Green Worldwide Shipping is the presenting sponsor of Global Atlanta's Trade Channel. Sign up here for monthly global trade updates.
Market Access International is the presenting sponsor of Global Atlanta's Canada Channel. Subscribe here for monthly Canada newsletters.
Canada remains dedicated to its now-testy relationship with its southern neighbor, but resiliency amid a Trump tariff assault is requiring more investment at home and further diversification of export markets, the country’s top diplomat in Atlanta said Tuesday.
Without mentioning the U.S. president directly, Consul General Rosaline Kwan said “unpredictable times” have befallen a trillion-dollar trade partnership that over decades has forged deep integration of North American supply chains.
“Every day, 400,000 people cross the border. Every day, $2.5 billion of goods cross the border. So this gives you a sense of the significance of the relationship, and this relationship is diversified in all different kinds of sectors,” Ms. Kwan told Global Atlanta during the publication’s latest Consular Conversations luncheon.
In this “outside the Perimeter” edition of the monthly series, hosted by the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce and presented by Miller & Martin PLLC, Ms. Kwan outlined how the six states in her Southeast U.S. territory are maintaining strong ties with Canada amid turbulence at the national level.
The consul general was among officials who attended in June the SEUS Canadian Provinces Alliance conference in New Brunswick, where some 1,100 B2B meetings showed the vibrancy that still exists in the bilateral commercial relationship.
Before the conference, Georgia’s Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who largely backs Mr. Trump, visited Toronto to meet with Premier Doug Ford of Ontario, who has vocally pushed back on U.S. tariffs, often wearing a “Canada is not for sale” hat.
That discussion, and others among business leaders and policy makers at the conference, underscore the importance of continued dialogue at the subnational level, Ms. Kwan added.
“Conversations and interactions and engagements like that carry us forward,” Ms. Kwan told Global Atlanta in an interview before an audience of more than 100 guests.
Canada, she noted, is the top customer for the U.S., with 8 million jobs nationally depending on U.S.-Canada trade.
The same is true for Georgia and most of its Southern counterparts, which have seen Canada top their list of export markets for decades. Georgia maintains a trade office in Montreal to deepen integration with a market that bought $7.4 billion in Georgia goods in 2024. On the sidelines of the June conference, Mr. Kemp met with New Brunswick-based Irving Tissue, which just invested another $600 million in Macon, Ga.
Once considered a given, what Ms. Kwan called “mutually beneficial” interactions have been thrown into question this year by Mr. Trump’s imposition of “reciprocal” tariffs on Canada, first at a rate of 25 percent in June, ratcheted up to 35 percent in August.
According to the White House, the measures were aimed at stemming illicit immigration and the flow of fentanyl into the U.S. via the northern border.
Canada has long protested the characterization that it’s soft on crime or illegal crossings, and Ms. Kwan noted that less than 1 percent of fentanyl seized by U.S. officials came from Canada, even before the tariffs. Border apprehensions are down 99 percent, she said, since the government instituted a $1 billion security plan that included deployment of 10,000 troops and the appointment of a “fentanyl czar.”
“Just to be clear, there were very few cases to begin with, but now they’re even that much fewer,” Ms. Kwan said.
Mr. Trump still wasn’t appeased, and the onslaught against Canada, as well as suggestions that it should become the 51st American state, continued from the White House, even during Prime Minister Mark Carney’s first Oval Office visit in May.
Steep 50 percent tariffs on steel and aluminum, as well as a 25 percent levy on Canadian cars, meanwhile, targeted Canada on national security grounds, despite its traditional role as one of the staunchest U.S. allies.
“The imposition of tariffs based on the premise that Canada is a threat to national security is unjustified, simply,” Ms. Kwan said.
“The imposition of tariffs based on the premise that Canada is a threat to national security is unjustified, simply.”
Rosaline kwan, Consul general of Canada to the Southeast U.S.
For its part, Canada launched its own retaliatory tariffs on select U.S. sectors, which have since been relaxed since Mr. Carney was elected April.
The effects of some tariffs have been muted by the fact that goods trading under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, known as CUSMA in Canada, still flow tariff-free in both directions.
With a USMCA review coming next year, Canada will once again be open to making sure the deal — already renegotiated during Mr. Trump’s first term —remains “fit for purpose,” Ms. Kwan said.
“We’re ready to be at the table,” she added.
Still, despite their reputation for patience and tolerance, Canadians have been expressing their displeasure with American policies by boycotting goods and canceling trips to the U.S., a trend that hasn’t completely abated.
“Canadians have been choosing to spend their dollars where they think they’re best spent,” Ms. Kwan, noting that any discussions that call into question Canadian sovereignty are “not reality, nor the aspiration of Canadians.”
In light of persistent uncertainty, the Canadian government under Mr. Carney has been focused on building resilience, she said, reducing internal trade barriers between provinces, instituting “Buy Canada” policies, launching new infrastructure investments and expanding relationships with other trade partners, including Europe and Mexico. (Canada already has 15 trade deals covering 51 countries).
Mr. Carney’s office announced Friday that he would meet with Mr. Trump next week in an effort to resolve some of these disputes.
That couldn’t come soon enough for small and medium-sized companies that have had to choose between passing on additional costs to customers or seeing their profits fall.
“For them, it’s not very helpful to have this challenge of everyday unpredictability, uncertainty. The constant message that we hear is the need to come back to some stability, some predictability, so they can get on with doing their business.”
She noted that Georgians have a role to play in strengthening the bilateral relationship, pointing to ongoing initiatives like university exchanges, efforts to form a Georgia-Canada legislative caucus, and a recent visit by 90 Gwinnett leaders to Quebec.
Kevin Carmichael, senior vice president at Partnership Gwinnett, opened the forum by outlinining how the Gwinnett Chamber’s Strategic Leadership Visit enabled 90 local officials to exchange ideas with Montreal counterparts on education, transit, redevelopment and artificial intelligence on a Strategic Leadership Visit.
“The end goal is long-term. It’s about economic growth and it’s about prosperity for our region,” Mr. Carmichael said. “Montreal reminded us that vision, if paired with collaboration, also drives progress.”
- View the Gwinnett Chamber’s summary of the event here
- See a Gwinnett Chamber LinkedIn post with a video below:
The Dean Rusk International Law Center at the University of Georgia is the presenting sponsor of Global Atlanta's Diplomacy Channel. Subscribe here for monthly Diplomacy newsletters.