As former Prime Minister Stephen Harper said, Trump isn’t talking like a friend or ally of Canada. And Trump isn’t acting like one either. Canada must respond accordingly, and impose tariffs on the United States if the incoming President unleashes his economically illiterate policies on us.
Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper and current Ontario Premier Doug Ford are two of the most pro-American elected officials Canada has ever seen.
Both are big fans of our southern neighbours, both recognize that Canada and the United States have many shared values, and both understand that Canada and the United States are stronger when we work together on trade and defence.
That’s why both Harper and Ford have significant credibility when they criticize the rhetoric of incoming U.S. President Donald Trump. Ford and Harper aren’t anti-American left-wing politicians. The last thing they want to be doing is having to fight back against a seemingly hostile U.S. Administration. But this simply goes to show how extreme Trump’s rhetoric is, and how economically illiterate his trade policies are.
Thus, both Harper and Ford have become some of the strongest defenders of Canada in the face of the growing economic threat from south of the border:
Harper and Ford are right, and what they are saying is very important.
The reason it’s important is because both are holding on to the truth, rather than going along with Donald Trump’s reality-denying lies.
Trump is objectively wrong on trade. The U.S. is not ‘subsidizing’ Canada by having a trade deficit with us. In fact – as former Prime Minister Harper pointed out – the U.S. trade deficit is due entirely to the energy they import from us at a huge discount. If anything, Canadians are the ones getting ripped off here.
Harper also pushed back on Trump’s claims regarding security, accurately noting that drugs and crime often flow from the U.S. up into Canada.
We must always keep this in mind.
Trump is lying.
He’s lying to the American People (many of whom thought they were voting for lower prices only to get a likely tariff war that will drive up prices).
And he’s lying to the Canadian People, attempting to blame us for many of America’s problems, and presenting a false picture of the Canada-US trade and security relationship.
Sadly, many have chosen to go along with Trump’s lies, calculating that it’s easier to go along with the powerful person spreading falsehoods than it is to hold on to what is real.
Thankfully, Harper and Ford aren’t among those taking the cowardly path.
As a result of their willingness to be honest, Harper and Ford are helping give confidence to more and more Canadians who recognize that Canada needs to show strength and resolve right now, rather than rolling over.
Remember, what we do now matters not just in the short term, but the long term. Other countries – including hostile states like China and Russia – are watching to see how we respond to bullying.
If we can’t find the strength to retaliate against economy-wrecking policies imposed by a U.S. President who constantly lies, how would we withstand even more aggressive coercion and territorial demands from authoritarian states that are built entirely on lies, dishonesty, and violent coercion?
Canada must send a message.
And that message is that we won’t allow economic pain to cause us to roll over, and we won’t hesitate to respond. In the face of an attack on all Canadian industries – including the oil and gas sector, the automotive sector, the tech sector, and more (after all, blanket tariffs are an attack on our entire economy), Canada must respond with reciprocal tariffs. We should put a blanket tariff on the U.S. in response, with particularly severe tariffs on the Canadian products America is most dependent on.
This is persuasion through retaliation. Our persuasion target isn’t the U.S. President – who is ignoring even his close advisors who recognize that tariffs on Canada are an absurd and counterproductive policy.
Our persuasion target is American consumers, who expect the incoming Administration to lower prices and will thus be surprised to see Trump’s tariff war causing a tit-for-tat battle that raises prices instead. Those consumers will then pressure their politicians – who want to get re-elected – and pressure American businesses, which will then raise pressure on the Trump Administration to reverse course and return to a beneficial win-win trading relationship with Canada.
This requires all provinces to be onside with a Team Canada approach since any defectors will wreck our negotiating leverage.
We also need to rapidly enhance our self-sufficiency:
“This is also the attitude we need when building up our military. While we need to make massive purchases from our allies to make up for years of underfunding in the short term, there’s no reason we can’t have Canadian companies making world-class tanks, drones, self-propelled artillery, small arms, air defences, ships, and more. And in the medium to long term, we should seek to become a world leader in utilizing AI for military purposes, leveraging our impressive tech sector.”
Obviously, this isn’t the world anyone wanted. But Canadians can’t control who the United States elects, and we can’t control the fact that the incoming U.S. President has a view of trade that simply doesn’t comport with reality.
What we can control is how we respond, and we must respond in a way that shows we have the strength and resolve to defend ourselves in an increasingly hostile and chaotic world.
Spencer Fernando
If this piece left you clearer than it found you, that's the point. I write for readers who want to think past the week, to see the longer pattern beneath the daily story, and to come away steadier rather than more agitated.
That longer view gets built somewhere. On Patreon, essay by essay, I'm constructing The Long Work, a body of analysis meant to outlast the news cycle that prompted it. The readers there make it possible. No subsidies, no strings. The work answers to them.
$8/month to read it as it's built, and to have a hand in building it.