Ron DeSantis mocks Doug Ford, Canada boycott as Florida breaks tourism records (and wins Stanley Cups). Is the Sunshine State ‘hurting’ or thriving?

But Ford added that Canadians should feel free to travel to Florida if they wanted (2), noting that Canadians “love our American friends” with the exception of President Donald Trump — the “one guy I don’t see eye-to-eye with.”

Still, he said, the U.S. is “hurting down there right now … on all fronts,” including the economy.

Desantis appears to have taken Ford’s comments personally. He shared a clip of Ford talking on social media and an image of a press release touting Florida breaking its own tourism record in the second quarter of this year, as the state played host to 34.4 million travellers.

“Actually we continue to break tourism records (and win Stanley Cups),” Desantis added in a caption (3).

The Stanley Cup dig is incontrovertible. The Florida Panthers won back-to-back Stanley Cups in the last two seasons, beating Canada’s Edmonton Oilers in both finals matchups.

The Tampa Bay Lightning have won three Stanley Cups since 2004 — beating Canadian teams for two of them. A Canadian team hasn’t won the Cup since 1993.

But which of the two leaders is right about the impact of Canadian boycotts on U.S. tourism and the economy?

Florida’s not immune from Canadian impact

Statistics back up DeSantis’s claim that Florida welcomed a record 34.4 million tourists in the second quarter of this year, up 0.5% year-over-year (4).

But while the second quarter numbers are impressive, they don’t tell the whole story.

Visit Florida data reveal that the 0.5% tourism growth in the second quarter of 2025 was offset by a 0.6% tourism decline in the first quarter (5). So in fact, Florida’s tourism was down year-over-year in the first half of 2025. (Stats for the third and fourth quarters are not yet available.)

And while the Florida tourism industry welcomed 640,000 Canadian visitors in the second quarter, that’s a 20% drop from last year at the same time — and worse than the 16.9% drop in Canadian tourists in the first quarter.

Some estimates suggest that Canadian travel boycotts to the state could cost South Florida alone $90 million in lost revenue (6).

This week, Visit Florida President and CEO Bryan Griffin acknowledged the drop in Canadian visitors, but added that the state was seeing more tourists from other countries, including Brazil, with an 11.4% year-over-year boost in “overseas visitation.”

“It's something that we're really monitoring and looking to see if we can shift some efforts there to continue that good trend,” he said (7).

Canuck boycotts leave a multi-billion dollar hole in the U.S. economy

The state of Canadian tourism in the U.S. at large is even more dismal, with Canadian travel to the U.S. down just over 25% earlier this year, according to Tourism Economics (8).

A U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee Minority report released earlier this month showed that Trump’s tariffs on Canada, as well as annexation threats and unreliable trade negotiations are taking their toll on U.S. tourism — especially for states along the Canada-U.S. border.

From January to October, the number of passenger vehicles crossing into the U.S. from Canada dropped 20% year over year. For some states the decline was as great as 27%.

“Businesses throughout the region are also reporting fewer tourists, more vacancies, and lower sales,” the report noted (9).

The U.S. Travel Association projects that total U.S. travel spending will hit $1.35 trillion this year — but total spending by tourists visiting from abroad will fall 3.2% to $173 billion for the year (10).

That’s a $5.7 billion loss in revenue.

The report cites “significantly fewer visits from Canada [as] the primary driver of this decrease.”