Algonquin artist Doreen Stevens, right, and her daughter Charlotte perform a drum song during the National Day of Awareness and Remembrance for Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls and 2SLGBTQI+ People (MMIWG2S) on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on May 5.Spencer Colby/The Canadian Press
Bob Joseph is the author of 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act and, most recently, 21 Things You May Not Know About Indigenous Self-Government, which is a finalist for the 2026 Donner Prize.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s musings about making Canada the 51st state have infuriated Canadians.
Here we have a foreign power publicly considering subjugating this country, and a President promoting the idea of appropriating something that the U.S. does not own or have a right to own. This scenario would have been unimaginable to Canadians 10 years ago. But today, with the world in chaos, the economy sputtering, and separatist movements on the march in two different provinces, Mr. Trump is making this notion feel very real, including by calling Canada’s Prime Minister “governor.” Mark Carney has marshalled “elbows up” Canadians, who have made clear they aren’t interested, but that might not be enough to stop a unilateral declaration of sovereignty or a foreign-imposed regime change, as the U.S. launched in Venezuela earlier this year.
Canadians have responded defiantly to Mr. Trump’s rhetoric, with maple-leaf flags flying outside homes and businesses, “Buy Canadian” messaging, and a boycott of travel to America. Many have dismissed this talk altogether, if nervously – it’s hard to tell if the President’s threat is serious or a far-fetched notion – and it has also been disturbing, as it challenges our identity as Canadians.
That makes sense. After all, what Mr. Trump is proposing is the very definition of colonization.
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The parallels between the threatened colonization of Canada and Canadians by the U.S. and the very real colonization of Indigenous Peoples via the Indian Act start with the originating idea: to exploit vast natural resources, no matter who claims them, to generate wealth and secure power. In the country we call Canada, it began with beaver pelts, the fishery, and timber; today, it’s critical minerals and oil. While it’s nearly impossible to get into the head of the erratic President, one could fairly argue that his 51st-state musings are about taking Canada’s vast natural resources to generate wealth and secure power, too.
Colonization by the U.S. would bring other dramatic and negative changes, too. Let’s circle back to the disrespectful “governor” label for our Prime Minister. Canada already has a government, which includes a king, or what I like to call a hereditary leader. Mr. Trump’s quip signals a desire to change our government, our democracy, and our Constitution. It would make our elections radically different, forced to conform to the two-party system dominated by Democrats and Republicans. Our socialized medicine would probably be killed off, and U.S. law would supersede Canada’s.
We would also have to deal with the details and differences of American citizenship, and our school curricula would have to take an American-centric view – and Canadians would have to go along to get along. In my book about the Indian Act, I wrote about how control is tightened when one power takes something that doesn’t belong to them. There was once, for instance, a prohibition on the sale of ammunition to First Nations people. If Canada were to become the 51st state, I’m positive the United States would be concerned enough about our armed forces to do the same.
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Feeling defiant, dismissive, disturbed – these are all appropriate responses to Mr. Trump’s rhetoric. Anyone who is about to be or has been subjugated would understand these feelings entirely. So, shouldn’t we be trying to avoid the feelings, in general, wherever possible?
It reminds me of former prime minister Stephen Harper’s apology on residential schools. “Not only did you suffer these abuses as children,” he told survivors, ”but as you became parents, you were powerless to protect your own children from suffering the same experience.” Similarly, the President would be able to do whatever he wants because, if we were the 51st state, we would be a powerless people.
The 51st-state conversation has offered a painful and powerful illustration to many Canadians of what it feels like to have a foreign power potentially taking over one’s lands, resources, governance, and culture. It’s the feeling that First Nations people have felt for more than 150 years under the Indian Act, which imposed regressive and paternalistic laws. But I know my fellow Canadians wouldn’t want this – that we would fight it, just as Indians like myself have been fighting the Indian Act.
So, in the spirit of Canada’s continuing reconciliation journey, let’s use this moment of unity against a common foe to have a serious conversation about the colonization and oppression that already exists, and work in earnest on an Indigenous-led dismantling of the Indian Act.