Last year, the Liberal Party of Canada swept to power in an unexpected rout, ending nearly a decade of Conservative leadership. Out went Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who had turned Canada into one of the world’s top climate villains, and in came Justin Trudeau, a smart, handsome, charismatic heir to a political dynasty who made progressives throughout North America—including President Barack Obama—swoon. Trudeau promised to repair relations with indigenous people, put a price on carbon and reduce its pollution, welcome an additional 25,000 Syrian refugees, and appoint a gender-equal cabinet.

This year, in America, quite the opposite happened. After eight years of Obama’s progressive rule, Donald Trump unexpectedly won the presidency with promises of a different kind of change: to ban Muslims, deport millions of undocumented immigrants, build a wall along the entirety of the Mexican border, repeal Obamacare, and pull out of the Paris Agreement on climate change (after all, he has said that the “concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive”). His cabinet thus far is made up almost entirely of white men.

As leaders, Trudeau and Trump could not be more different. But a shared interest could bring them together: reviving the Keystone XL Pipeline expansion.

“He actually brought up Keystone XL and indicated that he was very supportive of it,” Trudeau said at an event last week, referring to Trump. “I’m confident that the right decisions will be taken.”



The “right decisions,” as Trudeau sees it, is for the U.S. to approve the pipeline. After Obama rejected it last year, Trudeau said he was “disappointed by the decision.”