Consider This from NPR - How Canada's national election has been largely shaped by Donald Trump

Episode Date: April 27, 2025

U.S. President Donald Trump's trade war and threats to make Canada the 51st state have become some of the biggest issues facing Canadians as they head to the polls in their federal election on April 28th. Scott Detrow speaks to Lloyd Axworthy, a member of the Liberal party, who served as Canada's top diplomat between 1996-2000, about the schism between the two longtime North American allies and how Canada's next prime minister can reposition the country's foreign and economic policy in the face of growing tensions with the United States. For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Ahead of Canada's federal election, there seems to be a groundswell of national pride. Elbows up! I love you Canada! You guys are brave! Go Canada, go! Go Canada, go! Elbows up, that's a hockey term expressing a willingness to defend yourself, to throw a punch.

And it's a phrase Canadians have been using to express their nationalism at rallies across the country, like this one in Halifax, Nova Scotia. And that wellspring of Canadian pride? It's mostly thanks to U.S. President Donald Trump. Here's how comedian Sean Majumder put it. We are a good neighbor who will still be there for our big brother, But we don't need you anymore, America. New tariffs have threatened to crush the Canadian economy, which depends heavily on U.S. trade. In response, many Canadians have canceled planned travel to the U.S. and are avoiding

even boycotting American-made products in favor of Canadian ones. But it's not just tariffs that are causing Canadians to sour on the U.S. and embrace national pride. I spoke to Governor Trudeau on numerous occasions and we'll see what happens. President Trump has mocked the former Canadian prime minister and repeatedly threatened Canada's sovereignty by expressing his desire to turn Canada into the 51st American state. On Friday, he did it again, telling Time Magazine he wasn't trolling

and that he was serious about taking over Canada. For me personally, this is not funny. Like I've heard some people say, oh, you know, he's just joking, he's just joking. No, this is not funny. This is not funny to us. It is a threat, it is real. That's Barbara Wilson.

She's a retired teacher from Milton, Ontario, about an hour west of Toronto. For her and millions of other Canadians, Donald Trump and the risks he poses to Canadian sovereignty are very much on the ballot in tomorrow's federal election, which many believe to be the most consequential in decades. Yeah, we're feeling vulnerable and it's not good and we need strong leadership. I think we have two very competent, capable people that could lead, but the voters will decide. The constant threats, the unpredictability, the threats of annexing Canada, the tariffs and so on have been felt really hard here.

Simra Sevi is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Toronto. She says Trump is the dominant issue on the ballot. Voters are looking for leaders who can handle the unpredictability coming from south of the border. Sevi says that unpredictability has helped upend what was supposed to be an easy electoral victory for Pierre Poliev and the conservative opposition party. At one point, the party was leading the liberals in the polls by more than 20 points. But all of that has been turned on its head

thanks to the resignation of an unpopular prime minister and more than anything, the arrival of Trump. Now the liberals, led by newly minted prime minister Mark Carney, have caught up. Here's Seve again. The liberals went from being written off three months ago, and now we're talking about them

possibly forming a majority government. That's a major shift in Canadian politics. Consider this. The race between Canada's two major parties has tightened in recent days. But no matter which party wins the election on Monday, the country's next prime minister will have to navigate an increasingly hostile relationship with the United States under Donald Trump. Coming up, we will speak to a former Canadian foreign minister, a member of the Liberal

Party, about what has been lost between the two former allies amid threats to Canada's sovereignty. From NPR, I'm Scott Detro. It's Consider This from NPR. Canadians head to the polls tomorrow in an election that many believe to be the most consequential in decades. And a big reason for that is America's president, Donald Trump. And no matter which party wins tomorrow, Canada's new leader will need to think about how the

country will position itself in relation to Trump at a rapidly changing world order. I talked about all of this with Lloyd Axworthy, a member of the Liberal Party who served as Minister of Foreign Affairs in Canada from 1996 to 2000. These days he chairs the World Refugee and Migration Council. When we spoke, he told me that the strong alliance between the U.S. and Canada, a hallmark of global affairs for generations, has been severely disrupted. A couple of major ruptures have taken place. One is the fundamental question of trust. That's the lubricant that makes things happen. And we've always had this trusting relationship and now it's lost. And what a lot of

