“America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country”, declared Mark Carney in his victory speech, after Canada’s general election this week delivered his Liberal Party a plurality of seats in parliament. “These are not idle threats. President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us”, Carney continued, promising that Trump’s oft-repeated plans to absorb Canada as America’s 51st state are “never, ever going to happen”.

Trump’s apparent designs on Canada, which appeared to begin with a social media post calling Carney’s predecessor Justin Trudeau “governor Trudeau”, weighed heavily on the country’s election. The Conservatives still polled their best results since the 1980s, and Carney will have to lead a minority government, but the spectacle of a foreign leader looming so decisively over the elections of a major democracy is Ruritanian to the point of comedy.