DETROIT -- Trevor Pitcher's students at the University of Windsor's Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research have made breakthroughs in the international effort to restore sturgeon populations in the Great Lakes.

Those include efforts that unfold in American waters, such as releasing young, hatchery-raised sturgeon into Ohio's Maumee River, which feeds into western Lake Erie.

"Fish in the Great Lakes don't have passports," said Pitcher, so students from the Canadian university have routinely worked with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on projects like testing methods that reduce stress on hatchery-raised sturgeon, which makes them better at surviving in the wild.

But the institute has scaled back its cross-border sturgeon work this year, said Pitcher, an institute professor. Many of his graduate students, particularly his Muslim students and those born outside of the U.S. or Canada, are wary of crossing into Michigan. Instead of heading to Michigan to work with American agencies or on American streams, some have changed their research projects to take place solely in Canada to avoid crossing.

"The students are really concerned," Pitcher said. "The number of times they've had complications at the border since January has probably increased by an order of magnitude, and the perception of change is quite pronounced."

The Trump administration's mass deportation plan, increased scrutiny at the U.S. border and cuts to American science programs have had a chilling effect on collaborations between Michigan and Canadian researchers working on cross-national educational and research projects, Canadian and American scientists said.

People organizing conferences of Canadian and American researchers are retooling their plans to account for some attendees' fears of crossing the border. Some projects are delayed as universities mount additional layers of approval on international collaborations.

Meanwhile, Michigan State University's Canadian studies experts are finding themselves explaining why the northerly country is more than the U.S.'s 51st state, as President Donald Trump has described it, and Canadian universities are creating opportunities for Americans who have lost work or funding in the Trump administration's sweeping reductions to the federal workforce.

The tension at the U.S.-Canada border poses a problem for Great Lakes work since four of the five lakes are shared between the U.S. and Canada, and Michigan is a key border state that shares an automotive industry with Ontario. The new sense of distance is especially pronounced between Detroit and Windsor, two industrialized automotive cities whose downtowns are separated by a narrow swath of the Detroit River.

"Biodiversity doesn't have a passport, the water doesn't have a passport," Pitcher said. "It's really a shared resource that we've always worked well together on. It's certainly become clear to Canada that we need to do more on our end as we notice changes in the U.S. system. It's a pivotal time for both countries."

The Trump administration pursued an aggressive deportation initiative following his 2024 campaign promise to "close the border" and institute "the largest deportation operation in the history of the country," the White House said in an article published in April.

It also made sweeping cuts to the federal workforce early this year as part of a campaign to cut costs as the U.S. faces $36 trillion in debt and reverse past staffing increases. It also has ended research grants associated with diversity, equity and inclusion, such as a grant to study preterm birth in children born to Black mothers in Detroit.

A Trump administration official, in an email to The News, disputed the idea that its actions to enforce immigration laws would have a chilling effect on cross-border scientific partnerships.

"Canadians or any other foreign citizens who have appropriate authorization to visit the United States and who are not undermining our country's national security or breaking our laws are obviously not targets for law enforcement operations or ICE deportations," White House spokesman Kush Desai said in the email. "Unfounded hysteria fueled by lazy reporting about the administration's commonsense enforcement of immigration laws will not change the fact that the United States is home to the largest ecosystem of scientific research and innovation."

Wayne State center affected

Last year, Wayne State University and the University of Windsor launched a United Nations Regional Centre of Expertise. The center is led by professors at each university who collaborate on projects and educational events to promote a sustainable future for the two cities by addressing climate change, economic and health disparities, and social inequities.

Plans for the collaboration unfolded during the COVID-19 pandemic, when border crossings were temporarily halted, said Anneke Smit, a U-Windsor associate professor and the director of Windsor Law's Centre for Cities.

"I feel like the whole ethos of the RCE is about our connectivity even at times when we're not as physically or in-person connected," Smit said. "Maybe we didn't think it was going to happen again so soon."

Much of the center's work hinges on getting people from both cities together, she said. The leaders had planned to host a big meeting in September in either Detroit or Windsor, but since Trump's election, they now plan to either host events in both cities or host one with virtual attendance options.

"We have to be cognizant of the fact that not everyone on the Canadian side is comfortable traveling to the U.S.," Smit said. "Likewise, there are always folks who aren't comfortable or can't cross the border to Canada."

