Canadians worry about trade

Canadians now rank Donald Trump and U.S. trade policy as the biggest threat to their quality of life, according to a new Abacus Data survey released April 15. (abacusdata.ca) Abacus said 31% of respondents named Trump and U.S. trade and economic policy as their top threat, and 46% put it in their top two. The survey was completed in the week before publication and asked Canadians to choose from 12 concerns. (abacusdata.ca) The next tier of worries was lower: 26% cited provincial cuts to public services and health care, 22% named corporations prioritizing profits, and 21% pointed to government overspending and debt. Immigration registered at 18%, climate change at 12%, artificial intelligence at 10%, and China at 5%. (abacusdata.ca) The poll lands after a year of tariff fights that spilled from factories into household politics. Statistics Canada said goods exports to the United States fell 15.7% after tariff announcements in April 2025, while imports from the U.S. dropped 10.8%. (statcan.gc.ca) Ottawa has since rolled back many of its own counter-tariffs, but not all of them. The federal government says Canada removed most retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods on September 1, 2025, while keeping tariffs on steel, aluminum and automobiles in place as talks continued. (canada.ca) The U.S. side also changed this year. Canada’s Trade Commissioner Service says a February 20, 2026 Supreme Court ruling struck down the use of the International Economic Emergency Powers Act for tariffs, after which Washington replaced those duties with a global 10% tariff under Section 122 effective February 24, 2026, with exemptions for Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement-compliant Canadian goods. (tradecommissioner.gc.ca) Some sector tariffs still hit Canada directly. The same government guidance says the U.S. continues to apply Section 232 tariffs including 50% duties on steel and aluminum, 25% tariffs on autos and trucks and parts, and 10% tariffs on softwood lumber, with limited or no Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement exemptions depending on the product. (tradecommissioner.gc.ca) Abacus found the concern is broad across Canada, not just concentrated in one province. Fifty-four percent of Quebec respondents put Trump and U.S. trade policy in their top two threats, compared with 45% in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, 45% in British Columbia, 44% in Ontario, 43% in Atlantic Canada and 42% in Alberta. (abacusdata.ca) Older Canadians were more likely to see the U.S. issue as a top threat. Abacus said 59% of people 60 and older put it in their top two, compared with 48% of those 45 to 59, 38% of those 30 to 44, and 34% of those 18 to 29. (abacusdata.ca) That anxiety lines up with a broader shift in Canadian views of the U.S. Pew Research Center reported in July 2025 that Canadian opinions of the United States and Trump were at or near historic lows, and that a majority of Canadians saw the U.S. as the top threat to their country. (pewresearch.org) The result is a political mood in which trade is no longer a niche file for exporters and ministers. In Abacus’s numbers, it sits above every domestic issue tested. (abacusdata.ca)