Canadians are nonetheless avoiding U.S. journey, however not vice versa: StatCan – National

The variety of Canadians coming back from journeys to the U.S. dropped once more final month, whereas the variety of journeys to Canada by U.S. residents elevated for the primary time in 12 months, Statistics Canada says.

A newly launched Statistics Canada report states that final February, Canadian resident return journeys from the United States totalled 1.5 million, down 14.5 per cent from the identical month one yr earlier.

Statistics Canada additionally states that in February, U.S. resident journeys to Canada have been up 6.1 per cent from the identical month one yr earlier to achieve 959,600, marking the primary enhance after 12 consecutive months of year-over-year declines.

Meanwhile, Canadians are nonetheless travelling — simply to not the U.S.

“Canadian-resident return trips from overseas countries by air totalled 1.3 million in February 2026, up 7.2% from the same month one year earlier,” Statistics Canada says.

“In February, for the second consecutive month, a greater number of Canadian residents returned from overseas by air (1.3 million) than from the United States by auto (1.0 million).”

The decline in journey charges comes as Canadians proceed to keep away from travelling to the U.S., a development that began in early 2025 after the launch of the American administration’s commerce warfare towards Canada and threats to make the nation into the “51st state.”

In whole, U.S. residents made 720,400 journeys by car (+6.4 per cent) and 239,200 journeys by air (+4.9 per cent) to Canada in February. 

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The highest peaks of every day arrivals have been on Friday, Feb. 13 and Saturday, Feb. 14, earlier than President’s Day within the U.S., which fell on Feb. 16.

The lowest was seen on Tuesday, Feb. 3.

Statistics Canada acknowledged that a fair “sharper decline” (-31.5 per cent) was noticed when evaluating Canadian resident journey to the U.S. from February 2024 with February 2026.

Last month, each return journeys by car and by air declined from February 2025.

In addition, abroad resident journeys to Canada in February have been up 10.5 per cent from February 2025.

A larger variety of abroad residents arrived in Canada by air than by car in February 2026.

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Statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) additionally confirmed that “slightly more than 18 million Canadian personal vehicles entered the U.S., dropping by 18.8 per cent compared to the year prior, more than 26 million Canadians entered by the same mode of transportation.”

The variety of Canadian pedestrians getting into the U.S. additionally dropped by 15.4 per cent.

These numbers have been additionally launched final month.

The Prime Minister’s Office launched a press release Sunday revealing that Prime Minister Mark Carney and U.S. President Donald Trump spoke that afternoon on “the economy, developments in the Middle East, and trade relations between the two countries” and agreed to “remain in close contact.”

Despite this, Trump once more referred to Carney because the “future Governor of Canada” in a Truth Social post on Tuesday.

Trump’s submit was in reference to working alongside U.S. governors to “save The Great Lakes from the rather violent and destructive Asian Carp.”

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