U.S. Vice-President JD Vance on Friday took aim at Canada’s political leadership and “immigration insanity” as the reasons for “stagnating” living standards in America’s northern neighbour.
In a series of social media posts on X, Vance shared data purporting to show living standards in Canada falling below the U.S. and Britain in recent years. He then connected that to the fact that Canada has the highest population share of foreign-born people among G7 countries.
“While I’m sure the causes are complicated, no nation has leaned more into ‘diversity is our strength, we don’t need a melting pot we have a salad bowl’ immigration insanity than Canada,” the vice-president wrote.
In a follow-up post he added: “And with all due respect to my Canadian friends, whose politics focus obsessively on the United States: your stagnating living standards have nothing to do with Donald Trump or whatever bogeyman the CBC tells you to blame.
“The fault lies with your leadership, elected by you.”
Statistics Canada reported in 2022, using national census data, that 23 per cent of Canada’s population is foreign-born, the largest share in 150 years and “the highest among the G7.” The agency at the time projected the share could rise to over 30 per cent by 2041 if immigration levels remained the same.
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The U.S. share is currently over 15 per cent, according to census data reviewed by the Pew Research Center, also a historic high for the country.
Vance was responding to a post that shared a line graph, first published by The Telegraph last weekend and using data from Canadian firm Ice Cap Asset Management, that shows per capita GDP in Canada, the U.S. and the U.K. from 2016 to the present.
The graph shows Canada ranking below Britain on that measure since mid-2021, with the gulf growing wider since then. The Canadian line drops further in 2025, according to the graph.
Richard Dias, an Ice Cap Asset Management financial analyst, said he “agreed” with Vance’s comments in a reply on X.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who has called for immigration reform in recent months, shared the same graph Monday on X while criticizing Prime Minister Mark Carney’s financial policies, but did not mention immigration.
“Mark Carney is importing to Canada the same financial disaster that he caused in the U.K. as Bank Governor there,” Poilievre wrote.
“Wherever he shows up, inflation goes up, paycheques shrink, housing costs balloon, and living standards collapse. That’s the cost of Carney.”
Carney has announced plans to tighten immigration levels since becoming prime minister in March, building upon reductions first announced last year by the previous Liberal government, which oversaw historic increases following the COVID-19 pandemic.
The latest federal budget proposes freezing permanent immigration levels over the next three years and slashing temporary resident numbers by nearly 43 per cent by 2027.
Vance hosted Carney for dinner last month when the prime minister made his second trip to Washington to talk trade with Trump.
The U.S. vice-president has taken aim at Canada before, however. In a February social media post, he defended U.S. tariffs and demands to increase defence spending by telling detractors to “spare me the sob story about how Canada is our ‘best friend.’”
“I love Canada and have many Canadian friends,” he wrote. “But is the government meeting their NATO target for military spending? Are they stopping the flow of drugs into our country? I’m sick of being taken advantage of.”
It’s also not the first time Vance has blamed immigration for the rising cost of living and lower living standards in the U.S. and elsewhere.
He told Fox News in an interview last week that the current U.S. housing crisis is partly because the Biden administration “flooded the country with 30 million illegal immigrants who were taking houses that ought by right go to American citizens.”
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