Illustration of flags of Canada and US on a cracked wall. File photo.
By Maria Paez Victor – Mar 24, 2025
Suppose a Russian or Chinese president stated (repeatedly), that he intends to “break” the USA economy, that he does not recognize its borders, and wants to annex the USA. It would immediately be taken by the USA—rightly so—as a declaration of war.
This is exactly what has happened, as the US president Trump has said.
As the New York Times reported, “The US president on Tuesday reiterated his claims on Canada’s territory as he increased tariffs, threatening to bring the country’s economy to its knees … Mr. Trump has made repeated comments about Canada becoming America’s 51st state since winning the election in November, and last month specifically told the country’s departing prime minister, Justin Trudeau, that he did not believe that the border treaty between the two nations was valid.” (“Trump Intensifies Statehood Threats in Attack on Canada,” Matina Stevis-Gridneff, Mar 11, 2025, New York Times)
The Canadian people and politicians certainly are not taking this lightly. Many in the USA, seem to think this is more of Trump’s irrational ravings, “crazy things Trump says and does not mean.” But the word border is a red flag alarm in political terms as most of the world’s great wars have concerned borders.
Astoundingly, Trump is going after the US’s long-standing good neighbour, political ally and, most important and commercial partner. Adding insult to injury, he spews all sorts of lies and insults about Canada. In his ravings he has also physically threatened Mexico, Panama, and Greenland.
Canadians, taking Trump at his word, are furious. The upsurge of spontaneous boycotts of US goods and services, of cancelled trips to the US, of flag waving and assertions of nationalism, of booing US sports teams, is a phenomenon that has spread throughout this vast country. Rarely has a unity of federal, provincial and municipal governments been so solid and public in Canada. Indeed, politicians would risk their positions if they did not respond to the passionate solidarity that voters are demanding. “Canadian observers say their outrage at Trump’s attacks have fueled unprecedented levels of unity and collective defiance,” wrote M. Powers for Washington Post on March 20, 2025. It has prompted the Canadian Conservative Party leader, P. Poilievre, who has been constantly emulating Trump, to do an about-face and now is trying desperately to distance himself from that toxic leader.
Until now, Canadians did not feel the need to assert their nationalism. But this has changed, and quickly with the nation’s, borders, economy, way of life, and sovereignty threatened by a US president, a compulsive liar, who incapable of empathy, has a tendency towards malice and shows astounding ignorance in his stream of pronouncements. He creates chaos quite deliberately to intimidate and dominate.
Although some in the US have spoken out in defence of Canada, the response so far has been muted. Canadians are realizing that many of those they thought were life-long friends are in fact vipers, and they feel stabbed in the back. In these past years, Canadian political elites have followed US foreign policies indiscriminately, especially in Latin America. They did the dirty work for the US especially in adventures of “regime change.” This besmirched Canada’s reputation, and it has been seen as a lapdog to US imperialism. For example, Canada’s influential deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland led the extreme right-wing, anti-democratic Lima Group against Venezuela—a country that has done no wrong to Canada, but did it to support US attempts at regime change in Venezuela.
Canadians have woken up to the frighting prospect that the US has turned its sights on Canada. It sees the boot of imperialism on its own neck as its sovereignty, economy, and very existence as a nation threatened by the Americans.
Canada is country that emerged from the circumstances of a people who pointedly did not want to join the United States: a combination of English settlers who were loyal to the King and the Quebecois who would not relinquish their French language and culture. Not being Americans has been a sine qua non for Canadians.
The indigenous peoples were involved in this dispute, taking part in the struggles to be separate from the emerging USA. Undoubtedly indigenous peoples on both sides of the border have withstood much hardship and injustices. However, it is rarely in dispute that the First Nations of Canada have fared better than their kin to the south. “Saskatchewan First Nations Chief has said: ‘Our message is clear: our sovereignty isn’t negotiable.” Indigenous leaders in Saskatchewan see the US president’s threats to make Canada a 51st state as uninformed about Treaty agreements and First Nations’ inherent sovereignty.” (CBC, D. Patterson, Feb 24, 2025)
Trump has surrounded himself of sycophant enablers, people short on political acumen and experience who have proceeded to dismantle key US institutions. With 13 billionaires in his cabinet plus one not even in the cabinet, the dismantling of federal government capacity follows the extreme right wing mantra of eliminating government regulations and agencies and deliberately weakening of democratic procedures, checks and balances, all to give full reign to their power and private greed. US Congressman Bernie Sanders ceaselessly warns that the US is rapidly turning into an oligarchy “run by billionaires out to enrich themselves.” (Peter Wode, Rolling Stones, Dec 15, 2024)
Trump has also alienated other key allies such as the EU. His gross, obscene, public humiliation of Ukrainian President Zelensky in the Oval Office pretty much eliminated any sort of respect that the world could give to him as a president, or to the USA as any sort of ally.
Trump’s folly arises out of the phase that capitalism finds itself in: casino capitalism, “when the winning payers begin to cash in their chips. Because the global economy no longer has any long-term prospects, one, last, mad spree of plunder is now ongoing all over the planet” (Jonathan Cracy, Scorched Earth, Verso, 2022). This phase of Western capitalism has unmistakable characteristics: profound inequality, appalling ecological degradation including potentially catastrophic climate change, and the hollowing out of democratic institutions including international law. Trump’s megalomania and thirst for power fits perfectly with these features and hence his reviving of territorial imperialism for plunder. He wishes to take-over lands that have the resources needed by high-tech industries, such as Greenland and Canada which is a powerhouse of mining resources, as well as wood and water. Disdain for environmental protection is part of this thirst for plunder, hence the dismantling of his own country’s environmental protection regulations. Trump promises to “drill baby drill” for oil and gas, mine resources anywhere, and cut trees even in national parks.
