Everyone should take a deep breath and stop freaking out following this threat by Trump to impose 25% tariffs on Canadian exports. This is extremely unlikely to happen, although it doesn’t mean we should ignore it.
Trump is the author of “The Art of the Deal”, and he has a habit of making outrageous declarations as a bargaining position to force his counterparts to do something or make concessions under threat.
He similarly threatened to impose 25% tariffs on imported goods from Mexico in 2019 if the Mexican government didn’t curb the flow of migrants.
There are limits to how much tariffs he can impose given how interdependent our economies are. Trump says he will make us pay, but he knows that it’s American businesses and consumers who will actually pay the tariffs. Our exporting industries would of course suffer considerably, but inflation would spike in the US.
Trump knows that the flow of illegal migrants and Fentanyl from Canada into the US is a tiny problem compared to what’s coming from Mexico (or China in the case of Fentanyl).
He probably added Canada to this threat not because he believes we are a big part of these problems, but because he despises Trudeau, knows he’s weak and on his way out, and wants to wield a big stick in preparation for the renegotiation of the USMCA, and demands that we spend more on defence.
Thanks to Trudeau’s insane mass immigration policy, we are also seen internationally as a country that opened its doors to everyone, including criminals and terrorists who sometimes cross the border into the US. The new administration rightly see Canada as a threat to American security.
What we need to do to preserve our access to the US market is by all means not to get into a commercial war and threaten to retaliate. It’s to make real reforms, regain control of our borders, impose a moratorium on immigration and deport all illegals and foreign criminals, stop the experiment on making hard drugs more easily available, and upgrade our defence instead of turning our armed forces into a club for woke sissies.
And get ready for a renegotiation of the USMCA with tangible offers to put in the table, including scrapping supply management, which would actually be good for Canadian consumers.
What we need is a serious government willing to do the necessary reforms — not just to placate Trump and preserve our access to US markets, but because this will be beneficial to Canadians.
Canada is headed for its worst decline in 40 years as economy fails to recover from the pandemic.
Under Trudeau, incomes are West Virginia level, house prices are Los Angeles level, and a middle class family might pay *half* their income in taxes.
7 in 10 Canadians now think that “Canada is broken” — rising to 8 in 10 of the young.
Almost half of Canadians are considering moving to another country.
Rarely has a country fallen so far so fast.