Trudeau had announced on March 3 Canada is retaliating with 25 percent counter-tariffs targeting CA$155 billion of U.S. goods.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the Trump administration’s decision to impose broad tariffs on Canada by citing fentanyl is an “excuse” to destroy Canada’s economy and set up “annexation.”
Trudeau said it’s not clear what President Donald Trump’s goal is with the border security-related tariffs, which came into effect on March 4. Canadian goods imported in the United States are subject to a 25 percent surtax, whereas energy imports are slapped with a 10 percent surtax.
“I think in what President Trump said yesterday, that there is nothing Canada or Mexico can do to avoid these tariffs, underlines very clearly what I think a lot of us have suspected for a long time, that these tariffs are not specifically about fentanyl,” Trudeau said in a press conference in Ottawa on March 4.
The prime minister noted how Trump wrote on social media earlier that day about American banks not having access to the Canadian market. Trudeau remarked that U.S. banks do operate in Canada. Personal banking is, however, dominated by the “big six” Canadian banks.
“It’s an example of not really being able to see what it is that he wants, because even the excuse that he’s giving for these tariffs today of fentanyl is completely bogus, completely unjustified, completely false,” Trudeau said.
Trudeau made the comments as he is facing his last days in office, with the Liberal leadership race coming to an end on March 9. The race will choose Trudeau’s replacement following his January resignation announcement.
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Trudeau had announced on March 3 Canada is retaliating with 25 percent counter-tariffs targeting CA$155 billion of U.S. goods, with a portion taking effect on March 4 and the rest in 21 days.
The prime minister also said his government is contemplating taking non-tariff measures but didn’t share specific details. He said it could entail reviewing purchasing and contracting practices from American companies. A meeting with provincial premiers is taking place later today to discuss the situation, Trudeau said.
Asked by reporters whether Trump could be seeking to kickstart renegotiations of the United States-Mexico-Canada free trade deal, Trudeau said “it’s not clear what he really wants.”
“Or maybe the only thing clear is what he said multiple times that his goal is to make the Canadian economy collapse to after talk about annexation,” he said. “That’s what he wants. So I don’t know which negotiations we could currently undertake to convince him that that’s not his goal.”
Trudeau had previously told a business audience behind closed doors in February that he believes Trump’s talk of making Canada the 51st U.S. state is a “real thing.”
Meanwhile his Defence Minister Bill Blair said afterwards the comments are “concerning” but don’t pose a “real threat to us.”
Since Trump first made the threat to impose tariffs on Canada and Mexico over border and fentanyl concerns in late November, both countries have taken steps to strengthen security. Canada announced a $1.3 billion border plan to increase surveillance and enforcement and followed the U.S. lead in listing drug cartels and street gangs as terrorist organizations.
While taking measures to bolster border security, Ottawa has also been saying that Canada’s illegal migration and drug trafficking problem is not as severe as Mexico’s.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data for fiscal 2024 shows that 43 pounds of fentanyl were intercepted at the northern border, compared to 21,000 pounds at the southwest border.
The Trump administration has been saying that any amount of fentanyl crossing into the United States is not acceptable.
“You know people say, ‘Oh, it’s only a small amount of opioids, they’re only killing 75,000 Americans, you shouldn’t worry about that.’ I mean, the president is not going to take that laying down,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told CNBC on March 4.
“These things just have to end and we need to see material reduction in autopsy deaths from opioid and that’s what the president is talking about. This is not a trade war.”
Lutnick added that if Canada and Mexico can prove to Trump that they have stopped the flow of fentanyl, then tariffs could be removed.
CBP data shows that 5 pounds of fentanyl were seized in the northern border sector in November, 1 pound in December, and 0.03 pounds in January.
