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Why Mark Carney’s victory won’t heal the US-Canada rift
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
Mark Carney leads the Liberals to victory in Canada. So, what's next for the US-Canada relationship?
I think sometimes you have relationship with somebody, and they do something that shocks you, you can't unsee it, I think US-Canada is like that now. I think the damage is permanent. Of course, the interdependence is immense. The dependence on the Canadian side is higher. They're a much smaller country. Their population is right next to the United States. Just a thin strip there. So, it's not like you can suddenly decouple, but there's going to be a lot of de-risking. So, strong efforts, very tough negotiations coming on trade and on security, but also an effort to build infrastructure and ship Canadian resources away from the United States, towards other countries around the world. Medium-term, that's going to be a pretty significant change in how we think about Canada.
The conclave will pick the next pope. How is it relevant for the wider geopolitical landscape?
It's relevant because, increasingly, political leaders do not inspire. So, here you have a population as large as any country, about 1.4 billion Catholics all over the world, just like India, just like China. That's the size of the global population. If the next pope that is picked is someone who is inspirational, is someone that is seen as a 21st century leader that can reflect sensibilities and ideology, values that are not seen from political leaders around the world, in your own countries, then the ability to have an impact on what gets young people out, and motivated, and inspired and engaged in public service or on the streets, and mobilized, and demonstrating becomes significant. So, I do think there's a real opportunity here, but we'll see what it means when we finally see white smoke coming out of the Vatican.
Ian Bremmer surrounded by world leaders.
Political K-drama, Lebanon ceasefire, Trudeau at Mar-a-Lago, and more: Your questions, answered
It’s beginning to look a lot like the holiday season here in New York — so in the Christmas spirit, I decided to answer your most pressing questions in a December edition of my mailbag series. Want to know what I think about Trump’s latest picks for his new administration? What’s next for the Middle East? Gladiator II vs. Wicked? Ask, and you shall receive.
Hoping to crack a few echo chambers at once, I put out a call for questions onX,Threads, andBluesky, and — as usual — you all delivered an avalanche of insightful and thought-provoking queries. I sorted through hundreds of questions, spanning everything from “Is America in decline?” to “What is Moose’s favorite toy?” to “What is the meaning of life?” I’ll leave the philosophizing to Plato but am excited to tackle the questions more political in nature — with a few personal ones thrown in for amusement.
So grab some hot cocoa as I dive into your first round of questions (some of which have been edited for clarity).
What the heck happened in South Korea?
On Tuesday, President Yoon Suk Yeol shocked the world by (briefly and unlawfully) declaring emergency martial law before reversing course some six hours later. Martial law means all activities by parliament and political parties become prohibited, the media gets placed under state control, and protests and demonstrations are banned. Yoon claimed the move was meant “to eradicate” a fifth column of North Korea-aligned opposition elements, despite there being no evidence of such a threat. The truth: Yoon had become deeply unpopular after being swept up in several corruption scandals (with one notably including his wife). When the opposition refused to pass his budget, he snapped. Today, Yoon awoke to a political hangover, realizing that his decision destroyed any remaining legacy he might have had. He'll be impeached in short order (with a motion already submitted), and new elections will likely favor the opposition. South Korea will remain a democracy thanks to its institutions holding strong against the immediate threat of illiberalism (unlike some other countries I know). I predict the country will be able to move past this blip swiftly, and I doubt the rest of the world will be talking much about it in the coming weeks.
Do you expect the recent ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah to last?
Despite reports of some fire from both sides, which is to be expected, I think there’s a good chance that the truce will hold. About 60,000 Israelis evacuated the northern part of the country near the Lebanon border after Hamas attacked on Oct. 7, 2023. So a positive sign to look for would be if the displaced Israelis start heading back home. Israeli forces have pummeled Hezbollah, decimating their capacity to expand the war. Plus, Israel wants to give Donald Trump a win, and the two-month ceasefire will become "permanent" just as he is inaugurated. Coincidence? I think not.
How do you feel about Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau flying down to Mar-a-Lago in response to Trump's tariff threats? A weak move? A smart play? Somewhere in-between?
The Canadians are stuck between a rock and a hard place. America’s northern neighbors rely heavily on economic and political cooperation with the United States, so this was Justin Trudeau’s only move. Provincial governors across the political spectrum are demanding cooperation with the Trump administration as a matter of utmost urgency. The primary issue for Trudeau: He won’t be in power for long and, accordingly, has very limited leverage.
