were big states, but were attentive to states like Delaware and Wyoming, too, since each had a congressional delegation that included one member in the House of Representatives and two senators. It was a short hop from this domestic political understanding to an American diplomacy that treated smaller countries with respect.

The United States treated Canada with similar respect, The United States supported Canada’s inclusion in the institutions of the postwar order from the United Nations and NATO to, eventually, the Group of Seven. Canadians saw this as proof of an equal partnership with the United States, while Washington saw it as supporting an up-and-coming country – and diluting European dominance of multilateral institutions. It was in neither country’s interests to clarify this ambiguity.

Nevertheless, Canadians could not ignore the growing asymmetry between themselves and the United States, and U.S. pressure tactics often sparked anger in Canada: the Kennedy administration’s umbrage at Canada’s hesitation during the Cuban Missile Crisis, Lyndon Baines Johnson’s dressing down of Prime Minister Lester Pearson, Richard Nixon’s reference to Pierre Trudeau as an “asshole” – to which Trudeau responded that he had been called worse things by better people.

Trudeau also provided an enduring metaphor for the paradox of U.S.-Canada asymmetry when he remarked that for Canada, living next to the United States was like a mouse sleeping next to an elephant in that you felt every grunt and twitch. Decades later, Pierre’s son and Prime Minister Justin would update this metaphor, saying that the U.S.-Canada relationship was more akin to an elephant and a moose, giving Canada a larger avatar reflecting a smaller asymmetry, perhaps.

Justin Trudeau’s Canadian moose was then contending with Donald Trump’s American elephant, and Trudeau was willing to push back against Trump on occasion. By 2025, however, Trump was exercising “maximum leverage” against all partners, and this included the taunt that Canada should welcome a future as America’s 51^st state. Canadians took umbrage and nationalist sentiment and anti-Americanism rose to levels not seen since Pierre Trudeau’s era.

Trump is offering Canadians equality by requiring them to surrender the sovereign equality they value. The 51st-state taunt isn’t simply offensive because Canadians don’t want to be Americans. It proposes to resolve the asymmetry by substituting American federal equality for international sovereign equality.

Pitt-Rivers and the Paradox

This isn’t Canadian touchiness. It is a recognizable feature of human social relations. Canadians seek equality of status within a relationship defined by profound inequality of power. Pitt-Rivers’ insights initially arose from anthropology of supposedly distinctive “honor cultures,” but subsequently, scholars have increasingly treated the underlying dynamics of reputation, status, humiliation, and recognition as much more broadly applicable. Their insight is that honor is relational and socially fragile, precisely because other people’s responses can enhance or threaten it.

Canadians’ sensitivity to equality isn’t evidence that they have somehow failed to notice the asymmetry. Their insistence on equality is one of the mechanisms by which they manage the asymmetry. The United States generally accommodates that because treating Canada as an equal partner is cheap and produces cooperation.

Trouble arises when Washington decides to leverage its material advantage—and discovers that exercising power can diminish the very cooperation that power was intended to secure. Even a future president who sincerely restores the language and practice of equality will discover that American recognition of Canadian status is no longer as credible as it once was. Trump hasn’t merely damaged Canadian attitudes toward him; he may have devalued future American assurances. Ottawa and Washington will find public confidence in either side’s claims to equality elusive for years to come.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has argued that rebuilding America’s “Arsenal of Freedom” will require greater surge capacity, faster acquisition, and a willingness to accept more acquisition risk in order to reduce operational risk. The Pentagon’s 2026 National Defense Strategy reaches much the same conclusion. America’s next defense challenge is no longer deciding how much to spend on defense, but how quickly those resources can be translated into military capability.

That challenge extends well beyond the United States. As NATO leaders gathered in Ankara last week, the Alliance discussed not only higher defense spending but also stronger defense industrial production. Larger defense budgets are meaningful only if they produce more ships, more missiles, more autonomous systems, more secure supply chains, and greater capacity to sustain military operations over time. Money is no longer the principal constraint. The ability to translate investment into military capability is now critical.

The National Defense Strategy points toward the same conclusion. It emphasizes rebuilding the defense industrial base while accelerating innovation in autonomous systems, resilient supply chains, advanced manufacturing, artificial intelligence, secure communications, space capabilities, and technologies developed by nontraditional firms. The strategy identifies the capabilities America needs. It says much less about how those capabilities can be produced at the speed today’s strategic environment demands.

Part of the answer lies in modernizing North America’s defense industrial base by reconnecting Canadian industrial capacity to America’s evolving acquisition strategy. That, in turn, requires acquisition reforms on both sides of the border to converge around the requirements of modern deterrence rather than the assumptions of the Cold War. During the Second World War, Canadian factories—including many owned by American automobile companies—became an essential part of Allied war production even before the United States entered the conflict. During the Cold War, Canadian factories became part of the continental industrial base supporting American defense production. But much of the institutional architecture governing that relationship was designed during the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations, long before 9/11, autonomous systems, resilient supply chains, critical minerals, or strategic competition with China became central defense priorities.

Over time, however, the old system became less effective. The Global War on Terror expanded U.S. concern about sensitive and dual-use technologies, while strategic competition with China made trusted supply chains more important. At the same time, consolidation in the U.S. defense industry reduced competition and encouraged expensive, complex systems that were often difficult for allies to afford or adapt to their own requirements. The result was a paradox: the United States needed trusted allied partners, but its own regulatory and procurement systems made it harder for those partners to contribute.

Canada had its own problem. Years of delayed and reconsidered procurements—from the Sea King replacement to the F-35 decision—left Canadian national security professionals painfully aware that Ottawa’s acquisition system had become a liability. But the United States also had a procurement problem. That shared recognition now creates an opening. Washington is trying to accelerate acquisition and expand surge capacity. Ottawa is trying to rebuild its defense industrial base and procure at speed and scale. For the first time in a generation, reforms in Washington and Ottawa are moving in the same strategic direction.

That convergence creates an opportunity that has received too little attention. Washington is already modernizing the American defense industrial base. The next question is whether that modernization will fully reconnect trusted Canadian industrial capacity to America’s evolving acquisition strategy.

That is why the U.S.-Canada defense industrial relationship should be viewed less as a legacy arrangement than as a tool for current acquisition reform. The challenge is not creating a continental defense partnership. It is updating one that no longer moves at the speed modern deterrence requires.

That convergence is already beginning to shape defense procurement among America’s allies. Canada’s recent decision to select a German-Norwegian submarine partnership illustrates that allied defense production is increasingly multinational from the outset. The ICE Pact among the United States, Canada, and Finland applies the same logic to icebreaker production. Across Europe, governments are collaborating on submarines, combat aircraft, missiles, and air defense systems rather than attempting to sustain complete national industrial capabilities on their own.

The United States should view these developments as evidence of a changing defense industrial landscape rather than as a series of bilateral commercial competitions. Allied governments increasingly recognize that no single country can efficiently maintain every advanced manufacturing capability required for modern deterrence.

The strategic advantage comes from building trusted industrial networks that can innovate, expand production, and sustain military operations more rapidly than potential adversaries. The question is not whether allies will cooperate in defense production. They already are. The question is whether North America’s institutional framework is keeping pace with that reality.

North America already possesses many of the ingredients for such a network. During the Biden administration, the Pentagon used Defense Production Act Title III authorities to invest directly in Canadian critical minerals projects, recognizing that secure North American supplies of lithium, graphite, cobalt, and other strategic materials are essential to future military production. Those investments also sent an important signal: strengthening American defense production sometimes requires investing beyond America’s borders when those investments reinforce trusted continental supply chains.

The next step is institutional rather than financial. The U.S.-Canada Defense Production Sharing Agreement and the U.S.–Canada Defense Research and Development Agreement were designed to reduce barriers to continental defense cooperation. They should now be modernized for an era in which innovation, resilient supply chains, critical minerals, autonomous systems, and advanced manufacturing have become as strategically important as aircraft and armored vehicles were during the Cold War. The objective is not to recreate the defense industrial base of the 1960s. It is to apply the same strategic logic to a very different technological and geopolitical environment.

Removing unnecessary barriers within North America’s defense industrial base would not displace American workers or weaken American manufacturing. Quite the opposite. Modern defense production depends upon highly integrated supply chains in which expanding output generates work throughout the network. American prime contractors, suppliers, engineers, and manufacturers all benefit when trusted partners enable faster production and larger production runs. In an era when the Pentagon’s overriding objective is greater surge capacity, expanding the continental industrial base strengthens—not weakens—the American defense workforce.

Secretary Hegseth has argued that the United States must accept greater acquisition risk in order to reduce operational risk. If reducing operational risk is the objective, then every trusted source of industrial capacity deserves careful attention. That includes capacity the United States already shares with Canada but no longer employs as effectively as changing strategic circumstances require.

America does not need to choose between strengthening its own defense industrial base and working more closely with Canada. The faster path to both objectives is to ensure that North America’s trusted industrial capacity is modernized, connected, and employed in service of a common strategic purpose. Unlocking that continental capacity would strengthen the Arsenal of Freedom not by asking America to depend upon others, but by making better use of one of the trusted industrial partnerships it already possesses.

North America has often been strongest when strategic necessity forced its institutions to evolve. That happened after the Second World War. It happened again during the Cold War. Strategic competition with China presents another such moment. The question is not whether the United States and Canada should cooperate more closely. They already do. The question is whether the institutions that once made that cooperation a strategic advantage can evolve quickly enough to restore the confidence needed for that partnership to flourish again. If so, North America will again become the arsenal of the free world.

_{Photo credit: CPAC}

Canada’s trade minister Dominic LeBlanc surprised many observers on June 2 when he emerged from a meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer expressing optimism about the upcoming review of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).

The optimism seemed out of place. President Donald Trump had only recently revived his “51st state” rhetoric toward Canada. The United States had launched new trade investigations, maintained tariffs on key sectors, and continued bilateral negotiations with Mexico while Canada appeared sidelined. None of this looked like the prelude to a successful renewal of North America’s most important trade agreement.

Yet LeBlanc may be seeing something that many analysts have overlooked. A growing number of recent U.S. actions suggest that Washington may be separating disputes over tariffs, security, sovereignty, and industrial policy from the narrower question of whether the USMCA itself should be renewed for another sixteen years. If so, cautious optimism may be warranted.

At first glance, recent developments point in conflicting directions. President Donald Trump revived his “51st state” taunt toward Canada following news that the Canadian economy had entered a technical recession. The administration intensified pressure on Mexico through new cartel-related indictments and renewed discussion of possible unilateral U.S. action. The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) also released a Section 301 investigation criticizing Canada, Mexico, and other trading partners for weak enforcement against forced labor in supply chains.

At the same time, however, the administration has begun carving out some disputes from the USMCA review itself. Trump announced limited relief from Section 232 tariffs affecting steel, aluminum, and related industrial inputs after complaints from U.S. manufacturers and farmers about rising costs. Canada’s Minister for Canada-U.S. Trade Dominic LeBlanc and chief negotiator Janice Charette meanwhile traveled to Washington to present new proposals addressing U.S. trade concerns and publicly reaffirm Canada’s readiness to renew the USMCA for another sixteen years.

Taken together, these actions may indicate that the United States is beginning to separate broader geopolitical and security disputes from the narrower question of whether the USMCA itself should survive in stable form.

That distinction matters because the first USMCA review deadline arrives on July 1. Under the agreement, the three governments must indicate whether they support extending the agreement’s term for another sixteen years, from 2026 to 2042 with a subsequent review in 2032. Renewal requires unanimity. If one or more governments decline to support renewal, the agreement does not immediately terminate. Instead, it continues under its original timetable until 2036 while the parties continue annual reviews and negotiations.

For months, the assumption in Ottawa and Mexico City has been that Washington would refuse renewal while also avoiding outright withdrawal. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer repeatedly signaled to Congress beginning in late 2025 that he was unlikely to recommend renewal because of unresolved trade disputes with Canada and Mexico. Trump himself threatened withdrawal in March.

Yet the recent pattern of U.S. actions suggests a more complicated possibility: the administration may be attempting to preserve leverage over Canada and Mexico while preventing every dispute from becoming tied directly to the legal future of the USMCA.

The Section 301 forced labor investigation is particularly revealing in this regard. By pursuing enforcement pressure under separate U.S. trade authorities rather than through the USMCA review mechanism itself, Washington preserves the ability to escalate disputes over labor standards independently of the agreement’s renewal decision. The same logic may apply to Section 232 tariffs, where the administration has shown a willingness both to impose pressure and selectively ease it in response to domestic economic concerns.

A similar compartmentalization appears to be emerging on security issues. The United States has increased pressure on both neighbors outside the USMCA framework through cartel-related actions toward Mexico and through the pause in U.S. participation in the Permanent Joint Board on Defense with Canada, combined with reported U.S. dissatisfaction over Canadian defense spending plans. The accompanying rhetoric — threats of unilateral intervention in Mexico or repeated references to Canada as a “51st state” — heightens nationalist tensions in both countries while simultaneously increasing the political value of any eventual U.S. reaffirmation of Canadian and Mexican sovereignty.

This does not mean renewal is now likely. Major obstacles remain. Canada and Mexico still expect that Washington may prefer continued negotiations to a definitive renewal commitment. Both governments therefore have strong incentives to avoid making major concessions now only to face additional U.S. demands later in Trump’s second term — or under a future administration.

Nevertheless, recent developments suggest that the possibility of renewal can no longer be dismissed outright.

If Washington increasingly treats tariffs, forced labor enforcement, security disputes, and sovereignty pressures as parallel tracks rather than direct bargaining chips inside the USMCA review itself, the political space for renewal becomes easier to imagine. Canada and Mexico would gain the stability of a renewed continental trade framework through 2042, while the United States would retain multiple instruments of economic and political leverage outside the agreement.

Perhaps LeBlanc left Washington optimistic because he sensed that the negotiations are no longer moving toward either a clean break or a permanently open-ended renegotiation.

The outlook for renewal remains uncertain, and caution is still warranted. Significant disputes over trade, industrial policy, migration, labor enforcement, and security continue to divide the three governments. None of those disagreements will disappear on July 1.

Yet the emerging structure of the negotiations matters. By shifting some of its most contentious disputes outside the formal USMCA review process, Washington may be creating political space for renewal while preserving its ability to apply pressure elsewhere.

If so, the current turbulence surrounding North American relations may not signal the collapse of continental integration, but rather its evolution into a more transactional and strategically fragmented era.

On Monday, May 18, 2026, U.S. Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby posted on X that the United States was pausing participation in the U.S.–Canada Permanent Joint Board on Defense (PJBD) and placing the organization under review.

The move is consistent with the Trump administration’s broader approach to institutions: arrangements should continue only if they still serve a practical purpose, not simply because they exist through policy inertia. That principle is defensible. But the manner and timing of the announcement raise questions.

Colby announced the pause on social media rather than through a formal statement from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth or President Donald Trump. He also linked the announcement to a speech by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, implying that the decision was not merely administrative, but political.

Colby wrote:

“A strong Canada that prioritizes hard power over rhetoric benefits us all. Unfortunately, Canada has failed to make credible progress on its defense commitments. DoD is pausing the Permanent Joint Board on Defense to reassess how this forum benefits shared North American defense.”

He continued:

“We can no longer avoid the gaps between rhetoric and reality. Real powers must sustain our rhetoric with shared defense and security responsibilities.”

And concluded:

“Delivering on shared continental defense begins by recognizing our shared geography. Only by investing in our own defense capabilities will Americans and Canadians be safe, secure, and prosperous.”

The linked speech was Carney’s January 2026 address at the World Economic Forum in Davos. There, Carney argued that middle powers needed to reduce their vulnerability to coercion by great powers through stronger economies and military capabilities. Some in Washington may have interpreted the remarks as a call for greater strategic autonomy from the United States.

But Carney’s argument was better understood as an acknowledgment that countries such as Canada had become overly dependent on American security guarantees while underinvesting in their own defense. His response was not defiance, but rearmament.

Indeed, the timing of the PJBD pause is strategically puzzling because Canada is finally moving in the direction Washington has long demanded. The Carney government followed through on its pledge to reach NATO’s 2 percent defense spending target and committed Canada to moving toward the alliance’s new 5 percent benchmark, including major investments in military modernization, Arctic infrastructure, and continental defense.

On the merits, Canada is becoming more aligned with U.S. defense priorities, not less. So why threaten the PJBD?

The PJBD in Historical Context

The Permanent Joint Board on Defense was established in 1940 to coordinate U.S.–Canadian continental defense planning. At the time, Canada was already at war with Germany, France had fallen, and Britain stood alone in Europe.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt remained cautious about direct U.S. involvement in another European war, but continental defense was politically popular and strategically useful as a means of preparing the United States for possible future conflict.

Roosevelt met Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King in Ogdensburg, New York, in August 1940. The two leaders agreed to coordinate continental defense planning and created the PJBD as a standing bilateral advisory body. They also aligned Canadian war production with the U.S. Lend-Lease system supporting Britain.

The significance of the agreement went beyond military planning. Canadian historian C.P. Stacey later described the creation of the PJBD as the beginning of a new era in bilateral relations characterized by “close association amounting to actual alliance.”

He was correct. The Ogdensburg Agreement marked a decisive shift from a century of mutual suspicion to institutionalized strategic cooperation.

The PJBD subsequently recommended construction of the Alaska Highway, supported the creation of the Military Cooperation Committee, and helped lay the groundwork for the establishment of NORAD in 1957. Most recently, it endorsed major NORAD modernization efforts focused on Arctic surveillance, infrastructure, and command-and-control capabilities.

The institution matters not simply because of its history, but because of the way it operationalizes cooperation.

Institutions and Operational Trust

One of the underappreciated features of the U.S.–Canada relationship is the extent to which political decisions are translated into durable operational cooperation through institutions.

The political leadership of both countries decides whether to cooperate. Institutions such as the PJBD, the Military Cooperation Committee, and NORAD then make that cooperation routine at the working level while preserving sovereign political control in Ottawa and Washington.

This structure matters because it reduces the need for constant political intervention. The relationship functions efficiently precisely because trusted institutions handle practical coordination before crises emerge.

That was the original purpose of the PJBD in 1940: to create a binational mechanism for thinking seriously about the practical defense of North America.

Today, technological change has transformed the threat environment. Hypersonic weapons, drones, cyber operations, and Arctic competition all present challenges unimaginable to Roosevelt and Mackenzie King. But after decades of alliance cooperation, Canadian and American military planners now approach these problems with highly compatible assumptions, methods, and operational cultures.

That trust did not emerge automatically. It was built through institutions such as the PJBD.

Even if the board itself were suspended indefinitely, much of its practical work could continue through the Military Cooperation Committee, NORAD, or U.S. Northern Command. In that sense, the pause may prove less operationally disruptive than its announcement suggests.

Its significance is therefore primarily political.

What the Pause Signals

First, the pause signals that at least some within the Trump administration increasingly view cooperation with Canada not as a mutually beneficial strategic arrangement, but as a privilege that Washington can withhold.

That represents a significant departure from the logic of the Ogdensburg Agreement. Roosevelt and later Eisenhower understood the strategic importance of Canadian geography for the U.S. national security and believed that cooperation with Canada materially strengthened American security. The defense of North America has always been a shared strategic enterprise grounded in mutual benefit, not unilateral concession.

Second, the episode reflects a broader erosion of institutional memory within the bilateral relationship itself.

The United States increasingly neglects or forgets the institutions that have historically made the relationship function effectively. A similar dynamic appeared during disputes over the Enbridge Line 5 modernization project, when the United States largely ignored existing bilateral mechanisms such as the International Joint Commission that were designed precisely to manage cross-border disputes.

As the two countries move into the second century of modern bilateral relations, both governments would benefit from revisiting why these institutions were created in the first place.

The PJBD exists because leaders in both countries concluded that continental defense works better when cooperation is institutionalized before a crisis occurs.

Finally, the episode also reflects the sometimes-undisciplined nature of policymaking within the Trump administration.

Had President Trump himself threatened NORAD or the PJBD directly, the announcement would carry greater strategic weight. Instead, the pause emerged through a social media post from a subordinate official. That makes the move appear less like a settled presidential decision and more like an escalation by officials seeking to signal toughness toward Canada.

The first Trump administration exhibited similar dynamics. Following the 2018 G7 summit in Charlevoix, senior administration figures issued public threats toward Canada that often exceeded President Trump’s own rhetoric. Likewise, threats to use emergency powers to block exports of medical supplies to Canada during the COVID-19 pandemic ultimately went further than the White House itself appeared prepared to sustain.

Trump’s management style centralizes consequential decisions around the president personally. That makes it entirely possible that the PJBD pause could eventually be softened or quietly reversed.

If so, Canadians will remember the episode far longer than Americans do. But there are lessons for both sides worth considering.

Canadians should see the incident as a reminder that institutionalized cooperation with the United States cannot simply be taken for granted. Institutions remain effective only when both sides remember why they exist and continue to invest political capital in sustaining them.

Americans should also recognize the value of these arrangements. Institutions such as the PJBD help keep the bilateral relationship low-maintenance, operationally efficient, and strategically resilient. Politicizing them risks creating unnecessary friction in areas where rapid coordination matters most.

That is not a theoretical concern.

On September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush ordered the closure of U.S. airspace to prevent additional hijacked aircraft from reaching American targets. The order was implemented through NORAD by Canadian Lieutenant-General Mike Jellinek, who was serving as Deputy Commander at the time.

NORAD functioned as planned on one of the worst days in American history. It was planned first by the PJBD and then carried on by generations of Americans and Canadians who built the institutions, habits of cooperation, and operational trust necessary to make continental defense work. That is something worth remembering.

For most of its history, the National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers has been a technical document. Required by statute, the United States Trade Representative’s annual NTE catalogs the obstacles U.S. exporters face abroad and provides a basis for enforcement. It is not supposed to announce a radical new global trade strategy.

The 2026 edition does both. It still takes stock of foreign barriers, as required by statute. But it also makes explicit something that has been developing over the past year: the United States is moving toward a more reciprocal, tariff-backed, and strategically oriented trade policy. The report links its findings to a new set of “Agreements on Reciprocal Trade” (ARTs), describes a reciprocal tariff program, and signals a willingness to maintain U.S. tariffs above most-favored-nation levels even as partners reduce their own barriers.

That shift matters globally and is likely to face resistance from the Group of Seven (G7) trade ministers meeting this week in Paris. The G7 meeting provides the first coordinated setting in which major U.S. allies will assess whether to accommodate, resist, or adapt to this emerging U.S. approach. But its most immediate consequences will be felt at home—in North America—where the United States is heading into the mandated 2026 review of the USMCA with a different theory of how trade relationships should work.

The question posed by the 2026 NTE is what the Trump administration’s America First approach to trade means for three very different partners: Canada, where the relationship is politically strained; Mexico, where economic integration is deep but policy frictions are multiplying; and the five G7 countries outside North America whose bilateral trade investment pledges to Trump could be rendered enforceable by being turned into ARTs.

NTE shifts from upholding rules to obtaining leverage

The core evolution from the 2025 NTE to the 2026 NTE is straightforward. The 2025 report broadened the definition of trade barriers to include “non-market policies and practices”—subsidies, state-owned enterprises, industrial targeting—and linked them to U.S. competitiveness and national security. Trade policy was no longer just about tariffs; it was about structure.

The 2026 report takes the next step. It connects that diagnosis to a method: use tariffs to extract concessions and retain leverage even after agreements are reached.

That is a meaningful departure from the postwar model that shaped NAFTA and USMCA. Traditionally, trade agreements were designed to reduce tariffs on both sides and lock in predictability. Under the emerging approach, agreements look more like ongoing bargains, where access is conditional and subject to renegotiation.

For North America, this creates tension with the very logic of USMCA. The agreement was intended to stabilize a deeply integrated regional economy. If the United States now treats tariff leverage as a continuing feature of its relationships—even with USMCA partners—then the review risks becoming something more than a check-in. It becomes a test of whether the United States wants to preserve, revise, or partially unwind elements of that integration.

Canada: Between “Natural Conflict” and Competition

Canada enters this review in an uncomfortable position. On paper, it is the United States’ most complete and cooperative trade partner. The two economies are tightly integrated across manufacturing, energy, agriculture, and services. USMCA dispute settlement mechanisms have been used, and—on several issues—have worked.

In political terms, however, the relationship is raw. Disputes over “Buy American” provisions, electric vehicle subsidies, digital services taxation, and cultural regulation have accumulated. Even when resolved or deferred, they have left a residue of mistrust. What President Donald Trump calls the “natural conflict” between the United States and Canada over economic benefits; Prime Minister Mark Carney deems a natural competition for economic growth that both can win.

The 2026 NTE reflects the Trump perspective that trade is a winner-take-all endeavor. The new NTE still includes familiar issues—dairy access under supply management, for example—but the center of gravity has moved. The report gives sustained attention to Canada’s Online Streaming Act (C-11), Online News Act (C-18), Quebec’s French-language discoverability rules, and the Digital Services Tax (even if now in retreat.)

For U.S. policymakers, these are not niche concerns. They affect some of the most globally competitive U.S. firms—platforms, media companies, and digital service providers. They are also precedent setting. If Canada can impose content quotas, revenue contributions, or targeted taxes in ways that disproportionately affect U.S. firms, other countries may follow.

From the Canadian perspective, these are expressions of cultural sovereignty and domestic regulation. From the U.S. perspective, they are barriers to trade.

The 2026 NTE also introduces a subtle but important change: it applies the language of “non-market policies and practices” to Canada. This does not place Canada in the same category as China. But it does signal that U.S. scrutiny is broadening.

For U.S. firms, this is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it provides a framework to challenge policies that distort competition. On the other, it raises the possibility of reciprocal scrutiny of U.S. industrial policy, which has expanded significantly in recent years. This raises the likelihood of continued uncertainty over tariffs and Canadian countermeasures, to the detriment of cross-border business.

If Canada presents a challenge of political strain within a highly compatible system, Mexico presents a different kind of problem: deep integration combined with persistent policy divergence.

Mexico is likely to engage selectively through USMCA dispute settlement without undertaking broad policy reversals, with the goal of preserving access to the U.S. market, which remains essential to its economic model.

The competing priorities of the 2026 NTE and the 2020 USMCA

The U.S. trade strategy as expressed in the 2026 NTE is at odds with the trilateral promise of the USMCA.

