It has been said that those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat, and those that do learn are doomed to watch it repeat in horror.
That’s about how I felt when I started writing this.
What has happened and will happen in America should be a lesson for the rest of us, but I don’t know if it will sink in.
On Nov.5, I joined a watch party with friends on both sides of the border to watch the results roll in.
Back in 2016, I, like so many others, couldn’t understand how it was possible that Donald Trump had been elected, as races were called in his favour.
This time, in that watch party, there was little shock or surprise.
It also means I won’t be surprised if Canada follows suit with its own populist politicians.
One of the most common refrains in the exit polling was inflation and things like the price of groceries.
“It’s the economy, stupid.” That line really is evergreen. Trump asked people if they were better off four years ago — before the global pandemic that upended so much of society — and of course, people said yes. The cause didn’t matter; the symptoms did.
Canada doesn’t have a Trump of its own, but it does have it’s own far-right populists capitalizing on those who feel disenfranchised by larger parties.
The People’s Party of Canadahas seen its vote share increase election over election.
In just two years, from 2019 to 2021, the PPC went from 290,000 votes to more than 840,000.
In a post shared just a day before the U.S. Election, PPC leader Maxime Bernier said he hoped that Trump would win, that under Trump the U.S. government will pass laws to crack down on Facebook and Google, will end the war in Ukraine, and will force coverage of “radical gender ideology” because Trump will do something about that.
“The President of the United States, he’s speaking a little bit like us on different issues,” Bernier said. “Trump is speaking about ending illegal immigration, finishing the wall and the deportation off all the illegal immigrants. I agree with all that.”
And while more people being willing to vote for positions that are further right-wing is something to consider, one must also consider the fact that a lack of people supporting centre and left-of-centre positions is probably the bigger issue with the U.S. election.
It wasn’t that everyone all of a sudden decided Trump’s brand of authoritarianism was OK. Trump, so far with some mail in ballots remaining, earned about three million less votes than in 2020.
Instead, people decided they weren’t happy with who was in charge and just… didn’t show up. President Joe Biden won in 2020 with 81 million votes. Kamala Harris is looking to end up around 67 million. This is barely higher than Hillary Clinton’s popular vote victory in 2016.
I hope Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is watching this. I hope Jagmeet Singh and the NDP are too, because I’m sure the conservatives and reactionaries of Canada, no matter what party they call home, are definitely paying attention.
I have many friends south of the border, a number of them who are transgender who are worried about their lives in the future.
America isn’t Canada, but its presence and impact isn’t escapable either. The modern world is one more closely linked than ever before, and what happens in one nation impacts so many others.
I’m not looking forward to our biggest trade partner suddenly jacking up inflation by making massive tax cuts and tariffs on everything under the sun.
I’m not looking forward to the carte blanche that Trump will hand out to dictators like Russian President Vladimir Putin, or to human rights abuses like the persecution of Palestinians in Gaza.
I’m not looking forward to him potentially following through and putting anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in charge of the Centre of Disease Control, or letting Elon Musk run rampant elsewhere in his cabinet.
I have friends south of the border who right now are worried about surviving the next four years, whether because they’re gay, transgender, black or a woman.
If there is a piece of solace I can take is that I hope this serves as a wake up call for the rest of the world.
We survived a Trump presidency before, weathered shocks to the global and Canadian economy, his quiet and sometimes not-so-quiet endorsement of dictators and authoritarian regimes.
The world came out of it scarred and different, but Canada survived and we can do it again.
Brennan Phillips is a reporter with Black Press Media.