U-Windsor administrators shared guidance to help staff, faculty and students prepare to cross the U.S. border but did not discourage anyone from attending meetings in the United States, university spokesman Dylan Kristy said.

The university's travel guidance document acknowledged "the current evolving geopolitical climate" and recommended people review government travel advisories and be aware of border crossing protocols before making the trip.

"We recognize the importance of in-person collaboration, especially given the cross-border nature of much of our research and deep-rooted regional relationships," Kristy said in an email.

In April, the Canadian Association of University Teachers warned its members not to make non-essential trips to the U.S., particularly if they are from countries with tense diplomatic relations with the U.S. or if they had expressed negative views about U.S. politics on social media.

The reluctance of Canadian scientists to cross into the U.S. was pronounced at the annual conference of the International Association of Great Lakes Research, held in June in Milwaukee, said Mike McKay, director of U-Windsor's Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research. Canadian attendance was down, and roughly two-thirds of the Canadians who attended did so virtually, he said.

"We had to cancel our hockey game at the Great Lakes conference this year because a lot of the Canadians didn't go, and the U.S. federal scientists couldn't go," McKay said.

McKay, who works frequently in the U.S. and has worked at American universities, is not concerned about the border. He crosses at least weekly and said he recently has shepherded wary colleagues along so they don't have to make the drive themselves.

McKay said the surging Canadian pride that followed Trump's tariff announcements is at play, as is alarmism that increased after the Canadian government warned citizens their social media accounts and cell phones could be searched by Customs and Border Patrol agents.

MSU gets Ontario pen pals

Students from Michigan State University and the Ontario College of Art and Design University illustrated the tension as part of a shared virtual art course created by the universities.

Their assignment was to correspond with a pen pal in the other class, then mail each other photographs of themselves and pieces of their artwork. From there, each student was charged with creating art that captured the essence of their partner and explored the relationships across the Canadian-American border.

"It's more important than ever for students to engage with and learn about their nation’s neighbours," Ontario college Associate Professor Ilene Sova said in a university press release. "The project was a valuable opportunity to build unique, personal, and positive relationships across borders while presenting an artistic challenge for the artists to translate a stranger’s presence into a work of art."

The project is an example of the increasing collaborations Michigan State faculty have with Canadians, said Rebecca Malouin, director of MSU's Canadian Studies Center.

The center recently launched a new project called the Canada Connects Policy Initiative, which creates policy briefs for lawmakers about issues involving Michigan and Canada's relationship.

In June, supply chain management professor Jason Miller wrote a brief about tariffs' impact on Michigan's automotive sector.

"I don't think people understand Canada," Malouin said. "It isn't the 51st state, right? It's its own country with its own history, and a shared history in some areas, but it's very much independent.

"We're realizing we need to do a better job at telling that story and all of the great work our faculty are doing in (Canada) and with Canadians."

Canada is the top international destination for MSU faculty traveling for work, Malouin said. Michigan State researchers co-publish with Canadian researchers more often than with researchers from any country other than China, and collaborations with Chinese researchers have been declining.

Some MSU students and faculty, particularly those born outside the U.S., are reticent to cross the border since Trump implemented his administration's mass deportation policies, Malouin said.

Canadian universities are also taking longer to sign research agreements with MSU, she said. She described those agreements as being like a generic "formal handshake" in which the universities agree to allow their faculty to work together in research, teaching and outreach.

"The fact that things are taking longer and being looked at more closely, we have noticed that change," Malouin said.

In April, Malouin and the director of Ontario College of Art and Design University signed a memorandum of understanding that commits the universities to working together.

In a press release, Malouin said the agreement was critically important "during this politically charged time" and said the Canadian Studies Center was working on similar agreements with other Canadian universities.

Canadian universities are capitalizing on cuts to American research funding and science agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The University of Windsor is recruiting a Canada Excellence Research chair who will oversee sustainable waterways research, a job with $1 million in research funding per year for eight years. It's a federally funded position designed to attract top global talent.

University spokesman Kristy said U-Windsor isn't explicitly looking for an American. Pitcher and McKay, both faculty at the university's Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research, said the job puts U-Windsor in the position to attract someone who was let go from a U.S. science agency.

"This has really arisen because of the cuts on your side of the border where we are identifying this gap," Pitcher said. "That's an example of shifting our strategy."

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