NEW YORK: Right on the US-Canadian border, Corey Fram\u2019s tourism marketing job has gotten a lot harder of late.
\nFram is director of the 1000 Islands International Tourism Council, which promotes a nature destination with castles, cruises, hikes and fishing enjoyed by Canadians and Americans. But he says US President Donald Trump\u2019s continuous disparagement of Canada is taking a toll.
\n\u201cWe have had to switch gears a bit,\u201d Fram said from his office near the 1,800 tiny scenic islands that dot the St. Lawrence River framed by New York State and Ontario province.
\nSeeing Canadian and American flags often flying side by side, travelers didn\u2019t care what side of the border they were on. Now, with Trump\u2019s recent rhetoric, Fram has had to adjust his message.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve been very careful not to broadcast and demonstrate US assets to Canadian audiences and Canadian assets to US audiences because when we have, we found that has drawn out a lot of negative sentiment,\u201d Fram said.
\nCanadians have been stung by Trump\u2019s actions and words since he returned to the White House, both around tariffs and suggestions that Canada should be annexed by the United States.
\nThe American anthem has been booed at hockey games and some stores are removing US products from their shelves, even before Trump\u2019s latest salvo on Tuesday, when he increased tariffs on imported Canadian steel and aluminum to 50 percent.
\nTravelers are responding with their wallets. New bookings to the United States from Canada have declined about 20 percent since February 1 compared with the year-ago period, according to Forward Keys, a flight ticketing data firm.
\nUnited Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said on Tuesday the company has adjusted its capacity due to a big drop in incoming traffic from Canada.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve lost a lot of interest in going to the States in general,\u201d said Allyson C., 34, from Vancouver, who canceled her family\u2019s summer vacation to Washington, D.C., citing the on-again, off-again tariffs and the US exchange rate.
\nThis worries the US travel industry. Inbound travel to the United States is still just 90 percent of pre-pandemic levels, Geoff Freeman, CEO of the US Travel Association, said in an interview.
\nNo other country\u2019s residents go to the United States more than Canada, which notched 20.4 million visits in 2024. Canadian travelers also spend three times more on vacations than domestic US travelers, said Freeman.
\nSaturday night hotel bookings in Bellingham, Washington, a coastal city near the Canadian border which offers skiing and ferries to Alaska, declined 10.8 percent from February 2 through March 1. Bookings in Niagara Falls, New York, fell 8.1 percent over the same period, according to analytics firm CoStar.
\nWeather and the exchange rate also affected cross-border travel in 2024, said Jan Freitag, director of US hospitality at CoStar.
\n\u201cThe thing that is different this year is the rhetoric from the administration that has a lot of Canadians thinking twice about coming across the border.\u201d
\nFram said his tourism council is also not getting as warm a reception to invitations to bring Canadian travel writers and influencers to Thousand Islands attractions on the New York side.
\n\u201cAnytime that we put a restriction and make it difficult or make people not want to cross the border, that has a lasting impact,\u201d said Fram. \u201cIt is going to be a significant challenge to get back to where we were before this.\u201d
\nThe Trump administration said it will require all foreigners above the age of 14 in the US to register and submit fingerprints beginning April 11 if they stay beyond 30 days. Canadians are not exempt, even though they typically can visit the US for up to six months without a visa.
\nCanadians aren\u2019t the only travelers backing off from the US Bookings from Denmark and Germany decreased 27 percent and 15 percent year-over-year, respectively, according to Forward Keys. Demand from Europe as a whole only slightly decreased at 1 percent.
\nBut Canada\u2019s proximity makes it more important. A 10 percent drop in Canadian travelers could cost the United States $2.1 billion in lost spending, the US Travel Association estimated.
\n\u201cI would love to go back to the US, but right now, as things are, I as a Canadian don\u2019t really feel safe or welcomed,\u201d said artist manager Zina Oukil, 32, from Calgary. She is vacationing in Cancun, Mexico with her husband after canceling a road trip to Los Angeles.
\n\u201cI feel very sad about it, but also a little bit frustrated and quite frankly angry,\u201d Oukil said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NEW YORK: Right on the US-Canadian border, Corey Fram\u2019s tourism marketing job has gotten a lot harder of late. Fram is director of the 1000 Islands International Tourism Council, which promotes a nature destination with castles, cruises, hikes and fishing enjoyed by Canadians and Americans. But he says US President Donald Trump\u2019s continuous disparagement of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466715,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-466705","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n