King Charles and Queen Camilla arrive in Canada for 2-day visit amid U.S. tensions
Monarch will read speech from the throne in visit crafted to affirm Canada's sovereignty
King Charles and Queen Camilla arrived in Ottawa Monday for a two-day visit designed to show U.S. President Donald Trump that Canada is not a prospective American territory but a distinct constitutional monarchy with its own identity, culture and history.
The King's visit, which is happening at Prime Minister Mark Carney's request, is a chance to assert Canada's sovereignty by nodding to the country's longstanding ties to the Crown in the wake of Trump's 51st state taunts.
After touching down in a Royal Canadian Air Force plane and being greeted by Carney, Gov. Gen. Mary Simon, Indigenous leaders and a military band at the airport, Charles and Camilla toured Ottawa — a city he once called "the much-storied capital at the heart of a great nation" — meeting over 1,000 well-wishers at the city's Lansdowne Park and dropping the puck at a street hockey game before being whisked off to Rideau Hall, the King's official residence when he is in Canada.
The royal couple were ferried around in a BMW sedan and not the American-made Lincoln town car that was used the last time they were in the nation's capital — a symbolic gesture as Canada grapples with Trump's tariffs on foreign autos.
Charles planted a tree on the grounds of the 19th-century regal villa surrounded by hundreds more Canadian royal watchers, Carney, Simon and the country's lieutenant governors and territorial commissioners.
"It's a good day for Canada," Carney told reporters as he accompanied the royal party. "It's not raining, the sun is shining, the future is bright. The land is strong."
Some in the crowd mobbed the rope line after Charles tossed soil from all 13 provinces and territories onto the tree, a blue beech, which the Governor General's office described as "a symbol of resilience, adaptability and heritage."
The tree's hardwood was used by early Canadian settlers to craft tools and by Indigenous Peoples for medicinal purposes, according to a backgrounder provided to reporters. This durable, hardy tree mirrors "the strength of Canada's constitutional monarchy," the backgrounder said.
The people assembled for the tree-planting spontaneously broke out into a rendition of God Save the King and then O Canada.
As Charles and Camilla shook hands and stopped for pictures with those in the crowd, there were a couple cries of "Thank you for coming, sir!" and "It's an honour to meet you, your majesty." There were many more assembled for Charles's stop at Rideau Hall this year compared to his visit here in 2022, when he came as the Prince of Wales.
Royal historian Justin Vovk of McMaster University in Hamilton sees a broader significance to the tree-planting at this time, particularly in how a tree can represent Canada's critical natural resources.
"There has been so much talk the last four months about Canada's resources vis-a-vis the United States, the 51st state, all of that rhetoric," Vovk told CBC News. "So, the planting of a tree does take on added symbolism."
Later, Charles and Simon met inside Rideau Hall for a 20-minute meeting.
'Welcome home'
Simon said "welcome home" to Charles as they sat in one of residence's reception rooms, telling him that Canadians who came out to see him today have been very happy. The King responded, in part, by saying "it's very kind."
Camilla, wearing the diamond maple leaf brooch, a piece from the royal jewlery collection that has particular meaning for Canadians, was then sworn in as a member of the King's Privy Council of Canada — the body that advises the monarch on issues of importance to the country.
Jenna Kocik, who flew in from Yellowknife to witness the royal visit, arrived early in the morning to join the crowd at Lansdowne. She carried a banner blending the Canadian flag with the Union Jack.
She shook hands with the King and Queen as well as Carney and said the royal interaction was "momentous."
Kocik, who described herself as a "passionate royalist," said the visit is a testament to "strength in our sovereignty" and Canada's connection to the Commonwealth in an uncertain geopolitical environment.
Another spectator, Norman MacDonald, said he's "proud" that the King came to town to deliver a message on behalf of Canadians.
"Canada is not, obviously, for sale, and it's not going to be bullied," he said.
The highlight of this royal homecoming will take place on Tuesday when Charles reads the speech from the throne, which lays out the government's goals and how it plans to achieve them — the first time the sovereign has done that in Canada since 1977.
Each new session of Parliament is opened by a throne speech and the House of Commons and the Senate cannot go ahead with any business until the monarch or their representative, the Governor General, delivers those remarks — a nod to the vital role the Crown plays in Canada's parliamentary democracy.
