While acknowledging his Liberal government overshot post-pandemic admissions to Canada, Justin Trudeau defended immigration as essential and said successful integration depends not on common ancestry, but “shared values.”
The former prime minister shared his thoughts on immigration during a fireside-style chat with Finnish journalist Jaako Loikanna at the Sumoi Areena, an annual public debate and societal discussion forum in Pori, Finland, last Thursday.
He also expounded on the state of global democracy, Canada’s role in it, and his own political legacy, part of which, Loikanna highlighted, was the federal government under Trudeau having to acknowledge that it allowed immigration to get out of hand in response to the labour shortage that arose from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We didn’t get the balance quite right,” he said in October 2024 , after two years of record immigration sent shockwaves into the housing and labour supply.
Given that Finland, like many European countries dealing with more irregular migrants, is debating its own immigration policies, Loikkannen, the head of political and economic affairs for MTV News, asked what lessons they can learn from Canada
“The key on immigration is the capacity to integrate people into your society,” Trudeau began from the stage in a public park in front of a crowd of a few hundred attendees.
“Increasingly, in a very different world, defining what a country is through shared values and not through shared ancestry is the most important thing.”
Canada, he said, had the same debates about irregular immigration ongoing in Europe and concluded that giving people a “stake in the success of the country” is key to integration.
“That is how to make immigration work, and that’s the challenge that we all have to try and do in a very difficult and complicated time,” he said.
But Kevin Vuong, one of his former MPs, said when these same points were shared in Ottawa, Trudeau “implied we were racist.”
“Integration isn’t exclusion. It’s the promise we make to everyone who comes here: this is what we stand for, and you belong in it,” the former Spadina—Fort York MP wrote on X. “Calling that bigotry, as our then PM did, was how he lost the room — and the country.
“It was an excuse to avoid the hard work of nation-building as a personification of his administration: broad values based pronouncements instead of actual leadership and results.”
When we raised exactly these points of the need for integration of immigrants and shared Canadian values at Parliament, @JustinTrudeau implied we were racist.
But there was nothing ever racist about expecting newcomers to embrace the values that make this country worth coming… https://t.co/UFhxItFH3m— Kevin Vuong 🇨🇦 (@KevinVuongxMP) June 28, 2026
(Vuong ran for the Liberals in the 2019 election, but the party withdrew its endorsement two days before the election after a withdrawn sexual assault charge from earlier that year emerged. He entered Parliament as an Independent, joined the Conservative Party of Canada in 2023 and did not seek re-election in 2025.)
When Loikannen brought up how Trudeau’s approval rating plummeted over his 10 years in power, Trudeau said it has no concrete “utility” beyond gaining power.
“I mean, if it’s just about feeling really good about yourself, then maybe you’re in the wrong line of work, because best case scenario in politics, one-third of people like you, one-third of people hate you, one-third of people don’t even know your name,” he said.
Asked if he ever lost trust in himself over that time, Trudeau admitted he made mistakes and may have second-guessed himself, but stayed true to his values.
“I didn’t lose trust in my core,” he said.
Loikannen also used the hour-long conversation to probe Trudeau on Canada’s relationship with the U.S. and President Donald Trump in light of the annexation threats that followed the latter’s election in 2024.
“I think honestly, there were a few Americans who were kind of surprised that Canada wouldn’t jump at the chance to join with the US, that any European territory wouldn’t be excited about the idea of becoming American,” he said.
“I think that’s perhaps an example of the American exceptionalism where so many Americans are convinced without a doubt, and usually without too many facts, that America is just the very best place in the world and, of course, anyone would want to be part of us.”
Strong democracies rely on free and open conversations among neighbours, friends, and fellow citizens. Only then can trust be built, and can progress begin.
It’s always been a pleasure to visit Finland, and this was no exception 🇨🇦🇫🇮. Thank you to SuomiAreena for having me, and… pic.twitter.com/Oy7RIeBmKz— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) June 27, 2026
Trudeau said the 80-year-old president is an unpredictable entity within the international community. Whereas previous administrations operated with “an enlightened self-interest” that saw strategic benefits to other nations as benefits to the U.S., that’s not Trump’s modus operandi.
“It’s difficult for us as an international community to analyze what the American president might do, because he has shown that he’s not always working in the best interests of Americans and the American people, and that makes him unpredictable in a way that no other American presidents really were,” Trudeau explained
Earlier this month, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, whom Trudeau met with during his stop last week, suggested that the 27-member European Union should consider expanding to 40 nations, naming Canada as one of the new candidates.
“Wouldn’t it be lovely if Canada was the 28th state of the European Union rather than the 51st state of the United States,” he asked at an energy conference in Helsinki, per CNBC.
Trudeau celebrated the commonalities between Canada and European nations, particularly the Nordic ones, but said the relationship should remain professional rather than matrimonial.
“I think there are so many things we can do to do more together, to work more closely together, to align, to fully fulfill all the advantages in our existing free trade agreements, to look at those countries that aren’t right now in the European Union — places like Switzerland or Norway or Iceland and Great Britain now, Canada — and say, is there a way of doing much more together because we are aligned, because we are like-minded.”
He also argued that middle powers can increase their influence by reinforcing the international rules-based order and working together rather than competing against one another for short-term commercial gains. He said existing trade agreements with Europe and Pacific nations are examples of how countries with common standards “can provide a counterweight to the great powers” like the U.S., China, Russia and India, nations that “follow those rules when it’s convenient to them” and “use their might” when it’s not.
Of course, nowadays, no Trudeau appearance is complete without reference to his girlfriend, U.S. popstar Katy Perry. In fact, a quip about her was among the first words out of his mouth.
“I look at this crowd in the park and this stage, and I’m worried there might have been a mistake. You know my girlfriend’s not here, right?”
Later in their discussion, he told Loikannen and the crowd that Perry was also presently in Europe touring the sweltering summer festival scene and he’s set to join her in the coming days. (According to her Instagram , a set at the Werchter Boutique in Belgium was called off due to inclement weather. She has further dates in the U.K., France and Spain into next week and beyond.)
Trudeau said the couple shares a “deep intellectual curiosity about the world.”
“She is so interested in what’s going on in the world,” he gushed. “We have great conversations, and that is the building block of any healthy relationship, is being able to be at peace with each other and genuinely interested in each other and that’s very much what I have with Katy.”
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