SEATTLE — A decades-long tradition that once saw thousands of Toronto Blue Jays fans turn Seattle’s T-Mobile Park into a sea of blue is unraveling this weekend — and it has little to do with baseball.
Canadian fans, long known for flooding Seattle each summer for Blue Jays-Mariners matchups, are reconsidering their visits as political tensions rise under U.S. President Donald Trump. His recent remarks calling Canada the “51st state” have struck a nerve north of the border, leading some fans to stay home in protest.
“I have to put my country over my team,” said Arthur Gallant, a die-hard Blue Jays supporter who made the trip last summer but opted out this year. “It didn’t feel right to cross the border and spend my money there.”
He’s not alone. According to data from the Whatcom Council of Governments, the number of British Columbia vehicles crossing into Washington dropped from more than 200,000 in April 2024 to fewer than 99,000 in April 2025 — a steep 50% decline.
Washington’s Lieutenant Governor Denny Heck confirmed the slump, noting that reservations at local hotels are down by half for the weekend. Hundreds of tickets remain unsold for all three games between the Jays and Mariners.
Vancouver resident Daryl, who withheld his surname over concerns of being flagged at the U.S. border, said his group of 10 scrapped plans for a bachelor party trip to the games. “It’s always such a fun weekend,” he said. “But with everything going on — the rhetoric, the border — we decided not to go this year.”
In a bid to revive cross-border goodwill, more than 35 Seattle hotels and restaurants are now accepting the Canadian dollar at par. But even this incentive may not be enough to offset the political chill.
Bob Donegan, president of Ivar’s Restaurants, which is part of the initiative, lamented the situation. “This relationship has lasted a century,” he said. “We’re not expecting 10,000 new ticket sales — we’re just trying to show our Canadian neighbours that they’re still welcome here.”
Still, the absence of Canadian fans this weekend may be as noticeable as the silence where cheers once echoed for the visiting team.
