Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says U.S. president-elect Donald Trump’s rhetoric about merging the U.S. with Canada is distracting people from the costs Americans will face as a result of steep tariffs on Canadian goods.
Speaking to CNN on Thursday in his first media interview since announcing his intention to resign, Trudeau also pushed back on the idea of Canada becoming the 51st U.S. state, which Trump has increasingly spoken about in press conferences and on social media.
“That’s not going to happen,” Trudeau said.
“What I think is happening in this is President Trump, who’s a very skillful negotiator, is getting people to be somewhat distracted by that conversation, to take away from the conversation around 25 per cent tariffs on oil and gas, and electricity and steel and aluminum and lumber and concrete and everything the American consumers buy from Canada is suddenly going to get a lot more expensive if he moves forward on these tariffs.
“That’s something that I think we need to be focusing on a little bit more.”
Trudeau was in Washington, D.C., on Thursday for the state funeral of former U.S. president Jimmy Carter. Trudeau said he did not interact with Trump, who also attended the service.
Trudeau also met with U.S. business leaders to emphasize the need to avoid “unnecessary” tariffs off Canadian goods, he told reporters later Thursday.
Trump has repeatedly raised the idea of making Canada a U.S. state, pointing to imbalances in trade and defence.
During a press conference on Tuesday, Trump said he would use “economic force” to compel Canada to join the U.S., while reiterating his threat of “substantial” tariffs on all Canadian imports to “make up for” flows of migrants and drugs over the border.
Trudeau quickly responded that there “isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell” that Canada will become part of the U.S., and said so again Thursday.
“Canadians are incredibly proud of being Canadian,” he said. “One of the ways we define ourselves most easily is, well, we’re not American.”
Trudeau told CNN that Trump has made fair points about border security, and that his government’s recently-announced $1.3-billion border plan was “a clear win for President Trump.”
Yet Trump has not backed down from his tariff threat.
Trump has consistently alleged that tariffing foreign goods will raise billions of dollars of revenue for the U.S. and pushes back on economists who say universal tariffs are inflationary and raise prices for U.S. consumers.
Several premiers have taken to U.S. airwaves in recent weeks to make the case that Trump’s tariffs will be harmful to both countries. Thursday’s CNN appearance was the first time the prime minister has taken part in the “Team Canada” media strategy he’s pushed for.
“We do not want to see tariffs on our side, we do not want to see tariffs on your side,” Trudeau told CNN. “It’s bad for people who have for generations made things together and been successful together.
“We have so many resources in Canada more than our market can support, so we export them to our closest friend who can rely on them. It is a win-win for us.”
Trudeau said Canada “would definitely respond” to U.S tariffs as it did in 2018, when Trump tariffed Canadian steel and aluminum. Canada subsequently raised duties on several high-profile U.S. exports like motorcycles and bourbon, before the two countries ended the trade war a year later.
“We don’t want to do that because it drives up prices for Canadians and it harms our closest trading partner,” Trudeau said.
Trudeau said Trump’s re-election and escalatory rhetoric against Canada did not factor into his decision to step down as prime minister.
He said “there are a lot of feelings involved” among Canadians who have soured on his leadership, and that “misinformation and disinformation” about his government’s policies have played a role.
Although he pointed to data indicators that suggest the Canadian economy has recovered from inflation better than other nations, Trudeau acknowledged that “when someone’s paying $8 for a head of lettuce, it doesn’t matter that you’re doing better than they are in Spain or somewhere else.”
Asked what advice he had for whoever replaces him on dealing with Trump, Trudeau said his successor must continue to stress “that we do better when we work together.”
“That’s the focus that we need to have, and that’s certainly what I’ll continue to work on with President Trump,” he said.