Trump’s contempt for people who are not white is as disgusting as it is relentless. His war on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is a blatant demonstration of pure racism, an undeniable feature of fascist white supremacy. “The US government’s move to abolish diversity, equity and inclusion policies is a naked attempt to appeal to prejudice” (The Guardian, A. Mahdawi, Mar 13, 2024). The battlefield of prejudice is immigration. Every country has the right to regulate immigration, that is not in question; but the Republican Party’s mantra “blame the immigrant” (legal or illegal) for all the nation’s ills, has been taken by Trump to new heights. It is grotesque.
Only sheer racism can explain the horror of sending Latin Americans, mostly Venezuelans, to Guantanamo—the most dreaded, illegal, political prison of the USA. These are the very same Venezuelans who were urged to migrate, to leave the nation ruled by a supposed dictator, Nicolas Maduro, and the doors of the US were opened wide for them. The US and the far-right Venezuelan extremists promoted this migration as another way of trying to destabilize the legitimate and democratic government of Venezuela.
The legal offence of not having immigration permits does not equate to mayor crimes such as murder or terrorism. Trump, in fact, increased the role and capacity of Guantanamo, this penal US national disgrace, by sending these people there. Worse was to come. He paid $6 million to the fascist president of El Salvador to imprison 238 Venezuelans accusing them of being terrorist members of a criminal organization, Tren de Aragua, that the armed forces of Venezuela have already eradicated. Trying to make this illegal imprisonment legal, Trump’s henchmen evoked an ancient law from 1799 relating to foreign enemies of nations with which the USA is at war. “To invoke wartime deportation powers, Trump asserted that Venezuela’s government controls the Tren de Aragua gang. A US intelligence assessment says it is not true.” (New York Times, Mar 21, 2025)
These prisoners, who were not tried in court, were handcuffed, beaten and sent to a country whose prisons are known for their brutality. Even the Nazi butchers got a trial a Nuremburg. And anyway, when did the USA formally declare war on Venezuela?
There are geopolitical consequences of this American descent into plutocracy and putative fascism. For most of the Western world that considered the USA as a “beacon of freedom and democracy,” it is clear they want to walk a fine line between not harming even more the global markets but, at the same time, prepare to defend themselves from predatory US policies. One positive aspect of US madness, is that the movements and leaders of the far right in Europe and elsewhere who have taken Trump’s example as something to follow, now find themselves with a very unpopular mentor. The fascist tendencies of the US government under Trump are now quite visible and may no longer seem appealing to mainstream voters.
However, for Latin America, and particularly Venezuela, the stakes are very high indeed. Trump no longer intervenes based on the flimsy excuses of defending democracy. Now the interventions are done as punishment, where the victims are declared villains, where might is right, and where Trump’s decisions seem erratic at best. Clearly, Trump has no qualms ignoring the US’s own laws and judges, and even breaking his own “deals.” With respect to Latin America, he has no intention of abiding by international laws of Human Rights, the UN Charter or Geneva Convention. The US has a long history of violating these international laws, but the openly shamefaced way the Trump administration is proceeding further dooms the bedrock of rules, agreements, human rights and goodwill, on which international peace and prosperity depends.
Hopefully, Canada will take a good look at how Venezuela has coped with the illegal economic sanctions against it, and the many attempts at destabilization to overthrow its government. Venezuela—contrary to all pundits’ expectations—has not collapsed; people are fed, houses are built, and they have free healthcare and its increasingly self-reliant economy is far from broken (annual GDP growth of 3.1% in 2024 according to the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean). And more significantly, it still maintains its sovereignty.
Although the circumstances are quite different between Canada and Venezuela, Canada being one of the richest countries in the world with many more opportunities and choices, they do share one thing: the enmity of the US. A big tool of that animosity will be the lies: they will flood the press and internet with as many distortions and untruths about Canada that it can. This is how they demonized Venezuela and its president to the world. Canada should be warned and be prepared to counter this avalanche of misinformation that is already filling mainstream and social media.
There are three huge lessons Canada can take from Venezuela:
First: unity and steadfast resolve. Venezuelans defend their sovereignty passionately.
Second: move on, seek new friends, new allies, and new markets. The world is big. Venezuela found out it is not alone. A common danger creates unity. Canada can link with others that are also threatened.
Third: make government more responsive to people’s needs, not just for their welfare, but also for their democratic resiliency, which is the antidote of fascism. Venezuelan communes for example, are a creative feature in participatory democracy.
Canada can do all this and with imagination, hard work and compassion and rather be crushed by the US imperial boot, emerge stronger and more successful than ever.
Canada might also take heart from these words of Pierre Elliot Trudeau, considered by many as one of Canada’s finest modern prime ministers: “The democracy which embodies and guarantees our freedom is not powerless, passive or blind, nor is it in retreat. It has no intention of giving way to the savage fantasies of its adversaries. It is not prepared to give advance blessing to its own destruction.”
Maria Paez Victor
María Páez Victor, Ph.D. is a Venezuelan born sociologist living in Canada.