The introduction of ARTs and the emphasis on bilateral reciprocity point toward a more country-by-country approach by the United States.

If extended beyond North America, the ART model would likely be tested first among G7 partners, making the Paris meeting an early indicator of its viability.

The implications are significant. North American integration has been built on the assumption of a shared framework. If that framework weakens, firms may face greater uncertainty, and the region’s competitiveness as an integrated production platform could be undermined.

The implications of the 2026 NTE for USMCA are not simply about foreign compliance. They concern restoring tariff authority—the authority the Trump administration argued Congress had delegated to the president under the International Economic Emergency Powers Act (IEEPA), before the Supreme Court rejected that interpretation.

The outcome will determine whether North America remains a relatively stable, globally competitive economic region—or devolves into a more fluid, negotiated, and contested region where uncertainty remains the only constant.

Canadian Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre toured the United States from March 13 to March 19, with stops in Detroit, Houston, Austin, and New York City. In a pre-trip video message, he framed the trip as an effort to “leverage the relationship we have with the American people,” arguing that while Canada cannot control decisions made in Washington, it can draw on goodwill and shared interests across the border.

Over a series of stops, Poilievre’s trip dispelled the notion that he was indifferent to the United States or uncomfortable engaging Americans on U.S.–Canada relations. Unlike Maurice Sendak’s Pierre, Poilievre cares about bilateral relations—and about the damage done by U.S. taunts and tariffs since January 2025.

Poilievre and the Conservatives maintained a healthy lead over Justin Trudeau’s Liberals through most of 2024 and early 2025, but the April 28, 2025, federal election produced a new Liberal minority government. Critics attributed Poilievre’s loss in part to a perceived lack of credibility on U.S.–Canada relations, particularly uncertainty about how he would deal with U.S. President Donald Trump.

For many observers in both countries, that question has lingered since Mark Carney succeeded Trudeau as Liberal leader and became prime minister. What, then, did Poilievre’s March 2026 U.S. tour reveal about his approach to the bilateral relationship? Five takeaways stand out.

1. Long Time, No See

There have been five Conservative Party leaders since Donald Trump’s election in 2016: Rona Ambrose (November 2015–May 2017), Andrew Scheer (May 2017–August 2020), Erin O’Toole (August 2020–February 2022), Candice Bergen (February 2022–September 2022), and Poilievre, who won the leadership in September 2022. The British Conservatives have had six leaders over the same period, but all but one served as prime minister; none of the Canadian leaders did. Poilievre stands out as the only one of these eleven not to visit Washington as leader.

That absence matters. Poilievre’s reluctance may reflect Trudeau’s efforts to tie him politically to Trump, who was unpopular across Canada even before his second term. Whatever the cause, Poilievre has remained both little known and easily caricatured in Washington. In December 2024, Vice President J.D. Vance dismissed him as “Mitt Romney with a French accent”—a line that is inaccurate on its own terms and analytically thin. More pointedly, Donald Trump said in a March 17 interview on Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle, (as reported by Mickey Djuric for Politico):

“The Conservative that’s running is, stupidly, no friend of mine,” Trump said on “The Ingraham Angle” in a March 17 interview. “I don’t know him, but he said negative things — so when he says negative things, I couldn’t care less. I think it’s easier to deal actually with a Liberal.”

Whether Poilievre lost the 2025 election because he avoided Washington—or lost Washington because he lost the election—the result is the same: this outreach comes late. It may be too late to convince either Canadian voters or the Trump administration that he is ready to govern.

2. Engaging America Beyond Washington

Poilievre framed his trip as an effort to engage the American people directly and tap into longstanding goodwill toward Canada. As I have argued elsewhere, the foundation of U.S.–Canada relations is a durable friendship between the two societies. By that standard, the strategy makes sense—and, on its own terms, the trip largely succeeded.

The itinerary was bookended by business-focused engagements. In Detroit, Poilievre proposed negotiating a new Auto Pact, invoking the 1965 sectoral agreement widely seen in Canada—especially in Ontario—as a high point in bilateral relations. In the United States, however, the Auto Pact is remembered more ambivalently, particularly for the investment and production commitments extracted from U.S. automakers that nearly prompted the Nixon administration to withdraw.

In Houston, Poilievre met with energy executives to discuss oil and gas trade; by most accounts, the reception from the Texas business community was positive. The tour concluded in New York, where he addressed the Foreign Policy Association and appeared on Bloomberg. Both appearances were polished and effective.

The most revealing stop, however, was in Austin, where Poilievre appeared on The Joe Rogan Experience. Over more than two hours, he presented himself not only as a political figure but as a person: a fan of mixed martial arts, a student of Milton Friedman and Viktor Frankl, and an adopted child whose early life shaped his political outlook. He comes across as a familiar type—an intellectually driven conservative with a slightly nerdy intensity that is ultimately disarming. He moves fluidly between personal narrative and policy arguments, projecting both sincerity and confidence.

If Trump or Vance were to watch the episode, they might reconsider their earlier dismissals. More importantly, many Americans encountering Poilievre for the first time would find him more relatable—and more serious—than his caricature suggests.

3. A Moderate Conservative Message

Beyond optics, the trip conveyed a consistent and substantive policy message. Poilievre rejected Prime Minister Mark Carney’s suggestion that U.S.–Canada relations have fundamentally ruptured and distanced himself from Carney’s “middle power” framing at Davos. While firmly rejecting Trump’s suggestion that Canada could become the 51st state, Poilievre avoided personalizing the issue and declined to blame Trump directly for his electoral loss.

Instead, he emphasized renewal through familiarity: Canada should be a stronger ally (via increased defense spending), a more effective trading partner (expanding energy, agriculture, and critical minerals exports), and a more reliable neighbor (enhancing border security and cooperation on immigration and opioids).

This is not a radical departure from existing policy. Rather, Poilievre offers a recognizably conservative but ultimately moderate approach—one that contrasts with Carney’s framing without fundamentally breaking from it. It is a subtle repositioning, but a coherent one.

4. The Myth of Leverage—and Its Risks

Yet the intellectual foundation of Poilievre’s trip—his emphasis on “leverage” derived from American goodwill—raises concerns.

Such arguments have a long pedigree in Canadian policy discourse. From Saskatchewan Premier Allan Blakeney’s threat to cut off potash exports during the Canada–U.S. Free Trade Agreement negotiations to more recent claims about defense or energy leverage, Canadian policymakers have periodically argued that their contributions give them decisive bargaining power in Washington.

This view is misguided. At best, it overstates Canada’s influence; at worst, it creates expectations that are likely to be disappointed. More fundamentally, it rests on a faulty premise: that U.S.–Canada disputes persist because Americans do not understand Canada. In practice, most disagreements reflect genuine policy differences, not ignorance. Assuming otherwise risks underestimating the U.S. position—and misreading the nature of bilateral friction. This is the hazard that comes from overweighting the value of Americans’ goodwill toward Canadians and underestimating Washington’s capacity in the conduct of bilateral relations.

If leverage is an uncertain foundation for Canadian strategy, the question becomes where influence is actually built—and exercised.

5. Why Washington Still Matters

When I first came to Washington as a graduate student in 1991, I believed—as many Americans do—that the “real” country lay beyond the Beltway. That intuition still holds. But decades in Washington have also made clear that this city plays a central role in shaping both American policy and U.S.–Canada relations.

Poilievre chose not to include Washington in his tour. He justified this as a matter of principle: Canada has one prime minister at a time, and he would support Carney’s efforts in dealing with the United States. The position echoes Senator Arthur Vandenberg’s dictum that “politics stops at the water’s edge.”

It is an admirable stance—but, in today’s United States, an incomplete one.

American politics is too polarized for such norms to hold consistently. Relationships with Congress, think tanks, and policy networks are not optional; they are part of the operating environment of U.S. foreign policy. Private meetings, informal consultations, and off-the-record discussions provide essential insight into how Washington works—and how decisions are actually made.

For a leader of the opposition—and a self-described “prime minister in waiting”—avoiding Washington is therefore a strategic mistake. Engaging the American public is valuable and necessary, but it is not sufficient. Trust among leaders is built through direct interaction, not mediated through podcasts or social media.

The illusion of Washington is that its openness makes it legible from afar. In reality, the visible churn of debate sits atop deeper institutional dynamics that require sustained engagement to understand. Canadians, in particular, can be prone to overestimating their familiarity with the United States through media exposure and personal ties. That familiarity is real—but incomplete.

Epilogue

Poilievre’s U.S. tour was, in a small-c sense, conservative: modest in ambition, careful in tone, and respectful in execution. As an introduction to American audiences, it succeeded in presenting him as knowledgeable, serious, and grounded in both Canadian and American history.

At its best—particularly in the Rogan interview—it revealed a more personal and engaging side of Poilievre, one that may resonate beyond his political base. Unlike Sendak’s Pierre, he clearly cares. The tour is a useful beginning. The next test is whether Poilievre builds on this tour by engaging Washington directly.

Few countries are admired by Americans as consistently as Canada, and few countries admire the United States as openly as Canadians do. Yet admiration between neighbors rarely remains simple. Proximity breeds familiarity, and familiarity exposes flaws. Over time, the relationship between the United States and Canada has oscillated between admiration and ambivalence, warmth and disappointment. This paradox—of two societies that admire one another yet are frequently unsettled by what they see—has shaped the relationship for generations.

Many Americans admire Canada and many Canadians admire the United States. Yet the two peoples are too familiar with each other, at least superficially, to overlook flaws. The foundation on which the U.S.–Canada relationship was built—and still sustains it—is the friendship between Americans and Canadians. So when flaws on either side are on display, admiration becomes ambivalent, affection contingent, and trust diminished.

For officials engaged in managing bilateral relations, the cycles of admiration and ambivalence are atmospheric. Sunny days make it seem that anything is possible, and then storm clouds roll in and gloom rises.

The period following World War II was a peak of mutual admiration never seen before. As in World War I, Canada joined the conflict before the United States. But the American role was even more essential to the Allied victory and may have saved Britain, the mother country for both Canada and the United States. American soldiers, sailors, and airmen were impressed by Canadian grit on the battlefield and frustrated that European rivalries and Asian antagonisms had led to war for the second time in living memory. Canadians were sympathetic to this view.

As the United States worked to establish a postwar order that would make another world war less likely, a generation of American leaders shaped by these conflicts wanted Canadians on their team. From the founding of the United Nations to the Bretton Woods conference and later the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the United States ensured Canadians received a place at the table. Later, this instinct to include Canada in major Western initiatives persisted. Canada joined the newly created summit of industrial democracies—what became the Group of Seven—in 1976 during the Ford administration.

Canadians welcomed American invitations and joined in each new initiative with energy and enthusiasm. The good times for bilateral relations seemed as though they might last forever. But predictably, they did not.

The admiration of the early postwar decades did not disappear, but it began to fray in the late 1960s. The relationship entered a familiar cycle: admiration shaded by ambivalence.

The Vietnam War and the campus protests across the United States that produced clashes such as the National Guard shooting of students at Kent State University shocked Canadians. So did the civil rights struggle of African Americans, which exposed segregation and discrimination in law, and the race riots that ravaged major American cities from Detroit to Los Angeles. These events alienated Canadians from their American friends, whose attitudes about these upheavals were passionate and often puzzling to Canadian observers.

If these societal upheavals alienated Canadians, they also led many Americans to look at Canadians differently. Political differences were soon compounded by economic disputes. During the Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon administrations, Americans asked why Canada was not joining the Vietnam War as Australia had done. In Washington, long-standing grievances about Allied burden sharing during the Cold War sharpened.

Economic tensions soon followed. The Nixon administration accused Canada and other allies of maintaining undervalued currencies to gain export advantages in the American market. American politicians objected to Canada’s quiet solicitation of investment, production, and employment commitments from U.S. automakers and threatened to cancel the Auto Pact. In 1971 President Nixon imposed a ten percent import surcharge across the board without exempting Canada, breaking with the tradition of shielding close allies from such measures.

U.S. and Canadian leaders began reevaluating one another and downgrading expectations. The popular mood was uncertain, with people on both sides of the border calling for a return to the earlier spirit of goodwill. There were prominent voices on both sides who aligned themselves with the grievances of their neighbor. Some Americans argued that Canada should spend more on defense and avoid going behind Washington’s back in dealings with automakers. Some Canadians insisted that the United States was struggling through its own internal upheavals and deserved patience.

Canada was hardly immune from internal strains. Quebec nationalism began advancing arguments about unfair treatment by English Canada. Although these grievances were not comparable in scale to the racial injustices faced by African Americans in the Jim Crow era, the tensions were nonetheless profound. Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau’s invocation of the War Measures Act in October 1970 following the kidnapping of Quebec cabinet minister Pierre Laporte and British diplomat James Cross by the Front de libération du Québec shocked leaders around the world.

Nixon’s resignation following the Watergate scandal provided an opportunity to move past many bilateral irritants and restore goodwill in time for the U.S. bicentennial in 1976, the year Montreal hosted the Summer Olympics. The Ford and Jimmy Carter administrations demonstrated that the American constitutional order had survived a major test.

In Canada, the election of the separatist Parti Québécois in 1976 and the peaceful referendum on sovereignty in 1980—and the acceptance of the result by Quebec nationalists—demonstrated that constitutional politics could manage even profound national divisions.

