Why some Canadians are in denial about Trump

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This article was published 17/03/2025 (234 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Prime Minister Mark Carney has vowed Canada will never be a 51st American state and has called on Canada to present a united front to defend against United States President Donald Trump’s escalating attacks on Canada’s economy and sovereignty.

Most Canadians are already on board. Provincial premiers have committed to defending against tariffs, and recent polling data shows 85 per cent of Canadians resolutely reject Trump’s threats of annexation.

Yet, despite this widespread patriotism, some Canadians may have a relative or friend in the contrarian 10 per cent of citizens who welcome annexation.

Why do these people support Trump?

PSYCHOLOGY AND SECURITY

The answer has less to do with politics or economic frustration than it does psychology. The reason some Canadians are reacting positively to Trump’s threats is because cognitive biases often prevent human beings from accurately assessing shocks to their security environment.

Psychological biases are well-researched in international security scholarship, and I have witnessed their consequences first-hand in my work in conflict zones.

From peacekeepers to politicians to ordinary civilians, I have seen how cognitive biases can cause rational, intelligent people to ignore valuable evidence, even at great peril.

Humans often react to unsettling evidence by denying, minimizing or re-interpreting the information to restore their cognitive ease. Everyone in a conflict-prone part of the world experiences cognitive distortions and denial at some point. Psychological security often overrides physical security.

But these biases are dangerous. They undermine decision-making, slow down reaction times and cause people to believe dangerous things that make them unsafe.

The tricky part is that challenging a person’s denial can provoke defensiveness, even rage. But allowing denial to persist leaves them dangerously unprepared to face real-world threats.

On balance, the safer choice is to rip off these psychological Band-aids.

DENIAL THROUGH CONFIRMATION BIAS

Except for a small percentage of extremists, the 10 per cent who are in favour of American annexation are ordinary Canadians. What makes them different are two interrelated cognitive biases: confirmation bias and belief perseverance.

For Canadians who hold Trump in high esteem, acknowledging his threats creates cognitive dissonance. Some people find dissonance so distressing that it feels easier to reject or reinterpret the contrary information in a way that protects prior-held ideas and restores cognitive ease.

These confirmation biases allow the 10 per cent to redefine the word “annexation” to mean something else, such as peaceful political unification. That imagined definition turns Trump’s threat into a friendly proposal leading to greater prosperity and security.

That reinterpretation may reduce psychological distress, but it’s delusional.

Political unification is a non-coercive and consent-based process, wherein parties agree to incorporation through referendum, typically producing an all new government. Trump is proposing unilateral annexation, which is the hostile and illegal seizure of a sovereign state’s territory and the subjugation of its population.

Annexation is not marriage. It’s rape.

Unilateral annexation is so inherently violent that its prohibition in Article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter is considered the legal cornerstone of the post-Second World War international order.

As Trump, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and China’s Xi Jinping each champion annexing nearby sovereign nations in the name of greatness, that international order is now crumbling. If the laws, norms and institutions preventing annexation collapse, it opens the door to invasions, insurgencies and even global war.

Many of the 10 per cent are simply unaware of what “annexation” truly means, and could rationally change their position once they understand the facts. But a smaller subset of that group may reject the evidence entirely.

Belief perseverance causes some people to aggressively hold their original position, even when presented with disconfirming evidence.

While denial helps them feel safe in the moment, it also makes them dangerously unprepared to deal with real threats.

DENIAL THROUGH NORMALCY BIAS

Patriotic “elbows up” Canadians must also be wary of denial. For them, the issue is not identifying the threats, but comprehending their full implications.

Even among informed citizens, NATO, NORAD and the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing alliance are not easy to relate to. Trade wars show up on grocery bills, but these defence organizations keep peace in the background, which is harder to notice.

Canadians may intellectually understand that North American security is deteriorating, but that crisis may not seem as real as tariffs.

This is called “normalcy bias,” a psychological tendency to minimize the probability of threats or the dangers they pose, which delays protective action. Normalcy and optimism biases are why many people fail to evacuate quickly when they are forewarned about wildfires, hurricanes, earthquakes and even wars.

Slow reactions are not caused by stupidity or laziness. Research shows that the majority people respond inefficiently to warnings of forthcoming disasters. I have witnessed this bias in conflict zones and even experienced its effects myself. I can run 10 kilometres in about an hour, but when the Taliban attacked a bazaar less than 10 kilometres from my flat, it still felt far away.

Why? Because security threats don’t feel close until your windows start to shake.

While a military invasion is not imminent, Trump’s threats are so extreme that they warrant immediate action to improve Canadian defence. The time to take protective action is before windows start shaking.

For the majority of Canadians who already take Trump’s threats seriously, the first step in countering the normalcy bias is to pay attention to new risks and fractures in existing security co-operation.

With that evidence, they can initiate a national conversation about how to reduce vulnerabilities and improve resilience and defence.

ACCEPTANCE AND ADAPTATION

There is no time to argue with people who remain cognitively confused. The majority of Canadians are ready to have a laser-focused discussion about the real security challenges on the horizon.

The good news is that Canada can fortify its security and deter threats in this perilous new world.

The range of options may not be as comfortable as the bygone era of friendly alliances and NATO supremacy. But through intelligent debate, Canadians can develop realistic new approaches to national defence, and quickly.

Acceptance and adaptation are the keys to survival.

» Aisha Ahmad is an associate professor in politicial science at the University of Tortonto. This column was originally published at The Conversation Canada: theconversation.com/ca.