An image of water carving a channel in a gravel path that diverges and then joins up again.

It has been frantic weekend here in Canada. The President of the United States implemented an executive order that imposed a 25% tariff on every single item exported from Canada to the United States, except 10% on energy. In retaliation, our federal and provincial governments have imposed some selected tariffs on American imports to Canada and in some cases we have closed markets for procurement for American services or for products like American produced alcohol.

We are in a trade war that will likely lead to a recession in Canada within mere months on par with the 2008-09 recession. Back then, our GDP shrank by about 2.5%. We are in more than liminal chaos.

To make it worse, the President has declared that he will increase those tariffs if we don’t do what he says or if we retaliate. We have already retaliated.

Why has he done this? Well the stated reason is that there is a national emergency involving fentanyl and illegal immigrants crossing the northern border. Trump has said that the tariffs will be lifted if we make progress on these issues but he gave no indicator of what that means or would look like.

Let’s be clear. The opioid crisis affects both of our countries severely. For the past five years we have had a US-Canada Joint Steering Committee on this issue. But in terms of a border issue about 0.2% of the US’s fentanyl supply comes over the border. Immigrations issues over the northern order as similarly negligible. There are always issues to deal with.

But the President’s plan is clearly not to address these issues on the northern border through forcing the Canadian economy to its knees. We are already working on these issues together. Indeed I was in North Carolina in 2023 supporting incredible local leadership on opioid issues.

Instead, his agenda appears to be nothing more than the capitulation of Canada to US economic if not political sovereignty.

When dealing with Donald Trump, my heuristic has been “he will do what he says he will do and he will always lie about why.” This weekend the entire country has been talking about what we can do, how we can react, what is going to happen to different sectors of our economy. Fans have booed or sat through the Star Spangled Banner at NHL and NBA games. People are going through their inventory of household items and looking for Canadian made alternatives. There is palpable anxiety here about what comes next and what we have the power to do.

And yet, I haven’t heard much from my American friends on this. Not at all surprising because while this has been going on, your federal government is being chaotically dismantled. Also the tariffs that Canada has imposed on US goods are not really going to affect you all much. Although we are the US’s biggest trading partner, what we send to the US is dissolved into a market ten times the size of ours. You will feel price shocks at the gas pump and on imported foods from the US tariffs. If you buy a “domestic” car, you’re going to pay about $5000 more. Maybe the effect of these tariffs on Mexico will hurt you more on a day-to-day basis. But you might not see or understand how devastating the US’s opening volley in this war against Canada has been. Or what we are afraid will happen next.

This is a stupid and needless action. It has undone almost 5 decades of free trade between Canada and US which has deeply integrated our economies. It is going to result in millions of layoffs in Canada just when people are recovering from the economic shocks of COVID. We are already planning COVID-level responses to this to ensure that workers in Canada who are laid off can pay their rents while this is all happening. But who knows what will happen in the long run because there may not be a business to come back to. Our dollar will tank as we try to attract international markets for our goods.

So my American friends, it’s no surprise that this is happening of course. We all knew it would if Donald Trump got elected, becasue he told us he would. He has slid the knife between our ribs and seems intent on twisting it. I believe him when he says he wants to annex Canada, and I believe he will try everything in his power to do that economically rather than militarily. A couple of weeks ago I outlined how I think this might go, and I think this is still a plausible scenario. So thank you for not joking about the “51st state” thing any more.

We don’t want to be Americans. We don’t need to be part of the US, and you don’t need us to be Americans.

What I want you to know is that the work we do together matters no matter what our governments say about each other. The work I get to do with you in the US is in support of building organizations, teams and communities that builds community, resilience and connection. And many have you have helped support our organizations and communities here doing the same work. We’ve done that together because healthy communities and organizations that are founded on the work we do and are timeless capacities for dealing with change, for building better places and creating more sustainable goodness in the world.

So on that score – on the levels of friendship and colleagueship – nothing has changed. We are all victims of these kinds of macroeconomic and geopolitical machinations.

You all have work to do to deal with this stuff. In Canada we all have stuff to do too. But you and I? Our eyes have always been on bigger work of supporting life-giving contexts for people in their organizations and communities. The context always changes. The desire and need for belonging, connection and community is evergreen.

Onward.