Canadian Snowbirds Bought Into the American Dream in Palm Springs. Was It a Mirage?

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On the night of the 2024 presidential election, Ken James, a retired engineer from Calgary, Alberta, was at his second home in Palm Springs, Calif., watching with dismay as the results rolled in.

Mr. James, 68, called his wife back in Calgary. “If he gets back in, I’m selling,” he recalled her saying of Donald Trump.

Mr. James is among hundreds of thousands of Canadians, many of them snowbirds, who each year flock to Palm Springs, a sunbaked resort city about 110 miles east of Los Angeles that is known for its midcentury architecture, otherworldly desert and art scene. For nearly five months a year, when temperatures are often below freezing in Calgary, Mr. James and his wife spend languid days by the pool, hike sweeping canyons and enjoy live music beneath the stars at the local saloon.

But in recent months — as President Trump has announced a 25 percent tariff on certain Canadian goods and threatened the nation’s sovereignty — they and other Canadians are reconsidering their future in Palm Springs.