"The tone of this visit versus all the other ones I've witnessed is different. For the first time, the Crown is being presented as an integral part of Canadian democracy," said Nathan Tidridge, an expert on Crown-Indigenous history and the vice-president of the Institute for the Study of the Crown in Canada.
"This visit is giving Canadians a moment to reflect on their democracy, their society, Indigenous treaty rights. A visit like this — it's one of the few times we engage in national ceremonies and collectively look at our institutions and how they function," Tidridge said in an interview.
Pointing to a recent Pollara poll that shows Charles's popularity is up and more Canadians want to keep the monarchy than dump it — a reversal of the firm's past public opinion surveys on the topic — Tidridge said in these tumultuous times the Crown is valued for the stability and continuity it provides.
"With all the uncertainty, upheavals and chaos, the Crown is a stabilizing feature of our democracy," he said.
Amid talk of U.S. annexation, Carney has repeatedly pointed to Canada's founding peoples — British, French and Indigenous — to make the case that this country is a fundamentally different place than the republic to the south. Carney, a monarchist, has said Charles's homecoming is a way to show things are done differently in this country.
"The royal visit is a reminder of the bond between Canada and the Crown — one forged over generations, shaped by shared histories and grounded in common values. A bond that, over time, has evolved, just as Canada has, to reflect the strength, diversity, and confidence of our people," Carney said in a statement ahead of Their Majesties' arrival.
Carney said Charles personally delivering the throne speech is an "historic honour that matches the weight of our times. It speaks to our enduring tradition and friendship, to the vitality of our constitutional monarchy and our distinct identity, and to the historic ties that crises only fortify."
Simon said in a statement Monday that Charles's visit "at this pivotal moment in our history" is one that "holds profound significance."
"It reaffirms the enduring constitutional bond that has shaped Canada's journey into a proud and independent nation. Their visit invites us to reflect on who we are and to celebrate our distinct national identity," she said.
But Citizens for a Canadian Republic (CCR), an anti-monarchy advocacy group, was scathing in its assessment of the visit — saying inviting the King to counter Trump's threats and insults shows "Canada isn't yet a mature nation."
"On Tuesday, instead of elbows up, it'll be elbows down. Our national flag will be lowered," said Jamie Bradley, a director of CCR.
"Our head of state, a monarch visiting from another continent, will open our Parliament, effectively undoing everything we've declared that we stand for."
As is tradition, the Canadian flag that flies above the Senate will be temporarily replaced by the Sovereign's Flag while King Charles is in the building.
Charles's Canadian gestures
This is Charles's first visit to Canada since his coronation in 2023, a trip delayed in part because he has maintained a limited travel schedule since undergoing treatment for cancer.
While he hasn't been here since assuming the throne, Charles has made a number of Canadian gestures in the three months since the Trump trade war erupted.
Charles has met with both Carney and former prime minister Justin Trudeau for private audiences, wore his Canadian medals during a high-profile military visit, planted a maple leaf tree on the grounds of Buckingham Palace and granted his personal Canadian liaison and senior protocol officer in Parliament a sword.
In April, Charles addressed the Italian Parliament in Rome and referenced Canada's Second World War efforts, a rare gesture by the King when speaking outside of Canadian or Commonwealth settings.
Charles has long shown an affinity for the country, having toured Canada on 19 official visits since 1970.
He's had a number of "private working" trips here as well, including a stint at the Canadian Forces Base in Gagetown, N.B., where he trained as a military pilot after university.
"Every time I come to Canada … a little more of Canada seeps into my bloodstream and from there, straight to my heart," he told a crowd in Newfoundland in 2009.
A 'truly great country'
During his May 2022 tour to celebrate the late Queen's Platinum Jubilee — his only trip to a Commonwealth realm to mark the occasion — Charles praised Canada as a "truly great country" populated by "outward-looking, big-hearted" people.
"As I get older, it is particularly heartwarming to see my children coming to know and love this great country, just as the Queen and my late father have, and I and my wife in turn," he told a crowd in St. John's.
His wife Camilla comes by her affection for Canada naturally. Her great-great-great grandfather was Hamilton's Sir Allan MacNab, the former premier of the pre-Confederation Province of Canada and builder of the city's neoclassical mansion Dundurn Castle.
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With files from Janet Davison, the Canadian Press