Former prime minister Justin Trudeau is warning that American tariffs threaten to drive Canada closer to China in the auto sector.
Speaking at a CNBC event in Singapore on Thursday, Trudeau said “economic pressures and coercion” nearly drove Canadian aerospace company Bombardier “into China’s arms” almost a decade ago.
Trudeau said that when Bombardier began building its C-Series jets, both American aircraft maker Boeing and Dutch manufacturer Airbus did “everything they could” to keep Bombardier sales grounded.
“They were talking to all their customers, ‘Don’t you dare put in an order for the C-Series! Don’t you dare, don’t you dare!’ And finally, Bombardier started really struggling,” he said.
“So what happens? China comes knocking on Bombardier’s door and pulls up a dump truck full of money … So Boeing and Airbus, that were busy trying to put Bombardier out of business … almost drove us into China’s arms.”
Trudeau said he raised the issue at the 2017 G7 summit in Italy with U.S. President Donald Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron and now former German chancellor Angela Merkel.
Get breaking National news
After that meeting, Trudeau said, Airbus began purchasing Bombardier’s C-Series jets — a move he attributed to the talks at the G7.
Trudeau said a similar scenario is playing out now, with U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canada’s automakers pushing it to explore closer auto sector ties with China.
In 2024, Canada imposed 100 per cent tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles, matching a U.S. move, and citing unfair trade practices.
In 2025, Trump imposed punishing duties on the Canadian auto sector.
In January, after a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Prime Minister Mark Carney secured tariff relief for Canadian agricultural sectors in exchange for allowing up to 49,000 Chinese EVs into the country at a reduced tariff rate of 6.1 per cent.
Trudeau said the episode with Bombardier shows that bad-faith competition between nations that are supposed to share values only gives an advantage to countries that don’t share those values.
“We’re seeing a similar thing happen right now with President Trump. Threatening the Canadian auto industry, where we’re now having to look at working with China because the American industry doesn’t want to work with us anymore,” Trudeau said.
Who on earth cares about the drivel coming out of this clown’s pea brain? Hasn’t he already embarrassed and destroyed Canada’s reputation enough? The sooner he and his fake astronaut girlfriend leave this earth the better.
Shut the f….up Trudeau!!!!!
Who cares what he has to say. He should just closet himself away. Nobody likes him
As if Trudeau ever had anything that was important to say, just photo shoots all the time. Carney is the same, talk, talk, talk and no action.
So, to prevent this happening the ALWAYS EASTERN RUN QUEBEC FEDERAL GOVERNMENT will FORCE the western provinces to continue to financially support ALL the attempts by Quebec and Ontario to keep this industry going in these two provinces, same ole, same ole and why I say Alberta needs to leave or continue to be financially abused by this always eastern run federal government financially. This albertan WANTS to keep MORE of my hard earned money IN MY POCKET and no longer want to financially support any FAVOURED eastern run businesses any longer.
Maggie, i wish that you had been ok with getting youre lipstick smeared while you were in Cuba. But alas, here we are.
Maggie…why oh why did you not wear a condom when you were with Fidel????
Why are we even entertaining this idiot? Next to his father, he is the worst thing to ever happen to this country, yet media is still giving him attention? Who cares what he thinks. He’s the HUGE reason Trump has made a mockery of Canada and has ruined our relationship with the U.S. idiot.
I agree with 👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻👇🏻
Who the hell cares what trudeau thinks? The guy, just like his dad, tried to destroy Canada and got paid to do it, and now the mainstream media thought to ask him his thoughts on the current situation with the US? He deserves jail for what he did to Canada and Canadians, not his opinion