OTTAWA—Canada’s tightening of border security could mean 25 per cent tariffs against Canada and Mexico set to take effect next week could be postponed, while later tariff rounds still loom large, the Trump administration said Wednesday.
Canada’s New Democratic and Green parties, in separate statements Wednesday, declared the United States is no longer an ally under a president who is a “fascist” and should be banned from entering Canada for the G7 leaders’ meeting in June.
The NDP and Green leaders’ comments escalated the two opposition parties’ anti-Trump rhetoric at a critical time for the Canadian economy as the U.S. continues to threaten a broad range of tariffs.
On Wednesday, Trump sent conflicting signals at his first cabinet meeting about the immediate threat to Canada and Mexico.
Asked directly if he had seen enough progress at the borders to extend the 30-day tariff pause now in effect until March 4, the president told reporters “I’m not stopping the tariffs.”
He said “millions” have died from fentanyl, saying “it comes mostly from China, but it comes through Mexico, and it comes through Canada.”
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, two seats away from Trump, tried to clarify. He said Canada and Mexico have to “prove to the president they’ve done an excellent job” on tightening their borders in order for Trump to hold off on the threatened 25 per cent tariff on all their imports to America, including a 10 per cent duty on oil and gas, that were earlier this month delayed for 30 days until next week.
Lutnick distinguished “the fentanyl-related” tariffs from a larger threat of reciprocal tariffs that Trump has levied against all of America’s trading partners.
“The fentanyl-related things, they’re working hard on the border. At the end of that 30 days, they have to prove to the president that they’ve satisfied him to that regard. If they have, he will give them a pause — or he won’t.”
At that, Trump interjected, “We lose 300,000 people a year to fentanyl,” adding, “a lot of it comes through Canada.”
Trump has threatened several rounds of tariffs, with different objectives and different deadlines. Those are:
• A 25 per cent “across the board” tariff on all Canadian and Mexican imports, with a lesser 10 per cent tariff on oil and gas, possibly to take effect March 4: Trump first issued this threat on social media on Nov. 25, reiterated it on Jan. 20 inauguration evening, and tied it directly to what he called a flood of fentanyl and illegal migrants pouring into America from Canada and Mexico. Canada first said it is not causing the same problem that Mexico is. Then Canada said it would bolster border security with a $1.3-million plan. On Feb. 3, after Trump and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke twice on the phone and Trudeau pledged another $200 million, Trump agreed to a 30-day delay. Mexico also won a 30-day reprieve. That ends next week.
• A 25 per cent tariff on global steel and aluminum imports, including Canadian products, to take effect March 12: Trump first teased this threat aboard Air Force One on Feb. 9, then later signed executive orders, saying there are “no exceptions” to the tariffs to come. He later also said those would come on top of any previously threatened 25 per cent tariffs, meaning Canadian steel and aluminum producers, and industries like the auto and manufacturing sectors expect it could mean a 50 per cent stacked tariff.
• A 25 per cent tariff on global auto imports, including Canada, to take effect April 2: Trump outlined these auto tariffs at a news conference at Mar-a-Lago and accused European countries — as he has Canada — of “unfair” trade practices. It is not clear if this would pile on top of his other threatened import duties, meaning a 75 per cent stacked tariff could affect Canadian auto products sold into the U.S.
• Unspecified “reciprocal tariffs” against all countries that sell goods to America, to take effect April 2: Trump announced on Feb. 13 these tariffs would be in retaliation for what he deems “unfair trade practices” that hurt American companies, listing among tariff and nontariff barriers things like value-added sales taxes (such as Canada’s GST) that are applied to American goods sold in foreign countries, export subsidies that other nations use to support their products, and Canada and France’s imposition of a digital service tax on U.S.-based big tech companies. Trump has specifically cited industries producing automobiles, lumber, semiconductor chips, pharmaceuticals and dairy products as those he is targeting to bolster in the U.S. via this tariff plan.
• Unspecified tariff to come on copper, dependent on a review due in nine months: Trump ordered a probe on Tuesday into whether there should be tariffs on copper imports to rebuild U.S. production of a metal critical to electrical power grids, electric vehicles, military hardware, telecommunications and electronics products and consumer goods.
“So the big transaction is April 2,” said Lutnick, referring to Trump’s reciprocal tariffs. However, even Trump at one point seemed to mix up the different rates and deadlines he’s mused about.
Trump complained the U.S. “supports” Canada by allowing it to sell more products to the U.S. than it buys, a trade imbalance that he erroneously calls ”$200 billion a year in subsidies.” The U.S. government’s own statistics show that in 2024 the trade deficit with Canada was $63.3 billion, not $200 billion. And if Canadian oil is excluded from that equation, the U.S. actually has a trade surplus with Canada.
Trump continued to argue that the U.S. does not “need” anything Canada produces, and again singled out Canadian cars and lumber, claiming the U.S. provides Canada with military protection, and that Canada should be a 51st state, since without American support “they don’t exist as a nation.”
However the president made a rare departure from weeks of diminishing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “governor” of a 51st state, “let’s call him prime minister rather than the governor.” In the next breath, though, he said, “Justin Trudeau, nice guy. I think he’s a very good guy. I call him Gov. Trudeau. He should be governor.”
A senior Canadian official said that the Trudeau government has received no guarantee next week’s overall threat against all products Canada sells into the U.S. is being held at bay, and a meeting of premiers and a later cabinet committee meeting reviewed his actions to date. But there is no guarantee of what Trump will decide.
That is despite the fact several federal ministers and premiers have trekked to Washington over the past several weeks to persuade Trump that the Trudeau government is addressing legitimate concerns that Canada shares. Trudeau and Trump talked Saturday, with Trudeau raising Canada’s now $1.5-billion outlay at the border, to no apparent avail.
On Wednesday, the RCMP in a news release showcased a multi-police force “national sprint” operation that took place over a six-week period in December and January that it said targeted fentanyl and synthetic opioids.
The RCMP said investigations, some of which began before the operation, led to “524 arrests and the seizure of large quantities of drugs” including 46 kilograms of fentanyl, 15,000 pills of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids, 44 kilograms of meth, 29 kilograms of cocaine, 122 guns, more than 33 stolen cars and over $800,000 in cash across Canada. It did not indicate whether police determined that any of the drugs were destined for the U.S.
Public Safety Minister David McGuinty touts U.S. Customs and Border Patrol statistics that he said show between December 2024 and the end of January 2025, which spans the launching of Canada’s border measures, there was a 97 per cent reduction in seizures of fentanyl going from Canada to the U.S.
Canadian ministers privately tell U.S. officials of Canada’s concern about the flow of illegal guns northward. This week, however, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly publicly pushed back and called the U.S. a “net exporter” of illegal guns, fentanyl and illegal migrants to Canada.
For the NDP and the Greens, the position is that Canada must confront Trump’s aggressive trade and military statements and blacklist him.
In a formal speech Wednesday to the Montreal Council on Foreign Relations, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh asked, “What do you call a guy who threatens his allies including with the use of military force, spreads disinformation, proclaims he is above the law, and fires anyone who won’t do what he says — even those in law enforcement and the military?”
“A fascist,” he said, saying he should be banned from the G7 in Canada in June.
Jonathan Pedneault and Elizabeth May, co-leaders of the Green Party (which has two MPs, not enough for official party status in the Commons) also presented a scathing critique of Trump, and echoed the declaration Trump is leading a rise of “fascism within the United States” and he and his American officials should be barred from the international gathering in Kananaskis, Alta.