And yet the ambivalence with which Americans and Canadians viewed one another remained strong until the late 1980s, when the Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement sparked a new mutual understanding between Washington and Ottawa. For many Americans and Canadians, admiration returned as the United States and Canada prevailed in the Cold War. Trade liberalization increased interdependence and boosted prosperity on both sides of the border. Canadian anti-Americanism faded, as historian Jack Granatstein documented.

Ambivalence Returns with Anger

Like our childhood innocence, the conditions of the immediate postwar era that fostered unconditional goodwill between Americans and Canadians are unlikely to return. The two countries will probably never again see each other as best friends, blood brothers, or soul mates. But the current phase of the relationship has moved beyond simple ambivalence toward something sharper: alienation and estrangement.

There is also a structural dimension to this paradox. American political institutions bring disagreements into public view in vivid ways, exposing passions on all sides. Canada’s parliamentary system often channels those same disagreements into cabinet discussions, party caucuses, and federal–provincial negotiations that appear in public only after they have been mediated by participants and the press. The result is a difference in political style as much as substance. Canadians see American contention in raw and sometimes theatrical form—from the Nixon tapes to the highly publicized investigations and hearings that punctuate American politics. Americans, when they observe Canadian debates, often look for similar displays of passion and conclude—sometimes incorrectly—that Canadians must be concealing deeper disagreements.

How did this new cycle of ambivalence and alienation begin, and what can be done to improve the relationship now?

During the first administration of President Donald Trump, his claims that Canada treated the United States very badly on dairy, steel, and aluminum gained wide acceptance among many American supporters and independents. Trump also amplified the longstanding U.S. demand that Canada and other allies spend more on national defense.

As Frédérick Gagnon has noted, many Americans do not follow the bilateral relationship closely. As a result, Trump’s repeated criticisms shifted public attitudes toward Canada from benign admiration—or simple indifference—to wary suspicion. Social media spread this critique, to which disinformation campaigns by malign actors added their own distortions.

The Joseph Biden administration ended the angry rhetoric but continued policies that placed pressure on Canada, including industrial strategies designed to secure American leadership in artificial intelligence, clean technology, and electric vehicle manufacturing. Trump’s return to office, however, brought an escalation of hostile rhetoric, including threats to make Canada the fifty-first state and taunts dismissing Canadian contributions to the U.S. economy.

Former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau admired President Barack Obama yet found ways to work with Trump, maintaining defense and security cooperation and preserving U.S. market access through the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA). Trump’s reelection nevertheless triggered renewed estrangement between Canadians and Americans, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic reduced the in-person contact between the two societies that had long softened political disagreements.

To be fair, earlier American actions had also unsettled Canadians. The U.S. response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 shocked many Canadians. Americans were, for a time, very intolerant of suggestions that the attacks might be connected in any way to U.S. foreign policy. Canadians were also aggrieved when Congress mandated passports for Americans returning home from Canada—and for Canadians hoping to enter the United States. Many of the post-9/11 security policies adopted by the George W. Bush administration eroded the easy border crossing that Americans and Canadians had long taken for granted.

Today the anger is palpable. Justin Trudeau has become the target of remarkable mockery and disparagement on social media by American—or purportedly American—voices. More Americans now have opinions about the Canadian prime minister, positive or negative, than has traditionally been the case.

In Washington, Canadian anger—not merely indignation but anger—is now mentioned at nearly every think tank conference discussing the bilateral relationship. For much of the twentieth century, admiration and ambivalence coexisted. Today, anger has begun to displace ambivalence in political discourse, shaking the foundations of the relationship.

The paradox of ambivalent admiration is that admiration does not disappear when disappointment sets in. Many Canadians still hold American ideals—and many Americans themselves—in high regard. Their frustration arises in part because the United States no longer appears to be living up to the idealized image many Canadians once held.

Part of the damage to the relationship stems from the relative silence of Americans in response to Trump’s treatment of Canada. If more Americans publicly dissociated themselves from that rhetoric, it might help cauterize the damage and confine the anger more clearly to the administration and the president rather than the country as a whole.

Americans, after all, continue to hold broadly favorable views of Canada and Canadians. Numerous public opinion surveys over the years—including those conducted by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs—have documented this enduring goodwill for more than three decades. Nevertheless, Canadian politicians have come to be viewed more skeptically by many Americans, particularly on questions of national and economic security.

Younger generations have introduced a term— “situationship”—to describe relationships that are neither clearly stable nor openly hostile, but unsettled and uncertain. A U.S.-Canada situationship would be the logical form as ambivalence and the tentative nature of current commitments is tinged with mutual suspicion and anger.

What would the future hold for both countries in a U.S.–Canada situationship scenario? Paradoxically, if Canadian anger abated, it would be likely to improve slowly as Americans and Canadians rebuild trust. Ambivalence may remain an enduring feature of the relationship for some time.

For now, admiration remains alongside the ambivalence—and despite the anger that has recently entered the relationship.

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As Canada and Britain respond to the U.S. and Israeli war against Iran, American perceptions of both countries as allies are quietly being shaped.

Wars have a way of clarifying alliances. When the United States deploys military force, allies face pressure to decide whether to participate, support the operation politically, or criticize it. Each choice carries domestic political consequences at home. But it also shapes how Americans interpret the reliability of their partners.

For Canada, that dynamic has appeared before. Americans consistently rate Canada as one of the most positively viewed countries in the world. Yet when asked which country is the United States’ closest ally, Americans often choose Britain instead.

Understanding why helps explain why the response of Canada’s prime minister to the Iran war may matter long after the conflict itself is over.

The war with Iran has placed U.S. allies in an uncomfortable position. Washington has asked some governments to participate directly in military operations or provide access to bases for air strikes. Others have not been asked for anything at all but still face intense pressure at home to declare where they stand.

Two countries traditionally seen as among America’s closest partners—Canada and Britain—illustrate the dilemma. Their leaders must balance domestic politics, alliance commitments, and their own judgments about the conflict. Yet their responses matter in another way: they help shape how Americans perceive the reliability of allies when the United States goes to war.

This dynamic is not new. In 1999, when I was working at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a survey by the Chicago Council on Foreign Affairs startled Canadians: more Americans named Britain—not Canada—as their closest ally. A decade later a Gallup poll produced the same result.

The finding puzzled many Canadians. Americans consistently rate Canada among the most positively viewed countries in the world, often giving it the warmest score on the Chicago Council’s “feeling thermometer.” Yet when asked which country is America’s closest ally, Americans frequently choose Britain.

The answer may lie in how Americans think about war.

For decades the U.S. military has ranked among the most trusted institutions in American society—far ahead of Congress, the presidency, or the news media. That trust shapes how Americans respond when the United States enters a conflict.

In the run-up to military action, debates about presidential authority and the wisdom of intervention can be intense. But once American troops are deployed and in harm’s way, many citizens rally behind the military and hope both for success and for their safe return home. In that atmosphere, continued dissent often carries social and political costs.

Foreign reactions therefore become unusually visible. Allied support reinforces domestic consensus and strengthens perceptions of solidarity. Criticism, by contrast, can resonate strongly because it validates domestic dissenters and provokes sharper reactions from supporters of the war.

Americans often judge alliances less by structural cooperation than by visible wartime solidarity.

Countries that fight alongside the United States in controversial wars are remembered as loyal partners. Those that criticize American military action—even when the criticism is justified—can leave a more complicated and sometimes longer-lasting impression.

For Canada, this dynamic matters.

The relationship between the American and Canadian peoples remains the foundation of the bilateral relationship. Leaders are temporary stewards of that relationship and generally tread carefully when disagreements arise. The Iran war is simply the latest moment when those dynamics are visible.

With Us or Against Us?

A comparison of Canadian and British responses to U.S. military operations helps illustrate the pattern. Both countries are NATO allies and close partners of the United States. Yet over time Britain has more frequently supported American military actions, particularly when those actions occur outside formal UN or NATO frameworks.

Canada’s record is somewhat different. Ottawa has generally supported U.S. military operations when they take place through multilateral institutions such as NATO or with United Nations authorization, while showing greater reluctance toward unilateral interventions.

At the same time, the Canadian and U.S. militaries remain deeply integrated. Through NORAD—the only permanent binational military command in the U.S. system—and extensive officer exchanges, the Canadian Armed Forces maintain close operational ties with their American counterparts. Within the U.S. military establishment Canada is widely regarded as a dependable ally.

This combination of structural integration and occasional political disagreement helps explain the paradox revealed in the polling data. Americans tend to like Canada very much, but Britain’s more consistent support in U.S. wars reinforces its reputation as America’s closest wartime partner.

History helps explain why. Over the past half-century, the moments that have most shaped American perceptions of allies have not been trade negotiations or diplomatic communiqués but wars.

When U.S. forces are deployed, Americans pay close attention to who stands beside them—and who does not.

Three episodes illustrate how these perceptions develop.

Vietnam

During the Vietnam War Canada refused to send combat forces and frequently advocated diplomatic efforts to end the conflict, while Britain offered political support to Washington but avoided deploying troops. The war divided American society deeply.

Canada’s refusal to join the conflict did not produce a diplomatic rupture, but it created a perceptual gap. Anti-war Americans often viewed Canada sympathetically, while supporters of the war sometimes interpreted Canadian criticism as evidence that foreign governments were undermining U.S. resolve. The migration of tens of thousands of American draft resisters to Canada reinforced the association between Canada and dissent in the American political imagination.

Grenada

When President Ronald Reagan ordered the invasion of Grenada in 1983, Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau publicly criticized the intervention. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher also opposed the operation privately because Grenada was a member of the Commonwealth.

Despite allied objections, Reagan proceeded. The operation was brief and broadly popular in the United States. In this case foreign criticism received attention but had little effect on domestic opinion. When a military action enjoys strong public support at home, foreign dissent tends to carry less political weight.

Iraq

The Iraq War produced one of the clearest modern examples of allied disagreement affecting American perceptions.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair joined the invasion with substantial combat forces, while Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien declined to participate. France’s opposition to the war triggered an especially dramatic reaction in the United States. Favorability toward France collapsed in opinion polls, and symbolic protests—including the renaming of “French fries” as “freedom fries”—spread through American political culture.

Britain’s participation reinforced the narrative of the “special relationship.” Canada remained broadly liked and continued to cooperate closely with the United States on border security, counterterrorism, and the NATO mission in Afghanistan. Yet on Iraq Canada was less visible, and Chrétien’s criticism of the war strained his relationship with President George W. Bush.

The chart below illustrates the pattern. Britain and Canada maintain consistently high favorability ratings among Americans, while France’s opposition to the Iraq War produced a sharp but temporary collapse in public opinion.

Another factor that shapes American reactions to allied criticism is defense spending. For decades U.S. officials have complained that many allies spend too little on their own defense while offering strong opinions about American military actions. The argument surfaces regularly in NATO debates and has been a recurring theme in U.S. domestic politics.

Both Canada and Britain have recently pledged to increase defense spending, in part to respond to pressure from Washington. Yet the political impact of those commitments in the United States has been limited so far. Many American policymakers still interpret allied criticism of U.S. military operations through the lens of burden sharing: if the United States bears the largest share of the costs and risks of collective defense, foreign objections can be easier to dismiss.

This dynamic does not eliminate disagreement among allies, but it helps explain why wartime criticism often resonates differently in Washington than in allied capitals.

Iran and U.S.–Canada Relations

The Iran war presents a similar challenge for Canada’s prime minister. Whatever position Mark Carney ultimately takes will inevitably influence how Americans interpret Canada’s reliability as an ally.

So far Carney has tried to strike a careful balance. He initially expressed support for U.S. concerns about Iran’s nuclear program and its support for terrorism while also noting the absence of consultation with NATO allies and the lack of United Nations authorization. He later declined to rule out possible Canadian military participation.

This cautious approach reflects Canada’s domestic political environment. Relations with Washington have been strained by President Donald Trump’s tariffs and rhetoric toward Canada. At the same time, both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remain unpopular with many Canadian voters. Carney leads a minority government and must navigate these competing pressures.

Britain’s response has been less consistent. Prime Minister Keir Starmer initially denied the United States access to British bases for strikes on Iran before later repositioning Britain as a participant focused on protecting British citizens and regional partners from Iranian missile and drone attacks. That hesitation risks complicating the perception of Britain as America’s most reliable wartime ally.

Memory and Narrative

Public perceptions of alliances are also shaped by national narratives. In the United States and Britain, the alliance forged during the Second World War occupies a central place in political memory. The shared struggle against Nazi Germany helped anchor the idea of an enduring Anglo-American partnership that governments have repeatedly reinforced through diplomacy, commemoration, and popular culture.

Canada once possessed a similar narrative of close partnership with the United States. But during the Vietnam War era Canadian political elites increasingly aligned themselves with one side of America’s domestic political debates. Although public goodwill between Americans and Canadians remained strong, American policymakers sometimes interpreted Canadian criticism of U.S. military actions as an extension of those internal political divisions.

Such perceptions—fair or not—can erode trust over time.

Carney’s Iran War Challenge

The Iran war is only the latest test of how Canadian leaders manage relations with the United States during moments of conflict. History suggests that Americans pay close attention to how allies respond when U.S. forces are engaged in combat.

Canada’s relationship with the United States rests on deep institutional ties—from NORAD to integrated supply chains—and on longstanding goodwill between the two societies. But wartime decisions can shape perceptions in ways that outlast the conflict itself.