Has the United States become a rogue nation?
I’d define a rogue state as one that actively wants to break the norms and rules of the international order — diplomatic, economic, and military. By that definition, while the United States has taken rogue actions (the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the treatment of prisoners in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib, etc. etc.), on most issues, the US doesn’t belong in that bucket. However, the US is now far less committed to strengthening or even leading multilateral institutions. It has become more transactional, less oriented toward common values, and more interested in bilateral negotiations with a clearer power advantage than multilateralism. In that way, US foreign policy is becoming less “exceptionalist” and more akin to China’s — though with a stronger focus on national security leverage than China’s more principally commercial perspective.
When you visited Mexico a bit more than a year ago, you concluded that the country was doing better than expected and shared a fairly optimistic outlook for the country’s future. Do you still hold that view?
I feel less optimistic than a year ago, for sure. The Mexican economy should be doing far better, given its level of integration with the United States (the strongest economy in the world) and its favorable positioning vis-a-vis derisking/decoupling from China. However, some market-unfriendly decisions during Claudia Sheinbaum’s presidential transition, particularly but not limited to judicial reform, have hurt Mexico’s investment climate. Plus, concerns that the bilateral relationship with the US will come under pressure from the incoming Trump administration adds to the looming economic uncertainty. Still, Sheinbaum’s orientation is much more technocratic — and her Cabinet overall is more professional — than her predecessor, and that will help.
Can you please make sense of what's now happening in Syria/Aleppo? Will the Assad regime collapse?
Basically, a Turkey-backed militant Islamist group called HTS managed to snag Aleppo, Syria’s second-biggest city, in a matter of days, catching everyone off guard. It’s a huge deal, basically flipping the script on who controls what in Syria. But why now, after the Syrian civil war had been frozen for years? Two words: G-Zero, baby. Assad’s regime is extremely dependent on Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah for its survival. But Israel recently wiped out Hezbollah in Lebanon and weakened Iran’s proxy network, leaving Assad seriously vulnerable. Plus, Russia is racing to grab as much ground as possible before a potential Trump-forced ceasefire in Ukraine. With Assad’s main backers distracted and resource-strained, it was the perfect opportunity for the rebels to make a move. But here’s the kicker: Assad isn’t going down. Iran and Russia are too invested in keeping him in power, so they'll absolutely jump in to save his bacon. Even countries that are happy to see Assad and Iran weakened, like Israel and Turkey, don’t want to deal with the chaos that his overthrow would leave behind. So, while this is a massive shake-up, don’t bet on Assad getting the boot just yet – he’s survived crazier situations, and he’s got some powerful friends helping him hang on.
How are things looking for Russia given the ruble, Syria, and Iran?
In terms of those specific perspectives, things might not be looking too good for Russia. Low oil prices, new sanctions, and government spending on the war effort propelled the Russian ruble to its lowest levels in over two years. Rebel advancement in Aleppo makes both Russia and Iran look weak and distracted. Plus, there’s been anastronomical number of Russian casualties in Ukraine as Putin’s invasion has dragged on.
But that’s not to say that things are looking bad for Russia in the long term. Russian forces have been gaining more and more territory in the Donbas; President-elect Trump aims to end the war as soon as possible; Volodymyr Zelensky is under an immense amount of domestic pressure to stop the bleeding; and the Europeans are increasingly split on continuing economic and military support for Kyiv. With no direct internal threat to Putin’s position, the Russian president is still sitting comfortably in Moscow … with large bits of Ukraine essentially his.
What got you interested or started in politics to begin with?
My first trip outside the United States really kicked off my interest in politics. Picture it: Soviet Union in 1986, the Cold War in full swing. It was such a transformative experience for a kid from the projects. My perception of Moscow, Leningrad, and the former Soviet republics was so different than what the news was telling me, which was fascinating and made me want to explore other parts of the world. I wanted to go everywhere, study hard, and learn as much as possible to understand the world better. I thought of that kid when I made my trip to Antarctica last year, completing my journey to all seven continents.
Who is the most well-known person on your cellphone contact list?
Besides Beyoncé? Just kidding — I don't know many Hollywood types, but I suspect the few I do are the most broadly well-known, not all the political leaders. So I would probably say it’s Ashton Kutcher, who is extremely interested in international relations, especially in China. Bet you didn’t expect that answer.
