1 in 4 Canadians avoiding U.S. travel over feelings towards Trump: survey

Nearly 700,000 fewer people crossed into Maine from New Brunswick in the last year.

U.S. President Donald Trump has officially spent a year in office for his second term, and during that time nearly 700,000 fewer people crossed into the state of Maine from New Brunswick.

Numbers from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection show in 2024 a total of 2,786,928 travelers crossed into Maine through a New Brunswick land border crossing by either passenger vehicle, foot or truck.

In 2025, only 2,092,307 people made their way into states through the Maritime province. That includes August, when roughly 100,000 fewer people crossed into the states year over year during the peak summer month. It’s a difference of 694,621 fewer travelers from 2024 to 2025.

The big reason behind the travel change is largely due to tariffs implemented by the U.S. President on several Canadian goods. He has also repeatedly threated to annex Canada by calling the nation the “51^st state.”

“This second Trump administration is fundamentally different than the previous one and other administrations recently,” says St. Thomas University political scientist Jamie Gillies. “I think what we’re seeing here, and Mark Carney alluded to it in that that speech in Davos, Switzerland, as well, is that that the old order, the sort of regular routine of doing things, is not there anymore, at least through 2028.”

While it’s hard to predict what the border trends will be in three years, things are likely to be much of the same in 2026 if a new poll conducted by Abacus Data is any indication.

In a survey of 1,850 Canadian adults, the poll found one in four Canadians (23 per cent) avoided travel to the United States in 2025 because of Donald Trump’s treatment of Canada.

The poll also found that if they did travel to the U.S., Atlantic Canadians would be the least likely to report travelling to our southern neighbour.

What stands out most from the survey’s findings for Abacus Data CEO David Coletto is the fact one-third of Canadians would think less of a family member or friend who took a trip to the United States.

“That social stigma that has been created because of the divide on our politics and our views towards Donald Trump and the United States, might be affecting relationships in people’s lives,” says Coletto. “I don’t think it’s coincidental that, anecdotally, you hear people saying look, if I’m traveling to the U.S., I’m not going to post it on Instagram or Facebook. I’m not going to share it because I’m not sure people are going to like that.”

He says the strong reaction from Atlantic Canadians isn’t a surprise based on previous polls done by the company. As for the reason, he believes it could be due to the impact tariffs have had on fishing and forestry communities.

Even if a trade deal were to be struck tomorrow, Gillies believes some people who changed their travel plans last year won’t be heading back to the U.S. anytime soon. That could result in Americans stopping their northern vacations.

“If that relationship continues to deteriorate and the trust levels between the two countries on both sides of the border decline, we could potentially see a decline in Americans visiting Canada as well,” says Gillies. “It doesn’t help anybody, but given the mercurial nature of the Trump administration, we don’t know what’s going to come next.”