For American policymakers, the lesson is that alliances are often judged less by the quiet work of cooperation than by visible solidarity in moments of crisis.

For Canadian leaders, the challenge is to navigate Canadian domestic politics without weakening the perception of Canada as a dependable partner in the United States.

When the United States goes to war, Americans remember who stood beside them. Whatever position Mark Carney ultimately takes on Iran, Americans are likely to remember it long after the current political moment has passed.

For decades, U.S. policy toward separatism in Canada has rested on what diplomats came to call “the Mantra”: the United States supports “a strong and united Canada,” and Canada’s constitutional future is for Canadians alone to decide. That formula has served both countries well. As an American who cares deeply about the U.S.–Canada relationship, I believe it remains the correct official stance.

However, as someone who is not a U.S. official, but who cares deeply about the U.S.–Canada relationship, I urge Canadians who are contemplating secession not to do it — at least not now.

The Mantra emerged after the 1976 Quebec provincial election that brought a Parti Québécois (PQ) government led by René Lévesque to power, and it was repeated in the lead-up to the 1980 referendum in Québec. It remained the standard response during the Meech Lake and Charlottetown Accord debates and throughout the 1995 referendum. The policy served the U.S. national interest well by signaling respect and restraint.

This year, a Quebec election that must be held by October 5, 2026, could produce another PQ government, led by Paul St-Pierre Plamondon. In 2024, Plamondon pledged to hold a third referendum if elected, and current polling suggests he could replace François Legault as premier.

Meanwhile, Alberta has seen renewed separatist momentum. The 2021 Alberta Citizen Initiative Act created a pathway for petitions with more than 400,000 signatures to trigger referenda on legislation, policy, or constitutional change. Premier Danielle Smith’s government amended the act in December 2025 to lower barriers for qualification.

The first successful petition under the amended law will lead to a referendum on October 19 regarding provincial authority over immigration. Smith has said that a question on separation could be added if independence advocates secure sufficient support.

These developments are occurring at a sensitive moment in U.S.–Canada relations.

Leverage and Its Cost

On January 23, 2026, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent remarked that an independent Alberta would be an attractive partner for the United States, citing frustrations in the province over pipeline access to global markets.

Premier Smith replied that while some Albertans favor greater autonomy or independence, they do not seek to join the United States. Still, the wording of any referendum question will depend on the citizen initiative process, and October 19 is approaching.

Secretary Bessent’s acknowledgment of separatist sentiment does not formally depart from the Mantra. But in the context of the sixth-year review of the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA), highlighting internal Canadian divisions inevitably increases U.S. leverage over Canada.

In the short term, maximizing leverage can produce concessions. That is the logic of hard bargaining. Yet leverage applied without regard for trust carries long-term costs. President Donald Trump’s references to Canada as a potential “51st state” have already strained goodwill across Canada’s political spectrum.

Trust is not sentimental; it is structural. In Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity, Francis Fukuyama argued that successful capitalist democracies depend on shared expectations about rule-following and institutional reliability. This is especially true when economies are deeply integrated but sovereignty remains distinct.

Businesses invest when they trust exchange rates, regulatory stability, contract enforcement, and supply chains. Voters, too, evaluate foreign partners through the lens of trust.

From the 1989 implementation of the Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement through the renegotiation of NAFTA that produced the USMCA, the bilateral relationship entered what now looks like a golden era. The United States negotiated rules with smaller partners — and largely abided by them. In doing so, Washington accumulated trust. Anti-Americanism in Canada declined, and public support for deeper integration increased.

The Mantra contributed to that trust. By foreswearing intervention in Canada’s internal constitutional arrangements, Washington signaled restraint. Even some Quebec separatists drew reassurance from the understanding that the United States would not intervene against their aspirations. The Mantra remains official U.S. policy, though Secretary Bessent’s comments tested its limits and, in doing so, rattled many Canadians.

Unity as Strategic Asset

As October approaches, the continued U.S. commitment to the Mantra will be tested. That it cannot be taken for granted reflects lost Canadian trust. At the same time, Ottawa and Washington are engaged in the USMCA review and other sensitive negotiations.

Divisions within Canada — particularly on questions of sovereignty — inevitably affect Canada’s negotiating posture. Even the possibility of constitutional rupture introduces uncertainty into economic and political calculations. In the language of negotiation theory, it alters perceived bargaining power and reservation values.

Canadian friends will rightly argue that the ethics of exploiting such leverage should be part of the debate in the United States and I agree. Americans should debate whether short-term gains justify long-term erosion of trust.

Yet the USMCA review is underway, and the Trump administration has shown a willingness to press maximum advantage not only against rivals but also against allies. In that environment, fragmentation strengthens the stronger party and Canada cannot wait for an American debate or future election to reverse the U.S. course.

Irrespective of the U.S. policy debate, Canadians have agency over domestic political debates and elections. While I do not dismiss the aspirations of Quebecers or Albertans who seek autonomy or independence - the Mantra remains correct: Canada’s future is for Canadians to decide - timing matters.

Major constitutional decisions taken during a period of heightened external leverage risk weakening Canada’s hand precisely when unity would strengthen it.

PQ leader Plamondon has suggested waiting until after the Trump administration before holding another referendum. That instinct reflects strategic awareness. Even so, the shadow of separation may influence negotiations over issues such as dairy supply management, energy, or regulatory cooperation.

Tradition and Prudence

G.K. Chesterton wrote that “Tradition is the democracy of the dead,” meaning that inherited practices allow the wisdom of past generations to guide present decisions. The Mantra is one such tradition, and it has served the United States well.

Another American tradition has been driving a hard bargain so as not to overpay for things. The problem with maximizing leverage in the short term is the long-term costs of this negotiating tactic arising from lost trust and goodwill.

The Roman historian Tacitus wrote in his Annals (Book II, section 26): Plura conilio quam vi perficamus (in English, we accomplish more by prudence than by force). This is the difference between tactics and strategy. The United States does not need to sow divisions among Canadians to achieve a better deal in the USMCA talks or on any other subject. By prudently forbearing the use of its leverage the United States can achieve more when Canadian trust U.S. policy and the principles that underlay it.

The true art of the deal is maximizing gain and minimizing price. The Trump administration risks doing the opposite with Canada.

Pessimism comes naturally to analysts. When a pessimistic prediction proves wrong, whoever you are advising feels relief and won’t complain; when an optimistic prediction is wrong, people will blame the analyst. But I tend to be an optimistic person, so even when things look bleak, I recall a line from Leonard Cohen, “Even damnation is poisoned with Rainbows.” There is always hope.

Since the United States Supreme Court ruled that the International Economic Emergency Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA) does not authorize tariffs (concurring with lower court rulings) there have been several excellent analyses posted here on Substack and circulating from think tanks and faculty who know the law. Many have pointed out that U.S. President Donald Trump has other legal routes to impose tariffs and is likely to use them. Indeed, he quickly announced the tariffs of 10 (then 15) percent would take effect Tuesday, February 24, 2026, under Section 122 of the 1974 Trade Act. These are emergency tariffs that limited to no longer than 150 days, after which they can only be extended if the U.S. Congress votes to extend them. The new 122 tariffs expire on July 24, 2026, just 102 days before the congressional midterm elections on November 3.

Will Congress vote to renew tariffs so close to midterm elections? Not unless voters change their minds on Trump’s tariff policy. The Pew Research Center found in early February that over 60 percent of those surveyed said they disapproved of Trump tariffs. The Marquette University Law School polls asked voters in September and November 2025 and again in January 2026 whether the Supreme Court should uphold lower court rulings against IEEPA tariffs and found majority support for what the court ultimately decided last week. The Fox News poll, taken after the Supreme Court ruling was announced, found majority support for the Supreme Court’s decision.

A further indication of the mood of Congress on the tariffs – specifically, the tariffs imposed on imports from Canada – came with a surprising vote in the U.S. House of Representatives to void the president’s emergency declaration, the legal premise for the imposition of tariffs under IEEPA. The Senate might have agreed, but the Supreme Court ruling makes this less certain.

Which brings me back to rainbows. The U.S. Constitution famously established a system of checks and balances among the branches of government. And here we see both Congress and the Supreme Court checking the executive branch. The pessimists have been questioning the strength of the rule of law and even the U.S. Constitutional order, and as noted earlier that is to be expected. They were wrong in this case, happily.

There is another institution, albeit one of the soft institutions U.S. economist Douglass North identified in his work, that has held up well so far: the United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA) that was negotiated during the first Trump administration. Prior to the Supreme Court’s decision, the administration exempted USMCA-compliant goods from tariffs. To be USMCA-compliant, goods must meet the rule of origin for North American Regional Value Content along with other necessary conditions.

Not only have past tariffs exempted USMCA compliant items from tariffs but the new, Section 122 tariffs exempt them, too. As Andrew Rudman and I wrote back in 2021, for Canada and Mexico, the bet to endure a renegotiation of NAFTA and accept the new USMCA has paid off, and the strength of USMCA once again protects their exports to the United States.

Of course, optimistic forecasts about American politics are often poisoned with plot twists. And as we have learned since 2016, one should never underestimate Donald Trump’s determination, nor (as we learned in 2024) his capacity to go from setback to comeback.

Yet there is hope for our institutions yet. They held when tested. A little optimism about North American trade may therefore be warranted. It would have made Leonard Cohen smile to see trade back on Boogie Street.

As details of several concrete agreements arising from Prime Minister Mark Carney’s visit to Beijing emerged, the initial reaction in Ottawa and Washington resembled that of an audience hearing an unfamiliar musical score performed live — attentive, uncertain, and waiting for a cue before responding. The moment of suspense was not about the substance of the agreements themselves, but about how Washington — and President Donald Trump in particular — would interpret them.

When the response came, it was unexpectedly calm. As BNN Bloomberg’s Lynn Chaya reported:

“Well, it’s OK. That’s what he should be doing,” Trump told reporters Friday at the White House. “If you can get a deal with China, you should do that.”

As Chaya also reported, United States Trade Representative Ambassador Jamieson Greer described the agreement as “problematic” because it would allow 49,000 Chinese-made electric vehicles (EVs) to enter the Canadian market. This concern surfaced just weeks after the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy called on Canada and other Western allies to protect their markets from Chinese exports, in order to push China away from export-led growth and toward greater reliance on its domestic market to absorb excess manufacturing capacity.

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Others will assess the merits of the agreements Carney concluded with Chinese President Xi Jinping for the Canadian economy, the Chinese economy, and Canada–China trade. The question addressed here is different: what do these developments mean for U.S.–Canada relations? And how should we interpret the apparently conflicting signals coming from Washington?

Understanding Trump

A useful clue to Trump’s expectations of other world leaders — including Carney — can be found in his remarks to the United Nations General Assembly in 2017, when he stated:

“As President of the United States, I will always put America first,” and that other leaders “will always, and should always, put your countries first.”

Canadian exports to both China and the United States have long been subject to tariffs and other restrictions. Carney’s agreements with Xi restore Chinese market access for Canadian agricultural products. From Trump’s perspective, Carney is doing precisely what a national leader should do: attempting to put Canada first.

Ambassador Greer’s concern about the opening these deals create for Chinese-made EVs reflects a position Trump articulated on January 13 at the Detroit Economic Club. There, Trump told a Motor City audience that he welcomed Chinese and other foreign automakers building plants in the United States and hiring American workers — emphasizing that domestic manufacturing is preferable to imports.

This stance echoes the approach taken by the Reagan administration toward Japanese automakers in the 1980s. It was reflected in changes to the U.S.–Canada Auto Pact embedded in the Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement, which established a 50 percent North American rule of origin for tariff-free access to the U.S. market. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) raised this threshold to 62.5 percent, and the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA) increased it further to 75 percent.

At the same time, both the United States and Canada maintain regulatory safety standards that any vehicle must meet before being sold in their markets.

Under the new agreement with China, Canada is permitting up to 49,000 vehicles to enter a market where nearly two million vehicles are sold annually. This is managed trade, not free trade. These vehicles will continue to face a six percent Canadian tariff and must comply fully with Canadian regulatory standards before they can be driven on Canadian roads.

Ambassador Greer is correct that this complicates the ongoing USMCA review, where the objective is greater alignment among the three partners. But North America has never operated as a formal customs union with harmonized external tariffs. Instead, internal tariff-free access has long been governed by rules of origin. Carney’s agreement with China will undoubtedly prompt discussion of automotive imports during the USMCA review — particularly as Mexico has raised tariffs on imported Chinese vehicles to 50 percent — but this added complexity is not insurmountable.

Understanding Carney

Balance has long been a defining characteristic of Canadian foreign policy. By offsetting one great power against another, Canadian prime ministers have historically sought greater freedom of action.

During the colonial period, the United States served as Canada’s counterweight to Britain — first as an alternative source of manufactured goods under British mercantilism, and later as an alternative market for Canadian primary exports after Britain repealed the Corn Laws. During the Cold War, Pierre Trudeau opened relations with Mainland China ahead of the United States and pursued a nuclear peace initiative through dialogue with the Soviet Union.

Canada’s search for equilibrium in managing its relationship with its principal partner has never been about switching sides. Rather, it reflects an effort to reduce overdependence on a single relationship and the vulnerability that dependence creates.