Eric Martel, President and CEO of Bombardier
Hard Numbers: Bombardier blasts Ottawa, Freight flows fall, Canada-Taiwan trade pact framed, Titanic racket rocks Kiwis
4: Total cross-border freight shipments between the US and Canada fell 4% in annual terms in August 2023, according to newly released data. The drop was part of a broader slowdown in North American trade — freight flows between the US, Mexico, and Canada fell 1.7% over the same time period.
70: Canada and Taiwan have hashed out a free trade and investment pact that they hope to have in place in the coming months. Taiwan hopes the agreement, which comprises more than 70 provisions, will help its bid to join the CPTPP, a major transpacific trade grouping that Canada will chair in 2024. The Canada-Taiwan pact is sure to strain already-fraught Canada-China ties, as Beijing does not recognize the sovereignty of Taiwan.
10: If ever you doubt the reach of Canada’s soft power, know that there’s a place in the world where people mount 10 emergency sirens on their cars for the purpose of blaring songs by French-Canadian superstar Celine Dion louder than other cars fitted with sirens for the same purpose. This occurs regularly at 2 a.m. (yes, A.M.) in the town of Porirua, New Zealand. Local residents and officials have tried to stop these “siren battles,” but like Dion’s heart, they go on.
A graphic showing English-French bilingualism in Canada.
The Graphic Truth: English-French bilingualism in Canada
Parlez-vous le français? Probably pas très bien if you live outside Quebec, according to census data from Statistics Canada.
The share of Canadians who can hold a conversation in both English and French has plateaued around 18% for two decades, despite strong legal protections for the French language and official encouragement of bilingualism.
The background: Political rivalries between English and French-speaking Canadians dominated the early history of the country, and fuel some radical independence movements in Quebec even today. Official adoption of bilingualism at a federal level in 1969 was meant to help heal the rift.
And in the first three decades, it met with considerable success. The share of bilingual Canadians rose from 12.2% in 1961 to 17.7% in 2001.
However, most of the growth came in Quebec, which continues to push up the national rate of bilingualism. Nearly half of Quebeckers are bilingual, compared to less than 1 in 10 Canadians from other provinces.
Statistics Canada explains that English-speaking Canada has simply outgrown the share of the country with French as their mother tongue, but also pointed out that Canadians whose mother tongue is neither French nor English —- mostly immigrants — are less likely to learn both of Canada’s official languages.
But there’s one more wrinkle: Quebeckers whose mother tongue is neither English nor French are actually more likely than the general population to speak both languages, with 50.8% able to hold a conversation in French, English and their mother tongue. Incroyable!
Can Canada woo techies from the US and become a digital nomad hotspot?
The battle for tech talent between the United States and Canada is heating up. Last week, Canadian Immigration Minister Sean Fraser announced a suite of reforms aimed at attracting technology sector workers from around the world, including the US. The move comes as Canada struggles to respond to American green subsidies for energy and transportation as part of the Inflation Reduction Act.
Canada has long been wary of its global hegemon neighbor pipping it to the talent post. Brain drain – or “human capital flight” – has obsessed governments and commentators up north for decades. With Fraser’s new, multipronged immigration strategy, the country hopes to reverse the drain, and the US may be ill-positioned to fight back.
A four-pillar plan
Fraser’s four-pillar plan includes an “Innovation Stream” to attract talent to tech companies or “select in-demand occupations,” a “digital nomad” component to draw in folks who can do their work from anywhere, and amendments to existing programs to facilitate and extend tech-related work permits.
The spiciest bit? There’s a one-year plan for “a streamlined work permit for H-1B specialty occupation visa holders in the US to apply to come to Canada.” Those who enter via the program can later apply for permanent resident status if they meet the requirements. In short, Canada wants to poach foreign, pre-vetted tech workers residing in the US – up to 10,000 of them – and perhaps keep them.
While considered temporary, the program aims to provide laid-off tech workers in the US the chance to continue working in North America. Whether the program will continue past next year remains to be seen. But if the H-1B plan helps bolster Canada’s tech sector, there will be a good case for keeping it, no matter how the US responds.
The H-1B visa odyssey
The US H-1B visa is an employer-sponsored “nonimmigrant classification” for highly skilled workers from abroad, particularly in tech. The US allows up to 65,000 new visas each fiscal year, plus another 20,000 for applicants with advanced degrees from domestic colleges and universities.
