First published on The Marxist Worker

What seemed like a joke at first has caused a political earthquake in Canada, hastening the downfall of Justin Trudeau and sparking discussion about how (or whether) to defend Canadian sovereignty. Donald Trump first toyed with the idea of annexing Canada last December and has since doubled down, calling the Canada-US border an “artificially drawn line,” and threatening to use “economic force” including 25 percent tariffs to compel Canada to become the 51st state. His statements came as part of a broader expansionist plan to buy Greenland from Denmark and reclaim the Panama Canal.

Canadian politicians left, right, and centre all slammed the idea of Canada becoming the 51st state, trying their best to whip up a sense of patriotism and foster a “Team Canada” approach to combat Trump’s threats. However, not all sectors of Canadian society have been onboard, with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith refusing to sign on to Trudeau’s plan to impose counter-tariffs, and some Canadian figures like Kevin O’Leary proposing an economic union with the U.S. Despite Trump’s personal unpopularity in Canada, 30 percent of Canadians said they would support annexation (given certain conditions), including 43 percent of young people. It’s prompted questions such as: why does such a sizable group not value Canadian sovereignty, what is Trump’s real agenda, and what should be the response from the Left?

What Is Trump Doing?

Since 2016, the rule of thumb for understanding Trump has been, “Don’t take him literally, but take him seriously.” In this case, Trump isn’t literally trying to annex Canada, but his bluster expresses a genuine sense among sectors of the U.S. capitalist class that the current framework of the U.S.-Canada relationship needs to change. Trump is using his tried-and-true method of starting with an outlandish demand to get his opponent on the defensive, then negotiating down to what he actually wants.

Trump has outlined a few of his gripes with the Canada-U.S. relationship: the drugs and migrants supposedly “flowing” across the border, Canada’s relatively low military spending, and crucially, the U.S. trade deficit with Canada, which he calls a “subsidy.” Trump clearly wants Canada to spend more on its border security and armed forces, especially as arctic sea ice melts and opens up more trade routes for the U.S., Russia, and China to compete for. However, perhaps the deeper issue is U.S. capitalism’s growing competition with China and other regional powers as international investors, its long-term decline in profitability, and more recent decline in productivity, necessitating an adjustment of economic relations if the U.S. is to avoid a major crisis. U.S. capitalists are already making a deliberate attempt to reshore industry, and Trump has expressed his desire for Canadian auto production to move to Detroit. U.S. capitalists would also benefit from lower oil prices from Canada, and it’s possible that a renegotiated USMCA (“NAFTA 2.0”) could achieve that. At the absolute maximum, Trump might try to establish a customs union with Canada akin to the European Economic Community before it became the EU, removing existing trade barriers and guaranteeing common external tariffs.

It’s unclear how the Canada-US relationship will change or by how much, but it’s clear that the status quo can’t hold forever. Some Republicans are defending Trump’s bluster despite the fact that even talking about tariffs is causing uncertainty across global markets. His threats can’t simply be dismissed as “riling up the base,” — they’re a sign of real change to come.

Canadian Nationalism Is Reactionary

Canadian workers have reason to be concerned that economic or political “unity” on Trump’s terms would lead to the slashing of labour and environmental regulations, the outsourcing of unionized jobs, and an attack on Canadian Medicare. However, Canadian workers shouldn’t fall into the trap of “rallying around the flag” or supporting “Team Canada” as a defence against Trump’s threats. When Ontario Premier Doug Ford says “Canada is not for sale,” it begs the question of who “owns” Canada, and who has the right to sell it? Ford has repeatedly sold public land to private developers, so how can he be trusted as a “defender” of the Canadian public? Trudeau says he governs for “all Canadians,” yet his government has attacked Indigenous land defenders to clear the way for oil companies, and attacked the rights of striking workers to protect corporate profits.

The reality is that the Canadian state is not a state for “all Canadians” — it’s a tool of the Canadian capitalist class to police workers and oppressed people at home while smashing barriers to imperialist super-exploitation abroad. Canadian workers have no interest in defending a reactionary, anti-worker institution built on settler-colonialism, founded by counterrevolutionary British monarchists, and remains a key ally to U.S. imperialism and Apartheid Israel. As an imperialist power itself, Canada hosts 75 percent of the world’s mining companies, and Canadian banks exert oligarchic control over much of the English-speaking Caribbean.

Further, the boundaries of the Canadian state don’t represent any organic national community with a distinct economy, culture, language, or system of infrastructure. Canada is a prisonhouse of nations, engulfing more than 50 Indigenous nations and Quebec, none of whom were asked if they want to join confederation. Trump is right that the Canada-U.S. border is an “artificially drawn line,” demarking nothing but the limitations of the American Revolution and attempts by the British Empire to prevent American expansion northward. Canada never had a bourgeois revolution to unite the nation, which is why so many regionalantagonisms persist to this day. Canadian cultural identity — to the extent it exists at all — is very weak, artificially perpetuated by laws mandating that radio stations play at least 35 percent Canadian content, and TV stations at least 50 to 60 percent. The Canadian government spends hundreds of millions of dollars every year trying to foster a distinct Canadian culture, but is increasingly facing an uphill battle thanks to the globalized nature of the internet.

Various left formations like the Waffle have tried to foster a Canadian “left nationalism,” but this perceived struggle for national liberation didn’t lead the Waffle to revolutionary conclusions like it did for revolutionaries in the Global South. Rather, it reflected the Waffle’s reformist and chauvinist politics. Their 1969 manifesto “For an Independent Socialist Canada” doesn’t mention the right of Quebec to self-determination or anything about Indigenous nations at all, but it claims that “The most urgent issue for Canadians is the very survival of Canada.” 56 years later, despite greater economic integration with the U.S., the Canadian state persists. Canada is a useful ally of U.S. imperialism in that it does much of the dirty work the U.S. doesn’t have capacity for, its lax mining laws are useful for American investors, and Canada’s monarchist, ultra-federal political system makes it almost impossible to make substantial reforms without overthrowing the system entirely. Canada is not a victim of U.S. imperialism, but a willing collaborator.

Cross-Border Solidarity Needed

Instead of rallying around the flag and playing into politicians’ “Team Canada” mentality, Canadian workers ought to reach out to workers across the border and look for ways we can collaborate on a class-independent basis. The interconnectedness of the Canadian/U.S. economy means that shocks affecting U.S. workers will inevitably affect Canadian workers, and vice-versa to an extent as well. Imagine how much the 2023 UAW strike could have been strengthened if it would’ve involved Canadian workers across the Detroit River? Conversely, imagine how much the 2024 CUPW strike could have been strengthened if it would’ve involved American postal workers?

Workers have no interest in respecting the artificially drawn line on the 49th parallel; a line that designates workers as “illegal” if they cross it without going through the arrival country’s byzantine immigration system. Their “illegal” status makes it easier for employers to underpay them and deny them labour rights, undermining the labour movement as a whole. Indigenous nations such as the Mohawks, Ojibway, and Blackfoot have even less interest in respecting the border, as it divides them from their own traditional territories and people. Smashing the border on the 49th parallel is an essential precondition for Indigenous nations’ right of self-determination, and would greatly increase workers’ freedom of movement across the continent.

Instead of shrouding ourselves in myths about Canada’s “enlightened,” “tolerant” society in contrast with “backwards” Americans, Canadian workers should learn from the most revolutionary moments in American history, from the struggle against British monarchism, to the mass desertion of ex-slaves that led to the abolition of slavery, to the Teamster rebellion of 1934, to the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, to the George Floyd uprising, etc. Only by understanding our shared history and fighting together against our intertwined ruling classes can we demolish the U.S. and Canadian regimes — the “Dr Evil and Mini-Me” of imperialist super-exploitation and domination.