Donald Trump is not who we are
At 3:24 yesterday afternoon, while Canada was battling devastating wildfires and smoke spread deep into both Canada and the United States, the President of the United States decided to weigh in. Not to offer support or express sympathy for the families forced from their homes. He wasn’t thinking about the countless times Canadians have been there for Americans during some of our darkest moments. Instead, he blamed a natural disaster on Canada, accused the country of negligence, threatened additional tariffs while the fires were still burning, and declared that “the United States is being unnecessarily invaded by filthy, polluted, and unhealthy air, the quality of which is dangerous, and totally unacceptable!”
He called it “Willful Negligence.” He accused Canada of refusing to engage in “basic Forest Management and Debris Removal.” He said the costs “must of necessity be added to the TARIFFS Canada is currently paying.” And he announced he would call Prime Minister Mark Carney “to find out what they are going to do about it.” As if the leader of a sovereign nation fighting hundreds of wildfires across his country needed to explain himself to the man who dismantled our own wildfire research.
That is what the President of the United States chose to do while more than eight hundred wildfires burned across Canada. While more than 100 million Americans in 18 states and the District of Columbia sat under air quality alerts. While the smoke from those fires turned the skies over Washington, New York, and Detroit orange and pushed air quality to hazardous levels. While an entire First Nation community lay in ashes.
On July 13, a fast-moving wildfire overwhelmed Namaygoosisagagun First Nation, also known as Collins First Nation, in northwestern Ontario, roughly 250 kilometers north of Thunder Bay. The community burned to the ground in less than an hour after flames jumped natural fire breaks. There was no advance alert from provincial authorities. No pre-positioned support. Residents evacuated by boat, escaping with almost nothing. Chief Helen Paavola later told the Assembly of First Nations that her community was destroyed without warning and without assistance. “They survived it, but now we have nothing,” she said. “The whole community burned down within less than an hour.”
That is the country and people he threatened with tariffs while their homes were still burning. And he was not alone. Before Trump even posted, four Republican members of Congress from Michigan had already sent a letter to Prime Minister Carney titled “Canada’s Apologies Won’t Clear Michigan’s Skies.” Representatives Jack Bergman, John James, Lisa McClain, and John Moolenaar declared that their “patience has run out.” They wrote, “We are done accepting apologies in place of action. If Canada will not manage its forests to prevent these fires, the United States will look elsewhere, and act on our own, to protect our people.” They threatened to reconsider “how much benefit of the doubt this relationship continues to earn.”
Then came Senator Bernie Moreno of Ohio, a close Trump ally, who announced he would introduce legislation to sanction Canada. He called the wildfires “this atrocity.” The bill is titled the “Countering Atmospheric Nuisances Arising from Drifting Airborne Foreign Incendiary Residual Emissions Act,” or the CANADA FIRE Act. It would sanction Canadian officials responsible for the fires, block their assets, revoke their visas, and declare Canada’s ambassador persona non grata until wildfire smoke no longer affects the United States. He wants to sanction Canada and Canadians with economic warfare.
And then came Senator Tim Sheehy of Montana, who posted that Canada “routinely blocks U.S. firefighting companies from attacking fires in Canada” and compared the cross-border firefighting relationship to “a Chinese protectionist racket.” What Sheehy did not mention is that he founded Bridger Aerospace, an aerial firefighting company that has received more than $235 million from the U.S. Forest Service since 2021. When he resigned from the company to run for the Senate, he owned 21 percent of it, making him its largest individual shareholder. A ProPublica investigation revealed that in March 2025, just months into his Senate term, Sheehy asked the Secretary of Agriculture to stop Forest Service airworthiness inspections of private firefighting aircraft. A draft executive order to eliminate those inspections leaked from his office the following month, and metadata showed it had been edited by his policy adviser and a lobbyist for Bridger. That same month, a Forest Service inspector discovered a crack in the wing of an aircraft Bridger had presented as ready for service. And his own company’s website states that Bridger Aerospace “conducts aerial firefighting operations across the United States and Canada.” He is not defending American interests. He is protecting his financial ones.
That is the coordinated response. The president threatening tariffs. Members of Congress sending hostile letters. A senator drafting sanctions legislation. And a former firefighting CEO with a nearly quarter-billion-dollar government contract using the crisis to attack his competitors. All of it aimed at Canada. All of it happening while families in northwestern Ontario had nowhere to go.
And here is what makes this more than just a reckless and morally reprehensible stunt. Just days before Trump posted his attack, a 56-year-old Canadian pilot named Nicholas Dale, from Sooke, British Columbia, was killed fighting a wildfire in Colorado. His helicopter crashed into Silver Jack Reservoir while he was battling the Gold Mountain Fire. He was there for us. He was fighting our fire. And hundreds of Americans lined U.S. Highway 50 in Montrose, Colorado, holding flags to honor him as a procession carried his body more than 100 miles from Gunnison to Grand Junction. Those Americans understood something the President of the United States does not: that Nicholas Dale did not check which side of the border the fire was on before he went in. He was there to help others in need.