Immigration attorney Andy J. Semotiuk, in a recent piece for Forbes, complained that the US needs to revise its H-1B visa program to ensure it remains competitive. He previously wrote that applying for the visa is a massive pain, requiring four applications and a long slog, including the requirement of a green card and employer labor certification to prove there are no American workers to fill the job.
Kylie Milliken, a researcher with Eurasia Group, says a major problem with the H-1B visa program is that the cap has not been raised since 2006. While it’s been working well, she notes, “it does not admit enough applicants to meet the needs of the labor market.” Despite calls from industry for changes, Congress hasn’t budged, which is no surprise, Milliken says, because “immigration is extremely divisive in the US, which makes policymaking difficult even when the government is under unified control.” In Canada, Fraser’s “streamlined” plan hopes to attract folks who’ve been able to get through the H-1B process, and their families, and permit them to work for “almost any employer anywhere in Canada.”
Any attempts by the US to respond to the Canadian plan, says Jon Lieber, managing director for the US for Eurasia Group, will be met by congressional deadlock on immigration. “The US is not likely to respond to anything Canada does because US immigration policy is not currently being set by the interests of US companies, but by domestic groups who are largely anti-immigration or at best immigration skeptics.”
That’s also why nothing’s been done to overhaul it to a more rational program, Lieber adds. “It’s basically working well for a small number of firms who benefit from it, and there’s no political will to expand it in the face of attacks.” That means no expansion to the number of applicants the US accepts and no replacement program that includes a pathway to citizenship.
Will visa holders move to colder climes?
Moving to Canada could be an attractive option for H-1B visa holders in the US who have recently lost their job because the visa is tied to employers. As Lieber says, those folks “are at the whims of their employers for their ongoing residency in the US.” So, someone who loses their job also loses their visa sponsor, leaving them with a stressful 60 days to find a new job.
As the US stares down a recession, the country has laid off nearly 200,000 workers so far this year, many of whom come from the tech sector. Alphabet has cut 12,000 employees, while Amazon let go 18,000 people, and both Microsoft and Meta eliminated 10,000 positions each. The US layoffs, and Canada’s inclusion of a path to citizenship within its H-1B program, might make applying to the northern alternative an attractive option for many.
Even though Canada’s tech talent-poaching plan is starting modestly, the US needs to keep its eye on the sector. “If the US wants to keep its tech industry robust and keep leading innovation,” Milliken says, “it will ultimately need to find a way to get more skilled workers into that space, whether by incentivizing American students to go into the tech and AI industries, allowing foreign-born graduates of US universities to work in the country longer after their student visa runs out, lifting the H-1B caps, or some other route.”
Canada’s H-1B plan launches on July 16, and the rest of its tech worker plan will unfold in the months to come, with the Innovation Stream due online by the end of 2023. By then, we should know whether Canada is managing to poach talent from the US – and whether it plans to aim for more in the years to come.
Ian Explains: Biden-Trudeau summit well worth the wait
Joe Biden and Justin Trudeau finally met recently, two years after Biden came to office. The good personal vibes, as expected, were great, and the state of the US-Canada relationship is strong, though not perfect, Ian Bremmer explains on GZERO World.
The US president and the Canadian PM signed an agreement on asylum seekers, but other, thornier issues still need to be worked out.
One of them is Haiti. Biden wants Canada to lead stabilization efforts there, but Trudeau is reluctant to put Canadian boots on the ground.
Beyond that: trade, security, climate change, Russia in Ukraine, and, of course, China.
Watch the GZERO World episode: What the US and Canada really want from each other
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Subsidy game could hurt Canada-US relations
Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC shares his perspective on US politics.
What is happening with US/Canada relations?
Well, I'm headed up to Toronto, Canada, just about a week after President Biden made his first trip to America's neighbor to the north, which is also the US' second largest trading partner. A very important, deeply ingrained relationship between these two North American economies. And a major source of tension right now between the US and Canada is over industrial policy. The US over the last several years has started to deeply subsidize infrastructure development, semiconductor manufacturing, and in the Inflation Reduction Act, green energy production, electric vehicles, and the components that go into this.
Now, the automobile industry is obviously a very major component of US/Canada trade and has been that way since the mid '90s when NAFTA was signed. The renegotiated USMCA has created a new set of playing rules for governing US/Canada trade, and there have been several long-standing disputes between the two countries that have not yet been worked out. And now with the introduction of the US' new subsidies, the Inflation Reduction Act is causing major concerns in Canada who are worried about losing green energy investments to the United States where there are tax preferences, loan programs, and other direct form of subsidies in order to get that manufacturing into the US.
