Ceremonial weigh-ins on the eve of UFC Freedom 250 at the White House, June 13, 2026/Shutterstock

By Colin Robertson

July 2, 2026

As the United States marks its 250th anniversary, the mood — especially among its traditional friends and allies — is less one of celebration than of alarm.

Since Donald Trump’s second presidency began doubling down on the most disturbing aspects of his first term, many allies now view the Great Republic not with admiration but with trepidation and, in some cases, active animosity.

For more than a century, the United States has been, for Canada, a benign if not benevolent neighbour, a trusted ally and a dependable trading partner. That relationship helped underpin Canadian prosperity and security.

Today, however, it is changing in ways that demand a profound recalibration of both our foreign policy and our domestic priorities.

Canadians often assume the United States works like other Western democracies. It does not. America is less hierarchical, less deferential, more entrepreneurial and more driven by public opinion than outsiders appreciate.

America is a nation of constant tension. It is a country divided by region, race, religion, class, and ideology. It always has been. The America that Lincoln inherited in 1861 was arguably more fractured than today’s. Franklin Roosevelt confronted depression and global war. Lyndon Johnson faced civil unrest, racial conflict, and Vietnam.

The America that Ronald Reagan famously styled as a “shining city upon a hill” —  a beacon of hope, freedom and opportunity, championing open markets, open societies and open alliances — is again in transition.

Under Trump, the United States behaves less like a beacon than a predator: a hegemon increasingly willing to use its economic and political power coercively.

To friends and allies, America is inconsistent and unpredictable. To adversaries, it appears more vulnerable if not in actual decline. To many of its own citizens, its future has become contested terrain.

For Canadians, the challenge is immediate.

For generations, our strategy rested on a broad status quo that seemed permanent: the United States would support free trade, value alliances, broadly uphold international rules and regard Canada as a uniquely trusted partner. Those conditions no longer hold with the same certainty.

Our response to this change should not be anti-Americanism. It should be prudence.

But before writing another obituary for the American century, it is worth recalling the observation of the acclaimed BBC broadcaster Alistair Cooke. Reflecting on the American experiment, Cooke argued that the country’s history was best understood as a paradox: “A land of the most persistent idealism and blandest cynicism, the race is on between its decadence and its vitality.”

That tension has defined the republic from the beginning.

America’s vitality is obvious. It lies in its entrepreneurial culture, its scientific innovation, its capacity to attract talent from around the world and its remarkable ability to reinvent itself. It is visible in Silicon Valley, in its research universities, in its financial markets and in the dynamism of its states and cities.

Its decadence is equally visible: the rampant corruption that both produced and has defined the Trump presidency, the political polarization; the fiscal irresponsibility; the social fragmentation; and the institutional distrust.

The question at 250 is not whether both forces exist. They always have. The question is which force is winning.

This is not the first time observers have doubted the American experiment. The republic has endured civil war, economic depression, social upheaval, assassinations, urban unrest and foreign-policy disasters.

Each crisis produced predictions of irreversible decline.

Yet, America has repeatedly confounded pessimists because, as historian Jon Meacham argues, its story is ultimately the story of what Abraham Lincoln called the nation’s “better angels”.

Progress has rarely been linear. Reform has usually followed failure. The country advances not because it avoids mistakes but because it possesses a recurring capacity for self-correction.

The struggle between fear and hope, exclusion and inclusion, isolation and engagement, has never been fully resolved. But over time, America’s better angels have mostly prevailed.

That capacity for renewal remains one of the country’s greatest strategic assets.

Under Trump, the United States behaves less like a beacon than a predator: a hegemon increasingly willing to use its economic and political power coercively.

The historian Stephen Kotkin offers perhaps the most compelling explanation for America’s resilience. Nations recover, he argues, when they possess a civic culture with strong institutions, an innovative economy, social mobility, the rule of law and an ability to attract talent from abroad.

By those measures, the United States retains formidable advantages.

Its universities remain magnets for global talent. Its capital markets are unrivalled. Its private sector continues to dominate many of the technologies shaping the future. Its constitutional system with its checks and balances, while strained and tested over the past decade, still disperses power across competing institutions.

Above all, America continues to attract ambitious people who want to build businesses, conduct research and create wealth.

When Ottawa thinks about Washington, it should think beyond Washington.

The United States is not a unitary state. It is a continental federation of 50 states, thousands of municipalities, and countless centres of economic and political influence.

The United States is much more than the occupant of the White House. It is Congress, governors, courts, universities, companies, labour unions, civic organizations and citizens. The strength of the republic has always rested less on individual leaders than on the vitality of these institutions.

The lesson for Canada now is the same prescription that has worked since Trump I: engage America broadly. The American system disperses power widely, often frustratingly, but deliberately.

Canada needs deep relationships with governors, senators, representatives, mayors, business leaders, unions, universities, think tanks, and local media. In an America where power is fragmented, influence must also be dispersed. We need 1,000 points of contact.

For Canada, success with the United States requires understanding how America works, investing in our own capabilities, and approaching the relationship with confidence.

That also means strengthening national resilience at home while diversifying partnerships abroad. It means investing seriously in defence, securing critical infrastructure, building energy and resource corridors, improving productivity and reducing barriers to economic growth. It means engaging the United States intensely while simultaneously expanding ties with Europe, the Indo-Pacific and other middle powers.

In short, Canada must become less dependent without becoming less engaged.

The objective is not separation from the United States. We can’t change our geography. The objective is greater sovereignty within an enduring partnership.

The deeper question raised by America’s 250th anniversary is not simply what kind of country the United States has become. It is what kind of country it wishes to be.

Will it remain the principal architect of an open international order or become another great power pursuing its interests with fewer constraints? Will it see alliances as strategic assets or as burdens? Will it draw strength from its diversity and constitutional traditions or allow polarization to weaken them?

To those who would write off America, history counsels humility. Generations before us have mistaken turbulence for terminal decline. America has repeatedly surprised its critics.

Cooke’s American race between vitality and decadence continues. Meacham’s better angels are still contesting the nation’s future. Kotkin’s sources of renewal remain largely intact.

For Canadians, realism requires preparing for both possibilities: an America that renews itself — and an America that does not.

At 250, the United States remains the most consequential nation in the world not because it is flawless, but because it possesses a rare capacity to confront its flaws and begin again.

The outcome of that contest will shape not only America’s future, but Canada’s as well.

Contributing Writer Colin Robertson, C.M., C.D., a former career diplomat, is a fellow and host of the Global Exchange podcast with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute in Ottawa.