The Ambassador Bridge soars over the river dividing Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, a symbol of the economic and cultural ties binding the sister cities across the international border between the US and Canada.
The crossing is one of the busiest in North America, with about $400mn in freight moving across the bridge daily. Nearby, more than 3.9mn vehicles moved through the Detroit Windsor Tunnel last year — some people commuting to work, others headed to concerts, sporting events or a favourite restaurant.
But US President Donald Trump’s trade policy has put these historic ties under pressure. Tariffs, and the associated uncertainty, have undermined the region’s prosperity and frayed ties that government, business and labour leaders describe using words such as “family” and “best friends”.
“It’s a border that exists, but it’s not anything that culturally has ever been an issue,” said Ryan Donally, chief executive of the Windsor Essex Chamber of Commerce. “So for this trade war . . . to start breaking down the social fabric between Detroit and Windsor, it’s even more hurtful, because quite frankly, it’s not just business. It’s not just a tax. This has damaged the cultural relationship between two best friends.”
Trump’s tariff scheme suffered a setback on Wednesday with a court ruling declaring them invalid and concluding the president exceeded his authority. An appeals court in Washington on Thursday temporarily paused the decision — which in any case did not affect some of the trade restrictions between the US and Canada, including tariffs on cars — a critical link between Detroit and Windsor.
This is a place where the winter freeze is described in Celsius and summer’s balminess in Fahrenheit. Where the Detroit Lions American football team include Ontario postcodes when limiting ticket sales to hometown fans, and the route for the Motor City’s marathon crosses the bridge and returns through the tunnel. Everyone knows someone who married across the border.
The car industry is perhaps the most critical economic bond between Detroit and Windsor. Stellantis builds the Dodge Charger and Chrysler Pacifica at its Windsor plant. Ford builds nearly 2,000 engines in Windsor daily, which go into the best-selling F-series trucks assembled in Kentucky and Michigan.
John D’Agnolo, president of Unifor Local 200, represents roughly 2,000 workers at Ford’s engine plants. The company sent workers there a letter this month that said no changes at the factory were anticipated.
Still, the uncertainty is palpable. Canadians bought more Ford vehicles than they built, D’Agnolo said. If Ford closed plants in the country, many Canadians would refrain from buying its cars and trucks, which would mean cutting “thousands of jobs” in the US, he added.
The North American car industry is so integrated that parts flow across borders multiple times as vehicles are assembled. That makes Trump’s remarks attacking Canada sting. “It breaks your heart to hear him talk like they don’t need us,” D’Agnolo said.
Trump’s 25 per cent tariffs on cars already have led to lay-offs in Canada, even with preferential treatment for vehicles under the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement. Louis Jahn, owner of Jahn Engineering in Windsor and head of the Canadian Tooling & Machine Association, cut his 70-person staff by 20 per cent as orders from American carmakers dried up. Some of the association’s roughly 200 members have laid off half their workers.
Because of Canada’s retaliatory tariffs, Jahn Engineering also is paying more for some components it imports from the US to make large-scale tools for manufacturers.
The company would pass on the cost of tariffs to customers, Jahn said. “In the end, consumers are going to pay for it.”
On the US side of the Detroit River, tariffs present opportunities and challenges for Lisa Lunsford, chief executive of Global Strategic Supply Solutions, or GS3. The suburban Detroit manufacturer has quoted more jobs since March as carmakers and their suppliers try to source more parts and materials from the US.
But uncertainty troubles GS3, too. The company agreed to make a part that Stellantis plans to use on a vehicle that, in the future, will be built at its Windsor plant. When Lunsford learnt that Stellantis briefly idled the Windsor plant because of tariffs, she worried about the programme and GS3’s place in it. “It could still happen,” she said. “But we don’t know.”
Pain in the US will not be confined to the automotive supply chain. General Motors workers benefit from a profit-sharing agreement, and the company’s strategy to turn a profit relied on worldwide procurement, said Sandy Baruah, chief executive of the Detroit Regional Chamber.
“Are GM workers going to get a $14,000 profit-sharing check this upcoming year, based on the trajectory we’re going on?” he said. “No.”
The economic impact extends beyond the car industry. Baruah noted roughly 6,000 workers cross the border daily to work in Detroit’s hospitals and doctors offices.
Tal Czudner, chief executive of the Windsor-Detroit Tunnel Corporation, said the volume of vehicles travelling through the tunnel had declined little compared with a year earlier, but the number of people had fallen 18 per cent. The discrepancy shows that while commuter traffic is holding steady, fewer families and friends are crossing the border on the weekend for leisure.
The time it took to pass through the checkpoint had also lengthened due to enhanced security measures, he said.
Windsor mayor Drew Dilkens also vetoed a measure to continue funding for a popular, hourly bus service between the cities. A legislative change by the Canadian federal government pushed the bus from break-even to a $1.4mn deficit, and Dilkens said Trump’s rhetoric made it impossible for him to ask taxpayers to fund it.
“We feel like we’re under attack by the president of the United States,” he said.
Shipping has been affected, too, with Port Windsor chief executive Steven Salmons noticing a decline in volume at the port, which usually has about 5mn tonnes pass through annually.
Three steel shipments were cancelled in mid-March because the deal was made before the tariffs, and the shipper was worried the customer would not accept the higher price, Salmons said. Typically, the steel travels to the Detroit Three car plants in Ohio, Michigan and Indiana.
There also had been “significantly less” salt shipped, Salmons said, which goes to US cities such as Chicago to treat roads in winter. Next month, when cities had started buying, Salmons said, they likely would face shortages and higher prices. Meat prices also could rise, as less canola is shipped to Toledo, Ohio, to be used in feed for cattle and chickens.
About 20 per cent fewer trucks crossed the Ambassador Bridge in the first four months of the year, even as a few miles away workers are nearing the end of construction on a new bridge, named after hockey legend Gordie Howe, a Canadian who played 25 seasons with the Detroit Red Wings.
The bridge is scheduled to open in the autumn, and local leaders say, with time, they expect relations across the border to return to normal.
“We’re best friends,” Czudner said. “We still hope to be best friends and are optimistic we’ll get back there.”