President Donald Trump’s threat to impose sweeping tariffs on Canadian goods and his stated desire to annex the country have prompted some of its residents to cancel trips to Vermont.
Abby Long, the executive director of the Kingdom Trail Association, the Burke-based bicycling network, told state lawmakers on Thursday that she’s gotten emails from Québécois trail users about the Trump administration. The message, Long said: “They love us, but they won’t be visiting for four years or until our political environment shifts.”
Kingdom Trails is one of the Northeast Kingdom’s largest tourist attractions, logging about 135,000 annual visits. About 40 percent of its users are from Canada.
Steve Wright, president and general manager of the Jay Peak Resort on the Canadian border, said cancellations of visits by Canadians have spiked. He estimated that 30 to 40 percent of visitors to the resort, which includes a ski area, hotels, a golf course and a water park, are from Ontario and Québec.
State officials could not quantify the impact on Vermont tourism. But tourism leaders said they are taking steps to increase advertising in response to reports that Canadians were changing their U.S. travel plans.
President Trump launched a major broadside against Canada on February 1, declaring he’d add a 25 percent tariff to imports from Canada and Mexico. He retracted that proposal on February 3, before it went into effect. Then on February 10 he reiterated his vow to annex Canada and turn it into America’s 51st state.
Canada threatened retaliatory tariffs, and Québec’s premier threatened to remove U.S. liquor products from Canadian stores.
On social media, Canadians have shared memes showing their anger. One meme depicts a huge beaver — Canada’s national animal — slapping the U.S. president.
Bernadette Jordan, consul general of Canada in New England, said she has friends who canceled their U.S. vacations.
“When you have someone saying they want to make Canada the 51st state, it does not resonate well in Canada,” Jordan said. “I think Canadians are just reacting how they know best.”
Jordan’s job is to smooth relations in the area she covers, which includes all of the New England states except Connecticut.
“I expect to be making more trips to Vermont than usual,” Jordan said.
Jordan met last week with state lawmakers who represent the counties on the international border. Sen. Randy Brock (R-Franklin), who lives about 10 miles south of Canada, said Jordan made it clear that she felt Canadian communities rely on their Vermont neighbors and vice versa.
“There’s some fear that in the event tariffs are imposed, it might be harmful to both of us,” he said.
The Vermont Department of Tourism and Marketing has also received reports of lodging cancellations, as well as complaints from Canadians.
“They’re saying in a nutshell, ‘We’re upset; we’re canceling our trip,’” Commissioner Heather Pelham said. “We’ve written back to say, ‘We’re still your friends, and we’d love for you to come back.’ Most people have been actually really nice in responding.”
She added that she thinks some of the drop in business might be attributable to the low value of the Canadian dollar.
The department will tailor its ads in Canada to include a “ready when you are” message that doesn’t go into detail about the geopolitical situation.
“We think it’s a better strategy not to wade into the specifics of what the federal government may have threatened,” Pelham said. “We can just say, ‘We’re still the same state we were six months ago.’”
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This article appears in Feb 19-25, 2025.
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