The Athabasca oil sands in northwest Alberta. Photo by Kris Krüg/Flickr.

The response to America’s renewed belligerence under Trump 2.0 has been all over the map. Doug Ford, perhaps Canada’s most Trump-like politician, made headlines for his “Canada Is Not For Sale” hat, despite his entire premiership being dedicated to selling off Ontario. BC Premier David Eby, for his part, suggested we might tax the Alaska Highway or ban American liquor and asked British Columbians not to vacation in the US.

Underneath Eby’s haphazard ideas lurked an announcement that lent a little more clarity to the multipartisan strategy that the range of Canada’s parties seem to be pursuing: capitulation. Eby announced a new task force focused on the threat of Trump’s tariffs, co-chaired by three business leaders including the president of Teck Resources, Jonathan Price.

Teck is a major, publicly traded multinational mining company with a century-long history, and like most of these firms, it is deeply tied to US capital. Teck is 67 percent owned by institutional investors. US-based asset managers Vanguard, Fidelity, Boston Partners, Dodge & Cox, Blackrock, Janus Henderson, and Davis Advisors account for seven of the top ten shareholder positions, and many of the other owners that aren’t based in the US are connected to and partially owned by American companies.

What this means is that Eby’s so-called response to the tariff threat is a matter of putting the fox in charge of the henhouse. Eby, like most other Canadian politicians, is trying to present a rhetorical commitment to Canadian nationalism while simultaneously rolling out the red carpet for foreign corporations. This isn’t a departure, exactly. He is simply doubling down on the........

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