Point to Point Parcel, a shipping and receiving business located less than 1,000 feet from Canada, barely survived the coronavirus pandemic when the international border was closed to non-essential travel for more than a year and a half.
But it couldn’t survive three months of the Trump presidency and escalating trade tensions with the country that made up 99% of its customer base, co-owner Beth Calder told Fox News Digital.
“[During] COVID, you couldn’t cross the border. Now people are choosing not to cross the border,” Calder said. “Our business could not survive months, let alone four years, without their daily use.”
Travel from British Columbia (B.C.) to Washington has dwindled in the wake of President Donald Trump’s tariffs and previous remarks on making Canada America’s 51st state.
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Point Roberts, a U.S. exclave of just over 1,000 residents, has been particularly hard hit. While it’s part of Washington state, the community sits at the tip of a Canadian peninsula and is surrounded by water on the other three sides. To drive there from mainland Washington, travelers would need to cross the border twice each way.
Calder’s parcel shop primarily provided a U.S. address for Canadians to shop on the American market. Business dropped sharply at the beginning of March and has “kept getting worse and worse,” she said. After 24 years in business, Calder said Point to Point Parcel’s last day will be April 19.
“The government has caused us to lose our business,” she said.
B.C. car traffic traveling south through the main crossing stations in Blaine, Washington, fell by 29% in February, compared to the year prior, 43% in March, and more than 50% in the first week of April, according to transportation data.
Local leaders worry this could devastate the economy in Whatcom County, a frequent destination for Canadians looking to buy gas, groceries and other goods.
Canadian visitors previously spent around $140 million a year, amounting to 11.7% of taxable retail sales in the county, according to the Border Policy Research Institute at Western Washington University.
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But tariffs and anger at President Trump have pushed many Canadians to stay home.
The mayor of Blaine, home to Washington’s busiest border crossing, said in a CBC interview last month that she understands “why Canadians want to boycott America and not support America.”
“However, by boycotting blue states like Washington, what you’re actually doing is making Trump happier,” Mayor Mary Lou Steward said. “He does not like blue states. He is a president only for those who support him, not for the whole country. And so by causing Blaine to suffer, you’re actually making his day.”
Tourism is the key economic driver in Point Roberts.
Beaches, hiking trails, a golf course and marina have long made the peninsula a popular vacation destination. Many of its homes are owned by Canadians or other international residents and would normally be showing signs of life by this time in the spring, said Calder, a dual-citizen and lifelong Point Roberts resident.
“It’s just weird to drive around and not see those houses start being filled,” she said. “Until some type of agreement is met between the two countries, I think Point Roberts is going to severely struggle.”
Calder implored Trump to “slow down” and consider the country as a whole, not just “certain major cities.”
“There’s a lot of small towns across the whole border crossing between the U.S. and Canada that are all equally being affected,” she said.
As for the Canadians who keep Point Roberts businesses afloat, Calder said she hopes they don’t hold individual towns responsible for the federal government’s actions.
“This is not a choice of this community. This is a choice of the president,” she said. “And I don’t think Point Roberts should be held responsible for a decision that this community would never be a part of making.”
On Tuesday, markets soared after Trump announced a 90-day pause on some of the sweeping tariffs he’s instituted.
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