Canadian anger with President Trump’s tariff and immigration policies appears to be causing a sharp decline in tourism from Canada, which is hurting businesses in the United States.
Roughly 4 million fewer Canadians are expected to visit the U.S. this year compared with 2024, according to an estimate by the travel analytics firm Tourism Economics, the Washington Post reported. That could result in a revenue loss of $4.3 billion, but the decline in visitors is already having an impact.
"It's terrible," Richard Clavet, the owner of Richard's Motel in Hollywood, Fla., which caters to Canadian visitors. "People are canceling reservations left and right. They're not booking. We should be super, super busy right now and we're just basically seeking American business," Clavet told the Miami Herald.
In addition to Trump’s 25% tariffs on some Canadian products, Trump signed an executive order on the first day of his second term that requires Canadian citizens to register with his government when traveling to the U.S. for longer than 30 days. That, plus Trump’s repeated assertion that he hopes to make Canada the 51st U.S. state, has not sat well.
“For the nicest people on the planet, who are Canadians, the language is strong,” Stacy Ritter, head of Visit Lauderdale in South Florida, told the Post. “There’s a lot of anger out there.”
More Canadians visit the United States each year than residents of any other country. Nearly 3.3 million Canadians traveled to Florida in 2024, according to Visit Florida. But many of those visitors stay longer than 30 days, with almost 60,000 Canadians residing in the state for some portion of the year, WFLA News reported.
"It's not only having a negative impact on the tourism market, but business as a whole," Cole Peacock, the owner of a business in Ft. Myers, Fla., called Seed and Bean Market, told WBBH News. "You need those extra visits to kick that profit margins to another level."
In apparent response to what are seen as the Trump administration's hostile actions against one of its closest allies, automobile travel in February from Canada to the U.S. fell by 17.5% compared to last year, data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection shows. That has hurt local border economies of towns like Plattsburgh, N.Y., where Canadian customers account for a significant portion of revenue. This week, the North Country Chamber of Commerce, which includes Plattsburgh, released a report showing that 66% of retailers in the town had "experienced a slight to significant decrease in Canadian bookings for 2025."
"This is profoundly sad to everyone in the North Country who rightly values the historic and special people-to-people relationship with our friends and neighbors,” Garry Douglas, president of the North Country Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement about the implementation of tariffs and the resulting Canadian travel boycott to the U.S.
Canadians have also canceled millions of plane reservations to the U.S., and Canadian airlines have cut back or canceled flight routes to snowbird destinations like Las Vegas and Palm Springs, Calif., the Street reported.
"Betrayed, frustrated and angry are the three words that keep coming up," Ron Stader, a Canadian from Calgary who winters at a home he bought in La Quinta, Calif., told the Desert Sun. "And obviously how could that not be expected when something like this happens with each country's number one trading partner and probably the two best allies in the world? It feels like a sucker punch."
Like many Canadians who own properties in the U.S., Stader is now looking to sell. That’s true across California's Coachella Valley, which includes Palm Springs.
"Half of them are staying and half of them said they're going to sell and they're not going to come back, that they're going to buy homes in Europe or someplace else," Palm Desert realtor Kathleen Sunshine O'Brien told NBC Palm Springs about the Canadians who own between 5,000 and 6,000 properties in the Coachella Valley.
That sudden exodus of Canadians and a lack of buyers to replace them could have a profound effect on the market.
“We have 4,000 homes on the market in the Coachella Valley, and if half of the Canadians sell, that’s another 2,500, which is going to make the days on market even longer than they are now and could force prices down,” O’Brien said.