During the LA wildfires in January 2025, Canada deployed water bombers from Quebec, firefighters from Alberta, and senior technical staff from British Columbia. Mexico sent 72 firefighters and military personnel to help fight the Palisades Fire. Governor Newsom said, “Emergencies have no borders. We are deeply grateful to our neighbors in Mexico for their unwavering support during one of our greatest times of need.” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum told her firefighters, “You carry with you the courage and heart of Mexico.” Both of those countries, Canada and Mexico, the two nations this administration treats as threats and adversaries, have sent their people to help us.
The cross-border firefighting partnership between the United States and Canada has been in place since 1982. It is not just a favor, and it is certainly not charity. It is a mutual aid agreement, built on decades of trust, that has saved lives on both sides of the border. In 2023, the United States sent 2,774 wildland firefighters to Canada during a historic fire season. In 2025, the USDA Forest Service deployed an airtanker to Alberta and mobilized over 150 firefighters and support personnel. Last summer, Trump’s own Ambassador to Canada, Pete Hoekstra, issued a statement saying he was “proud of the more than 800 U.S. firefighting personnel who stepped up to assist Canada.”
And just three days before Trump’s attack, that same ambassador issued another statement about the current fires. “This is a shared challenge, and it demands a shared response,” Hoekstra wrote. “I commend the outstanding cooperation between the United States and Canada as we confront these fires together. Our two governments are monitoring and sharing information in real time, coordination that reflects our partnership at its best.”
And then there is the part that exposes this entire attack as something even worse than hypocrisy. While Trump was blaming Canada for the smoke, the New York Times reported that the Trump administration was dismantling the very scientists whose job was to understand wildfire smoke, protect public health, and help communities prepare for disasters like this.
The Pacific Wildland Fire Sciences Laboratory in Seattle, which produces the Fire and Smoke Map that millions of Americans rely on to track fire activity and smoke exposure, is on a list of 56 of 90 research stations slated for closure under the administration’s Forest Service reorganization. The EPA’s Office of Research and Development, which operated the world’s only laboratory for controlled human-exposure studies on the health effects of wildfire smoke, has been shut down. A drone-mounted sensor called Kolibri, the only tool in the world capable of flying into smoke plumes and measuring airborne pollution, has been effectively grounded by the reorganization. Up to 75 percent of the EPA’s research staff could face layoffs. Scientists warned in May that these cuts could hinder efforts to protect people from wildfires as soon as this summer.
It is this summer. And the smoke is here. The same administration that dismantled our wildfire smoke research is now blaming Canada for wildfire smoke. The same president who pulled the United States out of climate agreements is attacking Canada for the consequences of climate change. The same government that gutted the agencies designed to protect Americans from exactly this kind of crisis is now standing on a propaganda platform calling our closest ally negligent. Climate scientist Jennifer Francis of the Woodwell Climate Research Center noted: “If anything, Canada should be blaming the U.S. for their increased fires.” The United States remains the world’s largest historical contributor to the greenhouse gas emissions that are driving the hotter, drier conditions making these fires worse every single year. And instead of acknowledging that, this administration destroyed the research, withdrew from the agreements, and blamed the neighbor.
Prime Minister Carney, when asked about the Republican criticism, did not raise his voice. He simply said, “Climate change is everyone’s responsibility, truly everyone’s, including the United States.”
And Ontario Premier Doug Ford, responding to the wave of attacks from Republican politicians, said what many of us have been thinking. “If there are some politicians out there chirping away, well, maybe what you should do rather than complain is send support, send help, because we have done the exact same thing for our American friends, and that’s what you’re supposed to do.”
And to be clear, no one is saying that wildfires do not need to be addressed. They do. Climate change is accelerating fire seasons across North America, on both sides of the border, and every government, including Canada’s, has work to do on forest management, prevention, and response. The destruction of Collins First Nation, a community that received no warning and no help, is proof enough that Canada’s own systems failed its most vulnerable people in this crisis. Those are fair conversations to have. But you do not have those conversations by threatening tariffs, and certainly not while the fires are still burning. You do not sanction an ally while its families are fleeing by boat. You do not send hostile letters to a prime minister whose country just lost a pilot fighting your fire. You offer help first. You grieve with them. You send resources, not threats. And then, when the smoke clears and the displaced are home, you sit down together and figure out how the entire continent can prevent the next devastating fire. That is what leaders do. That is what neighbors do. And it is worth noting that the United States has the exact same problem. We are fighting fires in Colorado right now. We have lost four firefighters there this summer. Our own forest management challenges are well documented, and this administration has done nothing to address them. It has done the opposite.
