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President Donald Trump has decided that he wants Canada.

Along with designs on Greenland and the Panama Canal Zone, Trump has expressed interest in bringing Canada into the United States. While the idea of a union of Canada and the United States has been bouncing around in some form since the American Revolution, the actual prospect of unification is nothing more than a MAGA fever dream. 

It is possible to squint tightly and see the logic of a union between Washington and Ottawa. Canada and the United States mostly speak the same language (although the existence of minority linguistic communities is a big deal, especially on the Canadian side). The national security apparatus of Canada and the United States are tightly tied together, as are the legacy of the Second World War, the Cold War, and NATO. 

Canada and the US are broadly similar economically, although the wealth gap between the two has expanded significantly in the past eight years. The political systems are broadly similar in that both are more or less liberal and democratic. 

But beyond these similarities are a host of intractable obstacles to a US-Canadian union.

Canada and America Merger: Constitutional Issues

Canada resembles the United States superficially, but Canada is governed differently in several key respects.

Most notably, Canadian federalism is different in key ways from US federalism, with many social questions (marriage, criminal law) reserved to the federal government and economic issues reserved to the provincial level. Based on the legacy of the British administration, Canada’s provinces are governed through parliamentary systems. 

There is no reason why a Canadian province could not retain a parliamentary system even after entering the United States, although the election of Senators would need to be direct. Canada also reserves special rights for linguistic minorities, notably Quebec and the three northern territories (Yukon, Nunavut, and the Northwest Territories) that are not easily replicable in the US constitutional system. 

The differences between the Canadian and American healthcare systems loom large regarding social and political issues. While there are questions about the efficiency and innovativeness of Canada’s healthcare system, in contrast to the United States, few Canadians seem interested in celebrating the murder of healthcare executives. 

Indeed, securing the health care systems would be paramount to any deal to bring Canadian provinces into the United States.

Distributional Issues

President Trump suggested that Canada could become the 51st state, but while there is little appetite in Canada for entering the United States at all, there is less than zero appetite for entering as a constitutive whole. Each of the provinces of Canada has a unique culture and history, more so even than most US states. The idea that Quebec, Ontario, and British Columbia could all be served by a single pair of Senators or a single state government is absurd. 

Any realistic plan for unification would bring several states into the Union. The average US state population is 6.84 million; the median is 4.5 million. If Canadian provinces sought roughly analogous levels of representation, the result would be from six to ten Canadian states, adding between twelve and twenty Senators and some sixty Representatives, depending on specifics. 

The easiest arrangement would be seven or eight, welding the Maritime Provinces plus perhaps Newfoundland into a single unit. This is far easier said than done, as these are very old, culturally and administratively distinct political units.

This would have a political impact in the United States as well. If the House of Representatives remained at the same size, most US states would lose one or more House seats. Moreover, including several formerly Canadian states would shift US politics to the left. The most conservative Canadian provinces are Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, but in any plausible arrangement, these would be outweighed by Democratic-leaning entrants. Combined with the loss of representation, the redistribution of political power would likely make the annexation of Canada extremely unpopular with broad swaths of the US electorate. 

Historical Context

In stark contrast to the American political imagination since almost the founding of the Republic, Canada is a real country with real people who by and large do not want to join the United States.

Recent polling showed that slightly more than a quarter of Canadians might contemplate a provincial shift to the US, but this is a largely imaginary number that does not take into account the real difficulties and real changes that a process of amalgamation would require. 

Moreover, even in this poll, there are significant differences across provinces in terms of tolerance for unification. Indeed, more Canadians see the upside of provincial independence than of joining the United States. 

Could It Happen? In a Word: No. 

No one has thought very seriously about this because it is not a very serious proposal and, consequently, not worthy of serious thought. 

Canada and the United States have been neighborly since the 19th century. World War II did not result in unification, nor did the Cold War. It is unlikely that the current ethno-nationalist mood in the United States will result in a plan for unification that could appeal to Canada.

President Donald Trump’s meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau this week covered a host of topics: the need for swift passage of USMCA, solutions to the opioid crisis affecting both nations, defending human rights in the Western Hemisphere, and more

Even if we interpret Trump’s remarks as a classic bargaining “overask,” no one in Canada is worried about unification at the barrel of a gun, and few are interested in unification in the face of a barrel of tariffs.

We are supposed to take Trump seriously rather than literally, but in Canada, it’s pretty impossible to take him seriously. 

About the Author: Dr. Robert Farley 

Dr. Robert Farley has taught security and diplomacy courses at the Patterson School since 2005. He received his BS from the University of Oregon in 1997, and his Ph. D. from the University of Washington in 2004. Dr. Farley is the author of Grounded: The Case for Abolishing the United States Air Force (University Press of Kentucky, 2014), the Battleship Book (Wildside, 2016), Patents for Power: Intellectual Property Law and the Diffusion of Military Technology (University of Chicago, 2020), and most recently Waging War with Gold: National Security and the Finance Domain Across the Ages (Lynne Rienner, 2023). He has contributed extensively to a number of journals and magazines, including the National Interest, the Diplomat: APAC, World Politics Review, and the American Prospect. Dr. Farley is also a founder and senior editor of Lawyers, Guns and Money.