Canada is to some, it seems, a lovely respite from Trump’s America, free of immigration bans on Muslim majority countries, questionably misogynistic comments, and leaders with signature hair that looks strikingly similar to an ear of corn. In the months preceding the 2016 presidential election, many celebrities, including Lena Dunham, Amy Schumer, Samuel L. Jackson, and Chelsea Handler, threatened to leave the country if Donald Trump won the election. Following Trump’s victory. Several claimed that they would move to Canada to avoid living in a Trump led United States. Since these declarations of immigration, however, many of these people have changed their minds.
Although it is not uncommon to immigrate to our neighbor to the North, when analyzing the search trends of “moving to Canada,” compared with “Donald Trump election” through google trends, there is an interesting peak in November 2016.The searches for “Donald Trump election” are shown in blue, and searches for “moving to Canada” appear in red.
As one can see, interest in moving to Canada is at a steady rate of very low searches before the election. Right around November 8th 2016, however, both “Donald Trump election” and “moving to Canada” experience a peak in interest, as it became clear that Trump would, in fact, win the election. Although Canada was responsible for the majority of the “moving to Canada” searches, the second most searches came from the United States.This peak in search caused by the mass hysteria that erupted after Trump’s election was probably responsible for the crashing of the Canada immigration website.
Marie Fazio 