Carney has explored the possibility of a closer relationship with Europe. Yet European disunity, Britain’s post-Brexit position outside the European Union, and widespread insecurity stemming from Russia’s military aggression and U.S. economic pressure limit Europe’s capacity to function as a meaningful counterweight to Washington. Russia, meanwhile, is both hostile and — following its catastrophic war in Ukraine — too weakened to offer meaningful partnership, as Cuba, Syria, and Venezuela are increasingly discovering.

China therefore emerges as the only plausible alternative pole. About 4.7 percent of Canada’s population — approximately 1.71 million people — reported Chinese ethnicity in the 2021 census, giving Canada a cultural presence within the broader Sinosphere that Beijing cannot ignore.

This same logic shaped Justin Trudeau’s early approach after taking office in 2015, when he pursued improved relations with China. That effort collapsed following the Meng Wanzhou affair and Trudeau’s widely publicized and disrespectful encounter with Xi Jinping at the 2022 G20 Summit in Bali, Indonesia.

Carney entered office determined to reset the tone of Canada–China relations. At the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ meeting in Gyeongju, South Korea — after Trump publicly indicated he had no plans to meet with Carney, still angered by an Ontario government advertisement comparing him unfavorably to Ronald Reagan — Carney sought and obtained a meeting with Xi. The two leaders agreed to re-engage, setting in motion the visit and agreements concluded this week.

None of this occurred in secret. Carney’s Beijing trip was known in advance to the White House. Indeed, the fact that Carney succeeded in securing concrete outcomes from China may even enhance his standing in Trump’s eyes.

Chinese Takeaways

China’s outreach to Canada also occurred amid a broader diplomatic push toward U.S. partners following Trump’s renewed threats of tariffs and his willingness to act militarily without consultation with NATO allies. From Beijing’s perspective, such moments offer opportunities — not necessarily to peel allies away from Washington, but to test the resilience of U.S.-led coalitions and introduce uncertainty into allied coordination. In Canada’s case, China achieved limited success: modest commercial re-engagement without disrupting Ottawa’s fundamental strategic alignment with the United States or generating any material threat to U.S. interests.

At the same time, Carney’s Beijing visit may modestly strengthen Canada’s hand as the USMCA review approaches. Canada is frequently taken for granted in Washington as a predictable and largely compliant partner. By demonstrating initiative beyond North America — and by doing so transparently rather than covertly — Ottawa has signaled that it retains agency in shaping its external economic relationships. This challenges assumptions that Canada “doesn’t have the cards” in the tariff dispute. Carney has shown that Canada possesses some cards it can leverage — and that it can play them strategically rather than defensively.

Trump’s planned visit to China in April 2026 adds a further dimension. Carney’s ability to extract concrete concessions from Beijing may raise expectations in Washington. Trump is now likely to seek bigger and better deals for the United States than Canada’s — not only in economic substance but in political optics — reinforcing his self-conception as the ultimate dealmaker. That, however, is a problem for Beijing and not for Ottawa.

Taken together, these developments suggest the emergence of what might be described as a nascent “Carney Doctrine” in U.S.–Canada relations. During their second Oval Office meeting, Trump characterized bilateral tensions over tariffs and industrial policy as a “natural conflict.” Carney responded by reframing the relationship more structurally, arguing that Canada and the United States are “natural competitors” pursuing advantage in global markets. This formulation normalizes friction as an inherent feature of economic integration rather than a sign of diplomatic failure.

If sustained, the Carney Doctrine may subtly recalibrate bilateral expectations. For Canadians, it offers a way to interpret disagreement with Washington not as betrayal or crisis, but as an ordinary consequence of competition among closely integrated economies. For Trump, it may recast Canada less as a dependent ally and more as a capable counterpart — one that seeks to win but does so within the bounds of a durable partnership. In that sense, the Carney Doctrine does not weaken the bilateral relationship. It may instead make it more resilient by grounding it in realism rather than sentiment.

A happy new year began with the news—announced on LinkedIn—that Canadian business executive and political strategist Goran Pesic is establishing a new United States–Canada Institute in Washington, DC. Details have yet to emerge, particularly regarding staffing and programmatic focus. Still, any initiative devoted to understanding and improving the bilateral relationship is a welcome addition to the Washington policy ecosystem.

This is not the first recent expansion of analytical capacity on U.S.–Canada issues in the capital. Two years ago, the Macdonald-Laurier Institute launched the Washington-based Center for North American Prosperity and Security (CNAPS). Under the leadership of Jamie Tronnes, what began as a partnership with the Hudson Institute has grown into a broader platform engaging policymakers, analysts, and advocates across Washington.

A Longstanding—and Expanding—Policy Community

My own professional path has intersected with many of the institutions that have shaped U.S.–Canada policy debates over several decades. Earlier in my career, I was a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, a U.S. think tank founded by the late Herman Kahn that maintained an office in Montreal from 1974 to 1994 and took pride in its Canadian work. That legacy included a 1979 study on the development potential of Alberta’s oil sands—research that later earned an entire chapter of criticism in Andrew Nikiforuk’s Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent.

Hudson today remains home to an impressive group of scholars whose work touches directly on Canada and North America, including Matthew Boyse, Jack David, and Brigham McCown. Former Conservative Party of Canada leader Erin O’Toole also serves as a Distinguished Fellow there, reinforcing Hudson’s role as a venue for serious cross-border dialogue.

Before Hudson, I spent many rewarding years at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), working in the Americas Program and leading what was then known as the Canada Project from 1992 to 2006. Alongside an outstanding group of affiliated scholars, we examined the impact of free trade and, later, the consequences of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States and its closest partner.

After I left CSIS, work on Canada continued through its deep bench of scholars focused on trade, energy, and international security. Today, Ryan Berg and Christopher Hernandez-Roy—himself a proud Canadian—carry that work forward. CSIS research on the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement, critical minerals strategy (led by Gracelin Baskaran), border security, pandemic coordination, military procurement reform, and Canada’s global role remains among the most rigorous in Washington.

The Brookings Institution also has a long and distinguished record of engagement on Canadian issues. From Kent Weaver’s work on Canadian federalism and Quebec separatism in the 1990s, to John Austin’s research on the Great Lakes regional economy, to Howard Wial’s leadership on automotive industrial policy during the 2008–2009 financial crisis, Brookings has repeatedly returned to Canada at moments of strategic consequence.

While I was at Hudson, Brookings commissioned me to study U.S.–Canada border security in 2008 and 2009. More recently, the Brookings-led USMCA Initiative under Brahima Coulibaly and Joshua Meltzer has produced annual assessments of the agreement and the North American economy—analyses proving invaluable as governments undertake the mandated 2026 review.

Another important contributor is the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). CNAS has developed a growing body of research on U.S. economic security and the strategic value of deeper integration with Canada and Mexico. Led by Emily Kilcrease and Geoffrey Gertz, both former National Security Council staffers, the project has drawn an impressive network of collaborators across Washington.

Canada’s Presence Across Washington’s Think Tank Landscape

Beyond these institutions, many Washington think tanks engage with U.S.–Canada relations on a regular or episodic basis. At the American Enterprise Institute, Karlyn Bowman and Canadian scholar Colin Dueck have produced influential work on public opinion and U.S. foreign policy, respectively, at an institution long associated with Canadian commentator David Frum. At the Heritage Foundation, James Carafano and Andrew Hale have written on Canadian defense and politics. Richard Sanders, a former foreign service officer previously affiliated with the Wilson Center, now serves as a senior fellow at the Center for the National Interest, where he continues to write incisively on Canadian affairs.

Policy engagement on Canada also thrives where there is no formal Canada-focused unit. The Bipartisan Policy Center has built a strong record on immigration and visa policy, led for many years by Theresa Brown, a former head of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Canada Desk and the first DHS liaison officer posted to Ottawa. The Migration Policy Institute has produced essential research by Muzaffar Chishti, Julia Gelatt, and Andrew Selee on refugee flows at Roxham Road, visa policy, and immigrant integration.

The Atlantic Council has expanded its work on Arctic and energy security with explicit attention to Canada, while Oren Cass at the America First Institute has engaged Canada within debates over economic nationalism and the intellectual currents shaping the Make America Great Again movement.

Trade, Economics, and North America’s Strategic Core

Trade and economic relations with Canada are inevitably on the agenda of institutions focused on the United States’ role in the world. At the Council on Foreign Relations, Edward Alden and now Inu Manak—both Canadians—have done outstanding work on U.S. trade policy. At the Peterson Institute for International Economics, Gary Hufbauer and Jeffrey Schott have been central figures in North American trade debates since the days of the original U.S.–Canada Free Trade Agreement.

There are two additional channels through which Canada-related policy research consistently enters Washington debates: business organizations and structured, recurring engagement by regional and professional groups.

The most prominent business voice on U.S.–Canada relations remains the Canadian American Business Council, led for many years by Maryscott “Scotty” Greenwood and now by Beth Burke. The Business Council of Canada has established a Washington office and expanded its engagement on trade and economic policy. The Canadian Chamber of Commerce has revived its collaboration with the U.S. Chamber and jointly organized business delegations to the capital.

The North American Strategy for Competitiveness Organization (NASCO) regularly engages all three federal capitals, bringing perspectives from the continent’s heartlands on infrastructure, regulation, and competitiveness. Laura Dawson, former director of the Wilson Center’s Canada Institute, now brings the Future Borders Coalition she leads to Washington on a regular basis.

Legal and regional networks also play a vital role. The Canada–U.S. Law Institute, jointly sponsored by Case Western Reserve University and Western University in Ontario, convenes an annual Experts Meeting in Washington on issues ranging from trade to artificial intelligence regulation, critical minerals, and sanctions coordination. The Pacific NorthWest Economic Region (PNWER), headquartered in Seattle, unites state and provincial governments from Alaska to Alberta and the Yukon to Oregon, engaging business and civil society actors on energy transition, Arctic development, and regional integration.

What Was Lost with the Canada Institute

Against this broad and diverse landscape, the closure of the Wilson Center’s Canada Institute in March 2025 was a loss felt across Washington’s scholarly community. I served as the Institute’s final director, and it played a distinctive role as a nonpartisan hub dedicated to Canada, the bilateral relationship, and North American political economy. Its work was strengthened by the Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute and Polar Institute, which provided depth and reach to our analysis.

While Canada-focused expertise in Washington remains substantial, it is now more widely dispersed—and perhaps less visible—than when the Canada Institute served as a convening focal point.

My view is straightforward: the more points of engagement on U.S.–Canada relations in Washington, the better. The intellectual capacity already exists to diagnose problems and propose solutions across a wide range of issues. I hope, in the weeks ahead, to add to that capacity through a rebooted center at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies—an academic platform connecting Canadian scholars with Washington, engaging the next generation of American and Canadian leaders, and drawing on historical experience to inform contemporary challenges.

The Missing Ingredient: American Engagement

The most critical missing ingredient remains robust U.S. engagement. Too many Americans have been silent or complacent during the recent strain in the relationship with Canada. There are now numerous entry points into Washington policy debates—including the newest initiative announced yesterday. With so much intellectual kindling at hand, my hope is that we can spark renewed attention and make 2026 the year the United States and Canada actively work together to renew and strengthen their partnership.

There was a cartoon in the New Yorker several years ago in which one diner says to another, “You seem so familiar, but I know we have never met. Are you perhaps Canadian?” This captures a persistent paradox in U.S.–Canada relations: Canadians seem familiar to Americans, yet Americans often know surprisingly little about them.

This dynamic is not unique to international relations. Walk a dog through your neighborhood and people you pass will recognize the dog before they remember you. Familiarity requires little effort; knowledge requires energy and priority. Americans function without knowing much about Canada, and often openly admit their benign ignorance. They assume that if they need to know more—about Canadian politics, markets, or security—they can readily consult a specialist. Yet Canada expertise in the United States remains a niche field. There are not nearly enough experts to meet the need, in my opinion, if not the market’s.

For Canadians, the luxury of benign ignorance does not exist. Traveling to the United States requires a passport, navigating a different currency, airport security rules, and—if ill fortune strikes—either the complexities of the U.S. health care system or the overlapping jurisdictions of federal, state, county, and municipal law enforcement. More significantly, the United States is Canada’s dominant export market; its companies are deeply embedded in U.S.-led supply chains. Canadian consumers are also immersed in U.S. entertainment, news, and sports—cultural familiarity that is imperfectly reciprocated. Few Americans could name as many Canadian musicians as Canadians can American ones.

This asymmetry gives Canadians a kind of cultural advantage. A skilled Canadian can “play American” well enough to put U.S. counterparts at ease. Differences are downplayed. Yet this very capacity reduces incentives for Americans to learn about Canada. If Canadians look and sound somewhat like Americans, why probe deeper?

However, this performance of similarity has limits. At first, Canadians’ politeness works to make Americans feel welcome, a courtesy extended to guests. When Americans are no longer viewed as guests but as “part of the family,” Canadian candor emerges—particularly about U.S. politics, social issues, or cultural behavior. When I surveyed U.S. foreign service officers who had recently completed postings to Canada, several described this shift from courtesy to critique as jarring. They wondered if earlier friendliness had been inauthentic, and a few parents reported their American children had been involved in schoolyard conflicts triggered by unexpectedly blunt criticism from Canadian peers.

Familiarity, once questioned, can feel like deception.

