Yes, but what he was referring to is that there was a proposal to run the line south of Lake Superior through Michigan-Wisconsin-Minnesota in order to reach Manitoba, which would have been shorter and FAR easier to build than through the Canadian Shield north of the lake. This however was politically unacceptable to run through the states, and and all-Canadian route through Ontario was completed.
Plus Canada gained dominion status (own premier and parliament) in 1867, so they were the ones making the decisions. British Columbia joined in 1871, and the railroad as much as anything was built to join BC to the rest of Canada - which at time was pretty much the lands along the St. Lawrence and along the north shore of Lake Superior.
I don’t know if the few non-First Nations people in the territorial lands between Lake Superior and B.C. especially wanted to be Americans; but Ottawa may have been afraid US railroads would build into the area, reaping the wealth of what would become the vast wheatlands in the west for the US.