This isn’t just about wildfires. It is not about smoke. It is not even about tariffs. What Trump and his enablers are really focused on is isolation. It is about severing every bond of trust, partnership, and alliance that connects the United States to the democratic world. Trump has threatened to annex Greenland. He mocked Canada with claims of 51st statehood. He has threatened military action against Mexico, Cuba, Colombia, and beyond. He has pulled out of climate agreements and international partnerships. Every one of these moves follows the same logic.
Authoritarian regimes do not want strong alliances because alliances create accountability. They do not want mutual aid because mutual aid builds trust. They want isolation because isolation means control. It is what North Korea does. It is what Russia does. It is what every government that fears the outside world does, not because the outside world is dangerous, but because the outside world can see what they are doing. When Trump attacks Canada during a wildfire, he is not trying to solve a problem. He is trying to make Americans believe that our neighbors are our enemies. That the people who sent their firefighters to die alongside ours are somehow exploiting us. That the countries who showed up when we needed them most are the ones we should punish. And if we let him succeed, if we let this administration convince us that we are alone in the world, we will be. That is the goal. And nothing good comes from it. Nothing good has ever come from it.
This is our moment to step up for our friends around the world. We carry the torch ourselves. Because the government has abandoned its role as a good neighbor, and that means the responsibility falls to us. As something each of us does, in our own communities and across borders, every single day. There are so many families with ties on both sides of that border. So many people who share more with their Canadian and Mexican neighbors than they will ever share with the people running this government. And it is on us right now to be the America that those neighbors remember when all of this is over. It is on us to support our neighbors here and across borders. To refuse to let the cruelty of one administration define who we are as a people. To show the world, person by person and community by community, that the United States is not the voice screaming on Truth Social. It is the people who lined a highway in Colorado with American flags to honor a Canadian pilot who gave his life for us.
And to those of you reading this from Canada, I want to say something directly to you. I know none of this surprises you. By now, you know exactly who this president is, exactly how this administration operates, and exactly how quickly they will turn another country’s suffering into material for a political performance. But knowing what to expect does not make it hurt less. So I want you to hear this from someone who writes every single night about what is happening in this country, and who sees the scale of the damage being done in our name: millions of Americans see this for exactly what it is. We see the cruelty, and we see the lies. And we are not okay with any of it.
We cannot ask you to trust us simply because we say the right words tonight. Trust does not work that way. It has to be earned through what we do next, through the people we elect, through the alliances we repair, through the promises we keep, and through the courage we show when cruelty is being carried out in our name. We will vote these people out. We will hold them accountable. We will rebuild what they have broken. And we will find our way back to one another. I know that may take years. I know it may take decades before we prove that this country will stop placing its most selfish, reckless, and morally empty people in its highest offices. But we will prove it. The American people are still here, still fighting, still speaking, and still refusing to surrender our country to the men who confuse power with greatness. This is not a promise from the government that betrayed you. It is a promise from the people who know that Canada has been our neighbor, our ally, and our friend, and who understand that friendship means showing up when the smoke is thick, the flames are rising, and someone needs us.
Because that is what I keep coming back to, night after night, and especially tonight. We are bigger than our government. We are bigger than one man. There are more of us, and this will catch up to him. Donald Trump will not be in office forever. Every enabler, every senator who drafted sanctions against a country while its communities turned to ash, every representative who sent a hostile letter to an ally instead of sending help, will be held accountable for what they did. History will record their names. And we will outlive their cruelty. We will outlive their destruction. And even if it takes us generations, we will rebuild the trust and become good neighbors again. Because that is who we actually are. That is why I still have hope for America. And you should, too.
I’ll see you tomorrow,
Heather
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This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.
Picture of the Day: My middle daughter and I were up in LA tonight to see the Spin Doctors, Gin Blossoms, and Blues Traveler. They were all great, but the real reason we were there was to see Chris Barron, the lead singer of the Spin Doctors. As part of my personal economic resistance, I am choosing to spend my money on people and businesses who are taking a stand against what is happening in this country. Chris is a prominent voice on the Threads app who never misses an opportunity to call out the corruption and cruelty in the Trump administration. The Spin Doctors have been one of my favorite bands since I was a teenager, and it means a lot to know that Chris is on the right side of history.
Sources:
https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/17/politics/trump-canada-wildfire-smoke-tariffs
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/17/trump-canada-wildfire-tariffs.html
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5972839-moreno-sanction-canada-wildfires/
https://www.propublica.org/article/tim-sheehy-bridger-aerospace-forest-service-inspection
https://www.aol.com/canada-wildfires-choke-us-smoke-132634608.html
I’m so ashamed of the behavior of this fascist administration. I apologize to Canada and Mexico for having to listen to this BS. Please know that the majority of true Americans pray for you and your battle with these fires.
So speaks a man who polluted the air of his own capital city, so speaks a man whose woeful ignorance knows no bounds who is punishing his own people with the tariffs he thinks he is imposing on Canada.