Canada last week responded with its own budget, laying out billions of dollars in new subsidies to help compete with the United States and hoping that it can attract some of that investment over the northern border. Canada has several very attractive elements that the US does not have, including lower costs of construction, more flexible immigration policy, allowing them to take in higher skilled labor from around the globe, that is set specifically around set of criteria having to do with how qualified and educated immigrants are. This exists in the US but to a much lesser extent, and now Canada's getting into the subsidy game.
So this could be an ongoing source of tension between the two countries. It means that if you're looking to build a manufacturing plant for green energy or EV, electric vehicles, or for batteries, there's going to be this race to the top that the US is trying to push. Where Canada, the US, the EU, are all looking at different ways they can get these manufacturers into their markets. And going forward, these types of tensions could be an important part of the US/Canada relationship.
Both leaders are incentivized to keep things friendly between the two countries. Canada has a lot to lose if they could cut out of the US market. And from the US perspective, Canada is sort of like a very large state where English is the primary language, there's very little trade barriers, a highly educated workforce that's competitive across many of the same areas that the US economy is, and the US is also deeply incentivized to get along well here with Canada.
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U.S. President Joe Biden and Canadian PM Justin Trudeau during a bilateral meeting at the North American Leaders' Summit in Mexico City, Mexico, January 10, 2023.
Biden-Trudeau talks focus on immigration and defense
Amid the pomp and pageantry accompanying President Joe Biden’s first official visit to Canada, he and Canadian PM Justin Trudeau are looking to make some deals.
Even before Biden’s arrival late Thursday, news broke that the two countries had reached an agreement on irregular migration flows across the US-Canada border, a sticking point for both governments. An influx of asylum-seekers across the Roxham Road crossing into Quebec has dogged relations, with nearly 40,000 migrants crossing in 2022 alone.
Trudeau has been asking the US to renegotiate the Safe Third Country Agreement, which requires asylum-seekers who cross select border points to be sent back to the country where they first entered. Why? Because it encourages migrants to enter at irregular crossings like Roxham Road, and once they’re in Canada they can legally make asylum claims.
The precise details of the new migration deal are still under wraps, but Canada has reportedly agreed to take in 15,000 migrants from the Western Hemisphere through official channels. The agreement also would reportedly allow both countries to turn away asylum-seekers who cross the border without authorization.
The Biden-Trudeau talks on Friday are also expected to turn to defense. Last month’s Chinese spy balloon fiasco has led to increased pressure on both leaders to ramp up security. North Korean missile tests and Russian advances in missile technology have added more urgency to North American defense.
A new Maru Public/GZERO poll finds that the vast majority of Americans and Canadians (93% and 91%, respectively) want the two countries to boost security efforts, and most Canadians favor either a joint missile-defense system or having US missiles on Canadian soil.
With both Canada and the US being behind on the modernization of the North American Aerospace Defense Command – much of its radar systems are from the 1980s – Friday’s discussions are likely to touch on NORAD investment.
Biden is expected to push Trudeau on military spending – like many NATO members, Canada lags behind its defense spending target of 2% GDP. Canadian NORAD officials complain that current military capabilities are sluggish. Last year, Trudeau’s government pledged $4.9 billion to upgrade NORAD, but Americans are skeptical about the speed at which Canada can deliver.
The war in Ukraine is also putting Arctic defense back on the map. The Maru/GZERO poll showed that majorities in both the US and Canada support a joint military presence in the Arctic. Receding ice in the region has freed up shipping lanes, portending new access to lucrative resources like oil and rare-earth minerals. The region’s security would take on even more geopolitical importance should Finland and Sweden join NATO, possibly making it a new frontline pitting Russia against the West.
There's no shortage of thorny issues for Biden and Trudeau to tackle, from defense and immigration to trade and Ukraine. For more on the presidential visit, be sure to join us on Twitter Friday at 12pm ET. We’ll be talking with Forbes' Diane Brady, Eurasia Group's Gerald Butts, and GZERO's Evan Solomon, breaking down what Biden and Trudeau need to accomplish during their meeting. Set a reminder here.
To stay up to date on crucial US-Canada relations, be sure to subscribe to our new newsletter, GZERO North.
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