Linguists warn English speakers learning French about faux amis—words that look familiar but have different meanings. The French “actuellement” means “currently,” not “actually.” Canada has its own faux amis for Americans. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms resembles the U.S. Bill of Rights, but its approach to certain liberties differs. Firearms ownership, constitutionally protected in the United States, is not an enumerated right in Canada. The Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination has no full Canadian equivalent; an accused person in Canada may be compelled to testify even to their detriment.

These are not trivial variations. They reflect divergent constitutional histories and debates about liberty, authority, and the role of the state.

Sigmund Freud once referred to “the narcissism of small differences”—the tendency to imbue minor distinctions with outsized significance because they matter to identity. For Canadians, difference from Americans is a central component of nationhood. Many joke that the defining feature of Canadian identity is being “not American.” As a young American scholar, this negative definition annoyed me, provoking the reaction: “What’s wrong with being American?” With time, I came to see that asserting difference from a powerful neighbor is a rational exercise in self-definition.

Seymour Martin Lipset’s classic Continental Divide: The Values and Institutions of the United States and Canada (1991) argued that our national mythologies shape enduring differences—from individualism versus collectivism to religion’s place in public life. When I first encountered Lipset’s work, some of the formulations (“America was born of revolution; Canada of evolution”) seemed glib. They now strike me as shorthand for deeper dynamics with policy implications.

Yet generalizations produce their own hazards. The United States and Canada are large, diverse, and regionally distinct. A Newfoundlander compared with a British Columbian reveals as much variation as an Alaskan compared with a Floridian. The Canadian most Americans “picture” is often an Ontarian—sometimes even a Toronto resident—reflecting the outsized influence of the Laurentian elite described by John Ibbotson and Darrell Bricker. One can find exceptions to any generalization, but national comparisons still resonate because they play a role in shaping group identity: to define “us,” one must also define “not us.”

Paradoxes are not problems to be solved; they are contradictions to be understood. The paradox of Canadians as familiar strangers challenges Americans precisely because it subverts expectations. Rationally, we know Canadians should differ—different history, institutions, policies. Emotionally, surprise at those differences can feel sheepish, even naïve.

This paradox has consequences for trust. Robert Putnam’s work on social capital formation emphasizes that trust enables cooperation. Canadian scholar Paul Pross’s concept of “policy communities” describes how people working in a shared endeavor—like the management of U.S.–Canada relations—develop their own norms, language, and expectations based on repeated interaction. The Canada–U.S. policy community has generally succeeded in overcoming the familiar-stranger paradox. One reason: Canadian personnel in foreign affairs and cross-border issues often remain in their roles for years, while U.S. officials rotate more frequently. Trust built on continuity is more stable than trust requiring continual reconstruction.

Francis Fukuyama’s Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity argued that economic integration requires deep confidence between partners. Where trust is partial, regulation grows, slowing the movement of capital, goods, and people. In Europe, trust enabled integration up to a point. In North America, trust has been more uneven, particularly regarding Mexico’s political stability and economic institutions. Yet even between Canada and the United States, more similar to one another than to Mexico, there have been limits to mutual trust that can be traced to the paradox of being familiar and strangers at the same time.

Even between the United States and Canada, trust is vulnerable. Looking back, the era from the Canada–U.S. Free Trade Agreement (1989) through early 2017 increasingly resembles a “golden age” of bilateral relations to me. During that period, the United States mostly adhered to rules it helped write rather than exploiting its economic heft to compel Canadian concessions. Since 2017, however, both the Trump and Biden administrations have used trade leverage more aggressively renegotiating NAFTA and employing US economic force in an industrial policy aimed at reshoring investment and innovation from Canada to the United States. These strategies may reflect domestic political imperatives, but they undermine trust nonetheless.

Trust, once impaired, is difficult to restore.

Understanding paradox can help. If Americans recognize that their assumptions of similarity are sometimes misplaced, they may feel less irritation when faced with difference. If Canadians recognize how their downplaying of difference shapes American perception, they may more clearly signal when conversation shifts from courtesy to candor. In short, acknowledging familiarity and difference together—rather than alternating between extremes—could strengthen bilateral expectations and credibility.

Rebuilding trust matters. North America’s global competitiveness depends in part on reestablishing confidence in cross-border economic relationships. Canada and the United States share the world’s largest bilateral trading relationship, and each will benefit from cooperation on energy, defense, innovation, and supply chain resilience. Yet success in these endeavors will require a mutual willingness to invest in understanding one another’s politics, pressures, and priorities.

We remain familiar strangers. But understanding the paradox—and its role in shaping trust—can help us become more familiar and less estranged. In U.S.–Canada relations, that is not a small thing. It is the foundation on which prosperity and security must continue to rest.

The relationship between the United States and Canada does not survive on autopilot. It endures because people—usually uncelebrated, often operating far from the spotlight—do the unglamorous, persistent work of making cooperation possible day after day. As the late Mount Saint Vincent University professor Reginald Stuart once observed, this work is dispersed across institutions and communities on both sides of the border, and therefore easy to overlook. We tend to notice it only when it fails.

At a moment when U.S.–Canada relations are under acute strain, the retirements of two such figures merit more than polite acknowledgment. They deserve reflection as reminders of what effective bilateral leadership actually looks like—and how much it depends on individuals willing to invest themselves fully in the relationship.

Canada’s ambassador to the United States, Kirsten Hillman, announced her departure from Washington in December. She arrived at the embassy in 2017 and became deputy ambassador to David MacNaughton the following year. By then, she was already widely regarded as one of Canada’s most accomplished trade negotiators, having served as chief negotiator for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, later renamed the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.

That experience proved indispensable when President Donald Trump initiated the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement. The outcome—the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement—was not inevitable, and it was not achieved through rhetoric or posturing. It required credibility with American counterparts, discipline under pressure, and a steady hand at moments when the process threatened to unravel. Hillman brought all three.

When Ambassador MacNaughton left Washington in 2019, Hillman became acting ambassador while Prime Minister Justin Trudeau searched for a successor. The search lasted far too long before the obvious became unavoidable: Hillman was already running the embassy, already deeply respected in Washington, and already the most effective representative Canada could field. In 2020, she became Canada’s first female ambassador to the United States.

Almost immediately, she found herself managing crisis after crisis. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Hillman was on the front lines of bilateral negotiations over border management and broader coordination of pandemic response. These were not abstract policy discussions; they affected families, supply chains, and public confidence on both sides of the border. Hillman handled them with steadiness and restraint at a time when neither quality was in abundant supply.

It was during that period, in November 2021, that she made a lasting personal impression on me. The Wilson Center had been asked to host an event featuring Prime Minister Trudeau and three cabinet ministers. The logistical demands were extraordinary, and when Canada’s advance team unexpectedly declined to reimburse more than $40,000 in costs, I concluded that we should cancel the event. After we notified Ottawa, Hillman called me directly—firm, but measured and humane—to urge reconsideration. We disagreed. I held my ground, knowing there would be consequences either way. When American donors ultimately stepped forward to cover the costs and the event went ahead successfully, it was a reminder that diplomacy is as much about preserving trust as it is about winning arguments.

That episode captured much of what made Hillman exceptional. She combined directness with respect, resolve with empathy, and a clear-eyed understanding that the relationship itself—its tone, its resilience, its institutional depth—was always the real asset at stake. In the years that followed, she consistently made time for the ecosystem of scholarship, policy debate, and public engagement that sustains U.S.–Canada relations over the long term. She appeared at the Wilson Center, engaged with boards and students, welcomed Johns Hopkins SAIS to its new home near the Canadian embassy, and supported scholarly exchange even amid institutional upheaval. When the Wilson Center’s Canada Institute closed earlier this year, Hillman reached out personally to check on the team and to convey that Prime Minister Mark Carney was aware and concerned.

I have worked in Washington long enough to observe every Canadian ambassador since Derek Burney. All were accomplished. Hillman stands apart for her steadiness across multiple, overlapping crises and for her personal investment in the bilateral relationship at one of its most harrowing moments.

Matt Morrison’s contribution to U.S.–Canada relations unfolded on a different stage but was no less consequential. We first connected in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. A native Michigander educated at the University of Michigan and the University of California, Berkeley, Morrison fell in love with the Pacific Northwest and made it his life’s work. In 1994, he became president and CEO of the Pacific North West Economic Region (PNWER), an organization founded to foster regional cooperation among U.S. states and Canadian provinces and territories.

Under Morrison’s leadership, PNWER became an indispensable forum for addressing nearly every major cross-border issue in the region: trade implementation under NAFTA and later USMCA; post-9/11 border security; cooperation around the 2010 Vancouver Olympics; pandemic response; Arctic development; wildfire management; invasive species; and earthquake preparedness. The list is long—but the point is not the enumeration. It is that PNWER, under Morrison, became the place where problems went to be worked on rather than argued about.

What set Morrison apart was not just the breadth of the agenda, but his method. He had a rare ability to translate complexity into urgency, and urgency into action. He would make a compelling case, propose something concrete and achievable, and persuade you—entirely sincerely—that one small step on your part could make a difference. And then he followed up. Persistently. Politely. Relentlessly. More often than not, it worked.

Morrison also understood something essential about the U.S.–Canada relationship: that federal diplomacy alone is insufficient. Real integration happens through states and provinces, governors and premiers, legislators who understand how policy plays out on the ground. Through initiatives like the Legislative Energy Horizons Institute, Morrison educated lawmakers on the deeply integrated nature of bilateral energy systems and brought them to Washington to engage federal policymakers and diplomats with confidence and sophistication. With Alaska, the Yukon, and the Northwest Territories at the table, PNWER became an early and persistent advocate for the western Arctic, introducing Members of Congress and Parliament to a region many had never seen—and converting more than a few into committed champions.

For those of us in the policy and academic world, PNWER was also a proving ground: a place to test ideas, connect with indispensable stakeholders, and see emerging issues—like the Cascadia Innovation Corridor or the private space economy—before they became fashionable.

Kirsten Hillman and Matt Morrison are hardly the only people who sustain the U.S.–Canada relationship, and both will be replaced. Their positions will continue. But the combination of judgment, curiosity, persistence, and personal investment they brought to their work is not easily replicated. At a moment when the relationship feels more brittle than it has in decades, their careers offer both reassurance and instruction. Good relations are not assumed; they are built—carefully, patiently, and by people willing to put the relationship itself at the center of their work.

They are giants—friendly giants—whose work mattered precisely because it made cooperation look normal. We should not forget how much effort that actually takes as we work to repair U.S.-Canada relations.

This is a brief post on a question that has been on my mind since I read the US 2025 National Security Strategy, which I wrote about here last week.

Where does Canada fit in a world of regional blocs? And where does Canada want to be?

The administration of US President Bill Clinton followed the logic of the North Arican Free Trade Agreement and reorganized Canadian affairs within US government departments and agencies into the Western Hemisphere region. Previously, Canada had been grouped with the countries of Western Europe, mainly NATO allies.

At the time and since, many Canadian officials and friends have complained that this change places Canada among countries with which it has little in common. And with the exception of Mexico - very different from Canada but connected via NAFTA and USMCA and the supply chains these agreements have engendered - the past thirty years have not seen US relations with the countries of Latin American and the Caribbean develop in such a way that the United States gained much from having Canada grouped with the other countries of the region.

There are exceptions to this: climate change is a common concern throughout the region, and Canada’s ties with Caribbean members of the British Commonwealth and Francophonie remain particularly with Haiti. Yet climate change is a global issue, and the Caribbean is a small part of US-Canada collaborative diplomacy.

Why does it matter? In the State Department and other departments and agencies, careers tend to develop within regions. I have known many US officials whose portfolios included Canada who were by training and experience Latin Americanists - and for some, Canada was a fascinating professional challenge, while for others, Canada was the odd and puzzling country within their remit and therefore one that received less attention or perhaps less successful attention.

Geography matters, and the Trump administration has, more than any administration since Clinton’s, been open to rethinking the organization of the federal government. For example, Trump recently added Greenland to the area of responsibility of US Northern Command. And it is openly considering replacing the USMCA with two bilateral agreements, undermining further the salience of North America as a region within the Western Hemisphere.

The new National Security Strategy divides the world into just five regions: the Western Hemisphere, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. Canada is mentioned once in the document in a list of major economies in Asia and Europe. As I read the document, I assumed that Canada was de facto addressed within the Western Hemisphere region. But arguably, Canada belongs among the developed economies when it comes to the issues and expectations that the National Security Strategy has for other countries.

If Canadians, or leaders in Ottawa, saw a benefit to the Canadian national interest in being associated with peers in Europe, there now may be an opportunity to convince this administration to make such a change. Joining the Asia region would be harder to do, and in many ways, Australia already fills a Canada-like role in Asia so were Canada included in this region it might receive less attention as a result.

The analysis in the US 2025 National Security Strategy is not kind to Europe, and many European allies might encourage Canada to remain overlooked in the Western Hemisphere rather than face the cultural critique that the document reserves for European governments. The US strategy calls for an end to the European Union and stronger national sovereignty for its members, more border security and defense spending and security self-reliance, less regulation and red tape, greater innovation in cooperation with US technology leaders, and less immigration from outside Europe. And the document suggests that the United States will support governments, parties, and movements that support these changes - intervention in the domestic affairs of allies that would be a shocking change in traditional US policy.

