A Saskatchewan farmer and rancher says any tariffs imposed by the U.S. and Canada would hurt his business but he'd be quite happy if it all led to his province becoming America’s 51st state.
Douglas Davidson farms and ranches south of Swift Current. In an interview, he said it was profitable in recent years to sell mustard to General Mills in Montana, but he can’t see them remaining a buyer with any tariffs in place.
“They'd probably like my mustard, but then I would have to discount my mustard in order to consummate a deal, as far as I could tell,” Davidson told Western Standard.
March is usually a big month for bull sales, but Davidson expects any U.S. tariffs to suppress the market there also, should they be enacted.
“Maybe some of the prices we were expecting are not out there for a time, until we can find new markets. But it's [worse] on the import side, on the tariffs the Canadian government's putting on. For example, we got almost all John Deere equipment. That's all built in the US, and our repair parts come out of the US, mostly.”
Davidson said the tariff issue is serious and Canada has limited leverage. He says “COVID levels of money printing” won’t solve the burden on Canadians either.
“It's not going to just blow over, is it? Somebody's going to have to come to their senses here. I mean, Trudeau is going to try to push around the United States. What he doesn't realize is the economy of Texas alone is far larger than the Canadian economy.”
Davidson is right. In American dollars, Canada’s GDP in 2024 was $2.11 trillion. This still trails the $4 trillion of California and $2.69 trillion of Texas.
Trump says the tariffs will disappear if Canada allows itself to be annexed by the United States. Davidson finds this possibility the “big opportunity” presented by the “big crisis.”
“Canadians are going to feel the pain,” Davidson promised. “And this offer about becoming a 51st state might start to look quite a bit more appealing once they get over the blustery side to start dealing with the reality. That would be my positive outlook for the whole thing.”
Davidson says most people resistant to the idea speak with "an emotional reaction" with "no basis in facts."
"If you can get a full value dollar rather than an Arctic peso [Canadian dollar], if you can get much lower taxation, if you can get the benefits of the Constitution, if you can get an elected Senate, if you can get the vote for your President and these type of things, and you get access to the world's largest market with no impediment, where is the downside?"
The farmer says most Canadians who object can't tell you how life would be worse as an American. He says people would still identify with their province if it became a state.
“Ask an American where they're from, they will never say, ‘I'm from the United States.’ They'll say, ‘I'm from Oklahoma’, ‘I'm from Texas’ ,’I'm from Florida.’ They identify with their state, their state culture,” Davidson explained.
“If you're an Albertan, you're still an Albertan. I can be a stubble jumper from Saskatchewan, just as good as I can, probably better, in the Union than I ever could in Canada. And I don't see, where's the downside?”
While Trump acts decisively as the U.S. president, Davidson watches Justin Trudeau in a prime minister’s chair everyone knows he will soon leave, his last two terms won without winning the popular vote either time.
“He's not in and he's not out. We kind of got a government, and we kind of don't. We kind of got a House of Commons, but they don't sit. We kind of got a prime minister that nobody ever elected. I mean, we kind of got a whole lot of s___ and nobody knows…really, when it comes down to it, who is running this joint?”