Great White North: Canada plays a very important role in the US presidential elections

Star-spangled banners fly alongside maple leaf flags on what was once considered the world’s longest unguarded border (there are guards today, but that’s more a product of post-9/11 security concerns than tension between Washington and Ottawa). Still, the famously even temperament that remains perhaps the first cultural touchstone for Canadians stands in stark contrast to the passionate, sometimes violent confrontations of American politics.

Intertwined with the United States on both trade and defense fronts, Canada has almost as much at stake as Americans in November. A handful of its citizens took a moment to reflect on what they hope will come out of Election Day in 2024.

Mary and Art, a married couple who work in education, have dual U.S. citizenship and vote only in U.S. elections. This fall, their top choices are, of course, Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee since President Joe Biden dropped out, and former President Donald Trump, her Republican rival. The couple set the tone for their fellow Canadians, noting that Trump’s potential second term is their biggest concern.

“Kamala Harris’s entry into the race has greatly alleviated that concern,” Mary said. “The United States is the linchpin for Western democracies to be able to confront autocratic countries like China and Russia. Donald Trump has made it very clear that he has no interest in confronting them.”

Art agreed, insisting that a Harris victory would preserve the world order established after World War II.

“There hasn’t been an election in which we haven’t had to hold our nose a little to cast our vote, but the idea that Trump might withdraw from NATO and support Putin and Xi Jinping, perhaps because of secret real estate deals, is so destabilizing that we would cast our vote for a Dracula-Godzilla Democratic ticket before we would contemplate Trump-Vance,” he said.

Art lamented the loss of the Republican Party, which he said might have made him and his wife rethink their votes, believing it no longer exists. As a result, he sees the 2024 cycle as more intense than either 2016 or 2020.

“There are always unhinged exchanges of criticism between the two sides, so this is no different,” he explained. “But so far in this cycle, there has not been a battle of ideas. Our dream is a debate between presidential candidates where both candidates, people of principle, lay out their different visions of how to move forward based on ideas and philosophies and not on who hates America and wants to destroy it. The idea that anyone running for political office is doing so because they want to destroy the political process is just absurd. It’s disturbing to think that some of our American neighbors would accept that as a reasonable assumption.”

Mary also lamented that the most important of American political processes has turned into a shouting match.

“Elections should be a process where people have to choose between different sets of policies, different approaches to common issues,” he said. “This time, it’s about name-calling and seeing who has the best witty comeback. That doesn’t achieve anything.”

Across the country, outside Toronto, Don and Debbie worked in training and sales, respectively, before retiring. They now shuttle between progressive Ontario and more conservative Phoenix. They are also rooting for Harris to win, though they are keeping it a secret among their American friends.

“We spend the winter in Arizona, so obviously we are concerned about what is happening in the United States,” Don said. “We are in a Republican area, so we don’t say too much for fear that they might not like what they hear.”

Debbie agreed with that strategy, resigned to an American political environment in which opinions rarely change.

“We don’t talk about politics at all,” he explained. “When I hear about the election, it doesn’t matter what anyone says. Everyone has facts and figures to back up what they say. No one is open-minded, so there are no exploratory debates. It’s all the same: ‘I’m right, you’re wrong.’”

Don said he believes most Canadians would be in favour of a Harris presidency, while Debbie said she fears the unrest unleashed in the states could spill over into the north.

“I think it’s important to have the sense that the United States has a stable and fully democratic system of government,” he added. “Everything we see in the United States tends to find its way to Canada at some point.”

Canadians’ alignment with Harris is more understandable when you consider that the future vice president lived in Quebec for five years and graduated from high school north of the border. Harris’s mother accepted a teaching position at McGill University and moved from California to Montreal with Kamala, then 12, in 1976.

There also remains a strong philosophical link between the California Harris oversaw as attorney general and senator and the progressive Canadian government of Justin Trudeau.

In York, Ontario, Susan is an engineer who believes there is one observation that unites Canadians watching the American campaign season.

“This election highlights the tremendous discord that exists in the United States and the level of government dysfunction,” said Susan. “Canadians have a lot at stake in any American election, as changes in American policies can affect all of our businesses. We keep track of all of that, as we are saturated with more American news cycles than Canadian ones.”

Susan described the average Canadian voter as someone who is more in tune with the Democratic Party’s worldview. She said she believes her fellow citizens want economic peace through a working NAFTA agreement, as the industries of both countries are tightly integrated.

“Canadians are much more comfortable negotiating with Democrats because of our shared values,” Susan added. “There is also a fundamental sense of justice in Canada, which was founded on the principles of peace and order, very different from the ‘live free or die’ sentiment that prevails in the American South.”

Dan is a writer born in the rugged parts of Alberta. He acknowledged that his homeland is further to the right than Ontario or British Columbia, and described his province as “more Trump country, if there is such a thing in Canada.”

He explained that regardless of whether they lean left or right, many Canadians see a serious deterioration in the intent and integrity of the Republican Party.

“I feel like (the Republican Party) lost its way under Trump,” Dan lamented. “Studying American history, it’s hard to see the party of Abraham Lincoln, Eisenhower, Reagan, and even Martin Luther King Jr. now being led by Trump — or by what I saw Trump described as: ‘a con man and reality show host from Queens who can’t make bail.’”

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Dan said he believes that if Harris wins the job, Trump will abandon the Republican Party, while the party will be happy to see him go.

“I think the original Republican values ​​are being lost because Trump only cares about himself,” he added.

John Lewinsky, MFA, is a writer based in Milwaukee.