Canadians believe, and I just, you know, I had a dinner with a group of friends last night who basically said what bothers them is the most that over, I the most that Over what 70 million Americans voted for Donald Trump knowing that he had these kinds of really Extremist positions and are still supporting him. I mean, I know his approval ratings, I guess are coming down But that really means that how in the future Can we trust because it's clear that the kind of democratic safeguards that were put in place while the constitution are just being overridden. So it would take some time and it would take some very different opening but I think it can happen. Let me just say, I mean,

I when I was foreign minister of Canada, I guess one of my best friends was Madeline Albright. We had some differences certainly, but we we also work cooperative together to make sure that things like salmon and water and trade and so on we're working well. We don't walk around with a chip in my shoulder but the provocation i think is there when you're talking about a threat when you're talking about rhetoric about land acquisition when you're talking about rhetoric about land acquisition, when you're talking about strong measures, these are all pretty serious terms that sometimes lead to very serious consequences of the far extreme of things. We're talking about the things that the wars start around. How much worse do you think the relationship

between the United States and Canada, as strange of a question as this is to ask, could get? Well, I think one of the strategies that the Canadian governments will be following is we don't want to get into sort of a hot war with the United States. But we will be working very actively to develop collaboration with other countries.

Mexico is a good example. But there are other countries around the world who are feeling the impact of Mr. Trump's sort of aggressiveness. You'd be amazed, Scott, to see how Canadians have responded. All the bourbon and American wine are off the shelves. People are selling their condos in Florida. People are no longer sort of buying American products. And it's just a full-scale kind of protest and I think the election itself will solidify that, it will unify Canadians around that and therefore I think the American

government and Mr. Trump and his administration will have to deal with a very unified and very sort of strongly deterrent country of 40 million people to say, we're not accepting this kind of aggression and intervention. Can I just take a step back? And I want to ask you about something I was thinking about. The last question I asked you was what do you think about the prospect of an American-Canadian war? You are the former Foreign Secretary of Canada.

You're talking about your close relationship with Madeleine Albright, the close relationship between the US and Canada. How does it feel to even be having this theoretical conversation? It just seems like such a strange thing to be asking. Oh, I know. Scott, it's surreal. I mean, I don't feel that I would ever have had to be engaged in this kind of conversation.

Canadians are first, they're angry, but they're also sad. And we're also learning to how to adapt. I mean, in a way, I wrote an article for one of the major newspapers said that we have to look at Ukraine as a cautionary tale. And I remember once meeting with a senior Ukrainian leader who asked me the question. He said, look, how is it that you live next to a big, powerful country and you seem to

get along? And my answer was, well, do it cautiously. But we're now in the same situation in a way that Ukraine is. We're living next door to a government that seems to be hell bent on expansion, of intimidation, and of getting its own way, and is not clearly interested in cooperative efforts, which I think is so unlike, I think, what we've been used to dealing with in different administrations from the different parties. Obviously, there's the massive trade between the two countries on the border.

What else is the biggest thing to you that is lost here if this tense relationship continues? I guess as somebody who has spent a lot of time in international matters, the withdrawal of the United States from cooperative relationships with countries and governments that share their values. This kind of isolationism, this pulling back, this seeming preference to play in the same

sandbox as Putin and Xi Jinping and the other sort of authoritarians. I mean, it really is sort of stunning for those outside to see just what is happening. Personally, I question whether I could cross the border without being apprehended. Really? That's a serious concern? Yes, it is a serious... There are already our cautionary advisories going out because what we're seeing is that border security, if they ask you to give over their cell phone and they check it out and say that somebody you're making a comment

about the President of the United States, who knows where you're going to end up. I mean, I think this increasing effort to overcome basic rules and laws and treatments is having a huge impact. And we had really strong levels of connection and we could end up having a very cold and frosty border, which I think would feed to the detriment of both of us. Lloyd Axworthy is former Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs and is now the chair of the World Refugee and Migration Council. Thank you so much for, I guess, talking to this American in this moment and helping us understand how Canadians are viewing this moment in time.

Well, I appreciate the opportunity to do it. Thank you very much. This episode was produced by Kara Joachim with audio engineering by David Greenberg and Simon Laszlo Jansen. It was edited by Timbiet Ermias and Tara Neal. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Scott Detro.