“We cancelled our $15,000 Disney World trip over Trump”: Why this GTA couple sacrificed their dream vacation

On January 28, my husband, Michael, and I cancelled our dream vacation. Our ninth anniversary is coming up in April, and we’d planned to celebrate it by travelling from our home in Keswick, Ontario, to Universal Studios, down in Florida. Back in December, we’d booked the whole thing: five nights at Universal followed by a three-night Disney Cruise to the Bahamas, then another few nights at Disney World. We’d invested a lot in the trip—all told, it was going to cost us around $15,500.

Michael and I love theme parks—especially Disney and Universal. We’ve gone to Florida four times together, and I’ve personally been to Disney World five times. The Canadian dollar isn’t what it used to be, so we don’t make the trip that often, but we try to head to Florida every five years or so. Travelling to a red state as a gay couple can feel a little nerve-wracking, but the Disney properties have always been safe spaces for us.

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As a couple, we’re kind of nerds. Early in our relationship, we bonded over our love of Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. We were really looking forward to visiting the Star Wars portion of Disney World, which we didn’t make it to when we last visited, in April of 2023. We also couldn’t wait to try the Jurassic World VelociCoaster, a newer ride that can reach up to 112 kilometres per hour. Between work and some stressful personal issues, we’ve both had a hectic year. We’ve been feeling drained. This trip was going to be a chance to finally relax and just enjoy each other’s company somewhere special.

We were planning to travel with two friends, one of whom is non-binary and has an X gender marker on their passport. In January, Donald Trump signed executive orders saying the US would eliminate X gender markers as an option on American passports and remove trans Americans’ right to change their gender markers when they transition.

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We started to get nervous. We didn’t know whether our friend would be given a hard time at the border. We weren’t even sure if they’d be let into the country. We weren’t happy with the way the Trump administration was attacking trans rights and trying to remove trans people from the LGBTQ acronym.

On top of these new passport policies, the Trump administration also signed a string of executive orders that targeted trans rights by seeking to ban gender-affirming care for anyone under 19, banning trans people from enlisting in the army and saying that the US will recognize only two genders, male and female. The group of us weighed our options, but we ultimately decided to wait and see. We live on opposite ends of the country and rarely get to see one another in person. We didn’t want to lose out on an opportunity to spend time together.

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Then, in February, Trump announced the first round of tariffs. That was the final nail in the coffin. The first time Trump was in office, my husband and I deliberately travelled to the US less because we weren’t a fan of him then either, but we didn’t have to cancel existing plans. This time felt different. I have nothing against the American people, but these tariffs felt like a direct attack on Canadians by the American head of state.

I like to think that I work hard for my money, and I didn’t want to spend it in a country that wants nothing to do with us. It became a matter of principle. I knew that one cancelled trip wouldn’t put a dent in anyone’s profits, but if more and more people make similar decisions, it could start to add up.

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My husband and I called our travel agent at Envoyage, Julie, and started to look into how much of our money we could get back—at that point, the trip had been fully paid for. She fought for two days straight and was ultimately able to pull enough strings to get us almost all of our payments back. The only thing we couldn’t recoup was a non-refundable portion of a flight, $500. I lost that cash with a smile on my face: it was booked with a Canadian airline—not a penny went down south.

After we got off the call officially cancelling our trip, my husband and I gave each other a huge high-five. I was so happy about my decision that I posted about it on social media. My friends reacted well, which helped solidify that we’d made the right choice.

We’ve since taken some other steps to boycott the US. These days, grocery shopping takes twice as long because I check the origins of every single product I buy. But it’s been worth it. Finding alternatives to US products hasn’t been too difficult, and the process has made me pay better attention to where my food is coming from. Some products, for example, are labelled “Product of Canada,” meaning they meet a threshold of 98 per cent Canadian content, while others are “Made in Canada,” which meet a threshold of only 51 per cent.

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Although we cancelled this trip, my friends, husband and I will still get to take a vacation together. We’ve booked a new trip, this time to Mexico. We’ll be staying for a week at a resort in the Riviera Maya, where we plan to hang out in the hot tub, sit under palm trees on the beach, drink more champagne than I’d like to admit and truly relax. We’ve already got our massages pre-booked.

While it was disappointing to give up our original plans, this trip will feel so much better. We won’t get the excitement of riding a new roller coaster, but I know that if we’d gone to Florida, I wouldn’t have felt good about it. The political situation would have put a damper on the trip.

I encourage anyone else who is considering changing their travel plans to think seriously about what’s right for them. I wouldn’t judge anyone who decides to travel to the US during all of this, but I personally have no regrets. It feels great to do my part.