Canada grapples with U.S. ban on travel from Europe amid border questions

Business leaders caution against overreaction to Trump’s surprise move

Canada and the United States conferred over the fate of their shared border, one day after President Donald Trump slammed America’s door shut to foreign nationals who recently spent time in Europe to stop COVID-19 contagion. Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said she discussed the development with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday and updated him about Canada’s health and border measures.

The conversation was part of the scrambling the Trudeau government faced after Trump’s drastic step to slow the accelerating global pandemic — a move that could pose a serious threat to commerce and travel between Canada and its largest trading partner.

“I spoke with him about the very strong public health system and health-care system in Canada and the measures we are taking to combat the coronavirus,” Freeland told reporters on Parliament Hill, noting they also agreed to remain in contact over the Canada-U.S. border.

The Trudeau government faced strong calls Thursday from business leaders to avoid overreacting to Trump’s decision to bar most foreign nationals who were recently in Europe. They urged the government to ensure Canada’s border agents were doing enough to keep potential virus carriers out of Canada, but to not hinder the country’s access to the crucial American market.

Perrin Beatty, the president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said the announcement had more to do with politics than public health.

“There’s a concern we may face, whether in the U.S. or elsewhere, pandemic protectionism — people will want to seal off markets, use the excuse of the pandemic for doing so,” he said in an interview.

Beatty said the government’s response doesn’t have to be identical to the U.S. but “we have to be concerned if we get too great a divergence that suddenly that we find problems on our border and problems doing business with our largest customer.”

Goldy Hyder, the president of the Business Council of Canada, said the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has been “spot on” so far, and that it has to resist the urge to overreact to Trump’s unexpected decision.

“We have to look at protecting that flow of services and that flow of people in what is effectively 75 per cent of our economy,” he said.

Most of the country’s premiers were in Ottawa for a first ministers meeting, but the outbreak forced Trudeau to turn that into a phone meeting to limit the spread of the virus.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford stressed the need to keep goods and people flowing between Canada and its largest trading partner.

“We have to look at this as North America, not just Canada … it’s absolutely critical we keep the borders open and have the trade flowing back and forth.”