But consider the admonishments of Europe in the 2025 National Security Strategy in comparison to the Trump administration’s criticism of Canada. The arguments are similar, and distinct from the agenda that the United States sets out for Latin America, including Mexico.

The US agenda for Europe also echoes Prime Minister Mark Carney’s policy agenda, which is the reason that I emphasized the alignment of Washington and Ottawa on several elements in the US Strategy. Some readers complained that I was advocating Canadian alignment as a kind of unconditional surrender to Trump demands. The point I am making is that the alignment exists already, and if that was appreciated in Washington then the Carney argument that the United States are natural competitors, not naturally in conflict over a fixed amount of jobs or investment in a zero-sum contest, could lead to greater respect for Canada from this administration.

Of course, not all Canadians support the Carney agenda. And some Canadians are too angry with the Trump administration to see any point in taking the US 2025 National Security Strategy seriously. But you do not have to agree with President Trump’s worldview to benefit from its articulation in the new Strategy. Written down in 30 pages it can be engaged with and debated in a way that tweets and off the cuff comments cannot. Better understanding how Washington sees the world is a first step toward Canada deciding how it fits - and how it wants to fit - in this vision. The US National Security Strategy may not be decisive in shaping a new world order, but to paraphrase former President Dwight Eisenhower, plans fail but planning is vital.

On December 4, the United States issued a new National Security Strategy. These strategies are mandated by Section 603 of the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986 and have been issued generally once in each presidential term.

Most of these reports have name-checked Canada twice: first, as a NAFTA or USMCA economic partner; and again, as a NATO member. The Biden administration’s 2022 National Security Strategy added a third mention of Canada, praising Canada’s Initiative Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations, a response to China’s arrest of Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor.

The Trump administration’s 2025 National Security Strategy mentions Canada only once, on page 22:

America First diplomacy seeks to rebalance global trade relationships. We have made clear to our allies that America’s current account deficit is unsustainable. We must encourage Europe, Japan, Korea, Australia, Canada, Mexico, and other prominent nations in adopting trade policies that help rebalance China’s economy toward household consumption, because Southeast Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East cannot alone absorb China’s enormous excess capacity. The exporting nations of Europe and Asia can also look to middle-income countries as a limited but growing market for their exports.

Canada is cited along with other wealthy, industrialized countries as part of a strategy to address China’s economic impact on the global economy.

Looking beyond the name-check count, the new US National Security Strategy addresses Canada indirectly in the second half of the report, which addresses global regions. Each region has a label attached indicating the US position with regard to that region. These are interesting enough to list here:

A. Western Hemisphere: The Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine

B. Asia: Win the Economic Future, Prevent Military Confrontation

C. Promoting European Greatness

D. The Middle East: Shift Burdens, Build Peace

E. Africa

The fifth President of the United States, James Monroe, instituted the policy now known as the Monroe Doctrine in 1823. It declared the Western Hemisphere to be the United States sphere of influence in which no new European colonies could be established and called for the independence of existing colonies in the region - including those in British North America.

What is the “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine? The 2025 National Security Strategy defines it on page 15:

After years of neglect, the United States will reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere, and to protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region. We will deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere. This “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine is a common-sense and potent restoration of American power and priorities, consistent with American security interests.

This policy puts Moscow and Beijing on notice that Russian and Chinese involvement in Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, and other Latin American countries will trigger a response from Washington. Likewise, Iran’s collusion and support for OPEC member Venezuela is now riskier for Tehran.

Canada could benefit from the “Trump Corollary”. In recent years I have participated in tabletop strategic exercises based on a scenario in which Russia sends a scientific research team to an island in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, then reinforces the researchers with a military presence triggering a crisis and redirects US military assets away from places like Ukraine, eastern Europe, and the Middle East. It is a classic “gray zone” hybrid warfare scenario consistent with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s tactics elsewhere and a serious risk because of the limited domain awareness and deployable military assets that the United States and Canada have for Arctic operations. Canadian strategic planners can expect that Canadian efforts to invest in Arctic surveillance and military capabilities will be welcomed by the Trump administration.

Similarly, and Chinese or Russian effort to operate in or near Greenland, which the Trump administration shifted to US Northern Command’s Area of Responsibility in June, making it part of the Western Hemisphere in US strategy.

Economic Security and Economic Force

For the Trump administration, US economic prosperity and industrial capacity are central to American national security. The first half of the strategy articulates the administration’s six strategic economic objectives: (1) Balanced trade; (2) Securing Access to Critical Supply Chains and Materials; (3) Reindustrialization; (4) Reviving the US Defense Industrial Base; (5) Energy Dominance; and (6) Preserving and Growing America’s Financial Sector Dominance. These objectives are defined in the report, and for anyone who took consolation from the belief that President Trump was impulsive and undisciplined, the articulation of these objectives here will dispense with that illusion.

At the same time, there is room for the United States and Canada to partner in pursuit of all six of these objectives. Bilateral trade is largely balanced when one removes energy from the figures. As Canada finds ways to ship energy to new markets, even this trade could become more balanced - and to the extent that the US is refining Canadian oil, liquifying and loading Canadian natural gas at US ports for overseas markets, and mining uranium for the nuclear energy revival in the United States fueled by the need to power artificial intelligence, Canada will contribute to US energy dominance.

Although there has been too little progress in developing Canadian critical minerals reserves, and neither country has made much progress on the processing of critical minerals - the area in which China has become dominant - the Trump administration is aware that Canada contains minerals and materials that the United States needs. As the mandated review of the United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA) gets underway, one of the most common suggestions from industry for improving the USMCA is the addition of a chapter on critical minerals and rare earths trade and related investment rules.

Reindustrialization and strengthening the US defense industrial base are both familiar Trump concerns and rightly so: current US capacity in both areas is inadequate and this is an acute vulnerability when China’s strength in both areas is growing. In both areas, the urgency for the United States to address these vulnerabilities makes Canada critical. Canada’s industrial capacity is closely linked to that of the United States via sophisticated supply chains, and the two countries integrated their defense industrial bases through the 1956 Defense Production Sharing Agreement.

It is here that Prime Minister Mark Carney’s reformulation of what President Trump has called “natural conflict” between Canada and the United States as “natural competition” provides a paradigm shift. The United States may yet attain the objectives for reindustrialization and defense industrial base revitalization if future administrations adhere to the objectives and strategy outlined in the 2025 National Security Strategy, but not fast enough to meet the current threats to US security. Canada’s attention to its own reindustrialization and defense production capabilities will enhance security and economic strength for both countries. When both are playing catch up, this is not a zero-sum scenario, but one in which growing capacity becomes mutually reinforcing.

Similarly, Canada’s role within the US financial sector adds to its leading global role, with Canadian-headquartered banks like BMO and TD and the Maple Eight pension funds invest significantly in the United States and many of Canada’s leading companies list on US stock markets.

A Strategy for Canada’s National Security

Based on this preliminary review of the new Trump National Security Strategy, Canada has greater potential to support American national security than the document recognizes. Why is Canada being underestimated by the authors? Some part of this is ignorance, and another part is, I suspect, a perception of the opportunity cost of working with Canada.

Administration figures have explained the lack of progress on Carney’s proposed Security and Economic Agreement by blaming the difficulty of working with Canada. This seems odd on its face, but there is a Canadian reflex to bargain for the maximum benefit for the minimum price with the United States. And, as a decentralized federation in which provinces are important players, Canadian negotiators must often ensure that provincial stakeholders are willing to deliver on any commitment Ottawa negotiates. In combination, this often means talks drag on and on and result in a minimal Canadian contribution. Americans grumble that the juice you get out of the Canadians is not worth the effort of squeezing it out of them.

The 2025 US National Security Strategy reveals that this approach to Canada is putting US national security - and economic security - at unnecessary risk. Whether this is because US strategists underestimate Canada, or because the urgency behind US strategy amid growing threats makes the time-cost of securing Canadian contributions too high and so they look elsewhere for what is needed, Washington is failing to manage its relationship with Canada wisely and exposing US national interests to needless risk.

At the same time, Canada’s national security is revealed to be in jeopardy by this US National Security Strategy. The Trump administration is pursuing goals that Canada shares and could help to advance, but because Washington does not recognize this, Canada’s value as an ally is underestimated. The real-world consequences of this include Canada’s absence from the Australia United Kingdom United States (AUKUS) project, the Indo-Pacific Quad, and perhaps the USMCA if the administration chooses to replace the agreement with two separate bilateral arrangements with Canada and Mexico.

The 2025 US National Security Strategy and Canada’s near-absence within it are a sign that US-Canada relations are in trouble, but not beyond repair. The US is missing what Canada can and should do to address the challenges this strategy correctly identifies as urgent. Future US national security interests depend on Washington resolving its Canadian confusion. Future Canadian national interests depend on the ability of Ottawa to convey the alignment of US and Canadian security and economic objectives to US decisionmakers rather than relying on mere membership in alliances like NATO, NORAD, and the USMCA as evidence that Canada is important to the United States.

It has been widely reported that President Donald Trump considers himself a peacemaker. His efforts to end conflicts between Israel and Hammas, and Ukraine and Russia, are impressive – if not yet complete. But American voters in general care more about domestic policy than foreign policy. Will Trump make peace with the United States’ neighbors in time for midterm elections in November 2026?

Last week, the odds of Trump seeking a tariff truce with Canada and Mexico improved.

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Washington cast a long shadow over Parliament Hill as the Liberal government tabled its first budget under Prime Minister Mark Carney and Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne. Unlike in the United States, Canada’s federal budget is not aspirational; it is the actual revenue and expenditure plan the government intends to implement. Three clear messages emerge from this budget for U.S. policymakers.

Defense Spending

The first message concerns continental defense and border security. Following the July Group of Seven leaders’ summit in Kananaskis, Alberta, Carney proposed negotiating a new Security and Economic Agreement (SEA) with the United States. To prepare for those talks, he pledged unconditionally to raise defense spending to 2 percent of GDP in the current fiscal year and to increase funding for border and law-enforcement operations—particularly to combat fentanyl trafficking.

Progress toward a SEA has been limited, and there has been little acknowledgment from the Trump administration that Canada’s increased spending, though overdue, was appreciated. Given Canada’s history of unmet defense-spending promises, Washington’s restrained response is understandable.

The new budget nonetheless upholds Carney’s commitments in full. In recent weeks, some Canadians speculated that the government might delay meeting the NATO target to preserve funding for popular domestic programs, while others questioned whether doing so would reward U.S. pressure tactics. Against this backdrop, the budget signals that Carney intends to keep his word to Trump and fulfill Canada’s allied defense obligations.

Still, Carney leads a minority government that requires opposition support to pass the budget. Failure would trigger an election. Skeptics in Washington will also note Canada’s chronic difficulties in translating defense appropriations into actual capabilities. Yet the larger point remains: Carney has sacrificed other spending priorities to address longstanding U.S. security concerns.

Infrastructure and Industrial Policy

Despite Carney’s responsiveness on defense, U.S. tariffs on Canadian exports have persisted and, in some cases, expanded. The budget reflects this reality in two major ways. First, it allocates C$280 billion over five years for “generational investments” in infrastructure—pipelines, ports, and emerging-technology sectors such as artificial intelligence and quantum computing. Second, it provides support for firms affected by U.S. tariffs to preserve industrial capacity and skilled employment in Canada, extending earlier assistance to steel and aluminum producers and potentially to automotive and softwood lumber firms as well.

The budget also includes funding to attract research talent from abroad, including Americans, and to welcome international students unable to secure U.S. visas. An additional C$110 billion is earmarked for regional development and a new “productivity super-deduction” to incentivize capital investment.

The federal deficit is projected at C$78.3 billion this year—a level Ottawa cannot sustain indefinitely. Yet the United States’ shadow looms here too. If Canada can shore up vulnerable industries, expand infrastructure for access to non-U.S. markets, boost productivity, and attract global talent over the next several years—while U.S. tariffs are eased or adapted to—this budget could give Canada the foundation to rebound should a future U.S. administration shift course on trade policy.

Carney’s message to Washington is clear: he intends both to defuse bilateral tensions and to compete with the United States for investment and jobs, all while reducing Canada’s dependence on its southern neighbor.

Election Risk

The budget’s fate now rests on a “confidence vote” in the House of Commons. The Liberals hold 169 of 343 seats—three short of a majority. If opposition parties unite against the budget, an election could come as soon as December. Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has vowed to oppose any budget with a deficit exceeding C$42 billion. New Democratic Party interim leader Don Davies has branded it an “austerity budget,” while Bloc Québécois leader Yves-François Blanchet has demanded Quebec-specific projects in exchange for support—none of which appear to have been included.

Carney and Champagne have taken a calculated risk. Their budget offers a bold response to U.S. tariffs and geopolitical pressures rather than a “Christmas tree” filled with gifts for opposition parties. This could provoke an election, but Carney may stand to gain. A larger Liberal mandate would strengthen his hand in future negotiations with Washington.

Although Canadians dislike winter elections and may resent returning to the polls so soon after the April 28 vote, the contrast with the ongoing U.S. federal government shutdown may remind voters of the perils of political paralysis—and of the need for steady leadership in Ottawa.

In sum, Carney’s budget communicates resolve to Washington. How Parliament responds will reveal whether that resolve extends beyond rhetoric, offering the most important signal yet to the Trump administration as it weighs its next move.