Blame Canada: Trudeau forced on defensive as Trump targets trade

When asked this week what he had learned about Donald Trump during the US president’s first months in power, Justin Trudeau paused.

“I’ve learned that he listens,” the Canadian prime minister replied after a few seconds. “He is a little bit unlike many politicians.”

As laughter broke out among the audience at the public Q&A with Bloomberg News, Trudeau continued. Politicians are usually trained to remain on message, he said. “[But] he has shown that, if he says one thing and then actually hears good counter-arguments or good reasons why he should shift his position, he will take a different position, if it’s a better one, if the arguments win him over.”

Trudeau’s comments may help to explain how this week, Canada unexpectedly joined the list of countries in the president’s crosshairs. On two separate occasions Trump took aim at Canada’s protectionist trade policies, describing them as a “disgrace” and “unfair”.

It was a sharp reversal from a few months earlier, when Trump assured Canada that his administration would simply be “tweaking” the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta). “We’ll be doing certain things that are going to benefit both of our countries,” Trump said at the time. “Our relationship with Canada is outstanding.”

His words unleashed a sigh of relief in Ottawa, where officials had spent months laying the groundwork for a smooth relationship with the new administration. Few countries have as much at stake when it comes to US relations; Canada sends about three-quarters of its annual exports to the US, and nearly 400,000 people a day cross the shared border. Roughly 2.5m jobs in Canada depend on trade with the US.

The relief, however, was short-lived. On Tuesday, as he unveiled his “Buy American and Hire American” executive order in Wisconsin, Trump called out Canada and its reliance on import tariffs and production controls to protect its dairy sector. In Canada, Trump said, “some very unfair things have happened to our dairy farmers and others.” Read more….