Canadians should recognize annexation bluster as a misdirection play in Trump’s bullying game plan

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/02/2025 (230 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

No, Canada is not going to become the 51st state.

Short of an all-out military invasion, it’s legally and practically impossible for us to be absorbed into the United States.

Even if Canada humbly requested that U.S. President Donald Trump take us in — and that is highly unlikely, given that polls have shown that nine out of 10 Canadians are opposed to the idea — there are enormous legal hurdles in the U.S.

Annexation would require bills in both houses of Congress. Getting a simple majority in the House of Representatives is doable. But amassing 60 of 100 votes in the Senate is — given the inability of Senators to spell the word “bipartisan” — nothing short of impossible.

So, why are we still talking on both sides of the border about annexation?

It’s complicated.

For Trump, the threat of annexation and the histrionics it has sparked on our side of the border is really just part of a strategy to get other concessions. Will he or won’t he? Every minute we spend wondering about Trump’s ultimate intentions is a stroke to his continental-sized ego.

In Canada, it’s largely because stridently opposing annexation not only feels so darn good, it’s good for us (depending on which party you belong to). Politicians in this country — particularly Liberals — have found that the more they rail against Trump’s 51st state musings, the more churn we experience in the federal political scene.

It all started rather innocuously in early December, when a beleaguered Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had dinner with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago enclave to see if the president-elect could be talked down from his tariff threats. There, Trump openly mused that if Canada couldn’t survive broad 25 per cent tariffs, it could become the 51st state.

Just about everyone saw the comment as a cheeky joke and, as a result, it didn’t resonate in our political narrative. But within days, it was taking on a prominent place in the national discourse thanks, in large part, to a news media that — despite its remoteness — couldn’t stop talking about it.

We largely knew it was impractical. But just like knowing that potato chips are bad for us, once we started munching on Trump’s preposterous proposal, we couldn’t stop. All manner of experts in history and international law were summoned to give serious commentary on a decidedly unserious issue.

If the fuse on the annexation debate was lit on Dec. 6, the explosion came on Jan. 6, when Trudeau announced his intention to step down after (finally) waking up and smelling the dissent.

The combination of the annexation threat and Trudeau’s resignation started creating unexpected consequences.

Suddenly, Trudeau was earning the respect of Canadians for standing up to Trump, and Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives were shunted to the sidelines.

In the last week, the Liberals started seeing modest gains in support while the Poilievre and his party watched as their gargantuan voter-intention lead slowly diminished. The shift isn’t enough yet to deny the Conservatives a chance to form the next government, but the trend lines should be a source of concern in the Torydom.

Does all this mean we shouldn’t worry about annexation? We should be concerned, but not about becoming the 51st state. Not exactly.

Beyond the very real, immediate economic damage that will come from tariffs, the bigger threat is the extent to which Canadian lawmakers are willing to bend to Trump’s will on law and policy in this country.

Trump has already exacted billions of dollars in border security investment, while Liberal government ministers are scrambling to assure the White House Canada will find somewhere between $20 billion and $50 billion annually to meet our NATO membership requirement of devoting at least two per cent of GDP to defence spending.

Those are hardly the only concessions Trump is seeking.

Trump complained about the inability of U.S. banks to do business in Canada. Although U.S. banks do operate here, many complain about the difficulty of getting permission to enter the Canadian market because of stringent regulatory requirements — the requirements that many in the financial sector believe helped Canada avoid the worst of the 2008-09 financial market meltdown triggered by reckless lending by U.S. banks.

Recently, White House officials flagged Canada’s three per cent digital services tax, which targets streaming companies with at least $20 million in revenues. The tax — which became law last year but the first payments aren’t due until June and are retroactive to 2022 — is expected to generate a billion dollars a year in desperately needed revenue, but the Trump folks would like us to back off.

Trump has also targeted the federal Goods and Services Tax. The U.S. is the only major country in the world without a national value-added sales tax. Thus, Trump is advocating that Canada should change its tax regime to benefit American companies doing business here.

What’s a Canadian political leader to do?

It’s all good and fine to rail against annexation, but our lawmakers need to explain how they are going to stop Trump’s creeping influence on domestic law and policy.

Let’s be honest here. Trump doesn’t want to own us; he just wants to control us.

Going forward, it would be refreshing if Canadian lawmakers started talking about that.

dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca