Doug Ford has no regrets about 'viral' Ronald Reagan ad that angered Donald Trump

“Now, every single local media, every large media, medium-sized media in the U.S., is talking about it,” Ford said at Queen’s Park. “And the message is very clear: protectionism does not work,” said the premier, who later took to American airwaves with appearances on ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN.

“We achieved our goal … mission accomplished.”

Ford said that as a courtesy before it aired, he ran the ad, first reported by the Star, past Carney and the prime minister’s chief of staff Marc-André Blanchard, and dismissed any notion that it scuttled prospects of a good trade deal.

Ford said Trump would have found any “excuse” to put pressure on Canada. He said there have been rumours of a deal “month after month” but any deal that didn’t include autos was never going to work for Ontario. “Our goal is to make sure that we get a fair deal, not a one-sided Donald Trump deal, but a fair deal for the people of Ontario and Canada, and I’m focused on auto. There’s no mention of auto anywhere,” Ford said. 

Speaking in Kuala Lumpur, Carney said there was no reason other than the pivotal Ontario ad that triggered Trump’s decision to end trade negotiations and threaten a new 10 per cent tariff, yet the prime minister pointedly did not blame Ford outright or criticize him in any strong terms.

“We were close to a deal,” Carney said in French. “Then there were the ads, and everything changed. The position of the American government changed, that’s obvious. It’s not more complicated than that.”

In remarks that were calibrated to not blame Ford and at the same time allow Trump the ability to do so, Carney underscored that it is the federal government’s responsibility to lead trade negotiations, and that his government deliberately made a choice not to advertise against tariffs in the U.S.

Aboard Air Force One en route to Japan, Trump said it doesn’t matter whether the commercial was sponsored by the provincial or federal government. “I don’t care whether it’s provincial or Canada itself. They all knew exactly what the ad was. The prime minister knew. Everybody knew. The prime minister knew what the ad was,” Trump said.

The president, who announced a new 10 per cent tariff on Canada Saturday as punishment for the ad staying on the air during the weekend World Series game broadcasts, said he didn’t know “when it’s going to kick in. We’ll see.” While in Malaysia, Trump signed agreements with Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia — all of which retained 19 per cent tariffs on their goods entering the U.S. and guaranteed billions of foreign investment dollars would be directed America’s way. 

A senior Canadian official told the Star there was no indication from the U.S. side what the next steps for Canada-U.S. trade talks would be, or how the new tariff threat would be applied. Several stakeholders told the Star “nobody” is talking.

Trump looked forward to meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping, and made clear he is uninterested in meeting the Canadian prime minister, whom he hailed in the Oval Office three weeks ago as a “world-class leader.”  Both leaders will attend the Asia Pacific economic forum summit in Gyeongju, Korea later in the week, Carney noted, suggesting they could talk there.

“I don’t want to meet with him. I’m not going to be meeting with him for a while. I’m very happy with the deal we have right now with Canada. We’re going to let it ride,” Trump said.

U.S. Ambassador to Canada Pete Hoekstra had harsh words for Ford, and said he had suspected the ad would provoke Trump’s anger, telling a virtual meeting with the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada, a business group that opposes a slew of Liberal policies, that he was first assured the Ontario commercial did not raise concerns among negotiators. 

Prior to Trump’s public castigation of the Ontario commercial, Hoekstra said he spoke to negotiators last Thursday and was assured that a long-sought deal on steel, aluminum and energy — which Hoekstra said was to include oil and uranium — would be reached by American Thanksgiving.

When Hoekstra asked if Ontario’s ad campaign had hindered talks in any way, he said he was told it had not. “They came back and they said, ‘No, it doesn’t appear that that is having an impact,’” Hoekstra relayed, “which I’m a little surprised about, because I know the president fairly well. And I know the marketing of what’s happening, and what these ads could or could not do, and how they could change the temperament.”

Trump himself appeared to downplay the ad just two days before declaring an end to trade talks over it.

Hoekstra — who at one point during the virtual meeting referred to the president as “Donald Tariffs” — said he was told negotiators had “ironed out most of the major issues” before Trump’s ire over the ad erupted.

Trump’s diplomat said he spoke to the president on Saturday, who gave him no “indication at all that he was in any hurry to get back to the negotiating table and get an agreement.” And Hoekstra questioned the timing of the premier’s ad campaign, which launched ahead of state-level elections in the U.S. and next year’s midterms. 

“If you want to hurt Donald Trump politically, you know, I guess you can do that. But interfering in the political affairs of a sovereign nation … I’m sorry,” Hoekstra said.

However, Ford remained defiant Monday. He confirmed that at the request of Carney Ontario paused the $75 million campaign featuring former president Ronald Reagan, but called it “the most successful ad in the history of North America,” boasting during the legislature’s daily question period, it received ”$300 million to $400 million in earned media” over the past several days. His office said the ad scored 11.4 billion “impressions” across the airwaves, media coverage, and social media platforms.

Carney, who is politically and personally close to the Ontario premier, struck a sanguine note.

“In any complicated, high stakes negotiation, you can get unexpected twists and turns, and you have to keep your cool during those situations. It doesn’t pay to be upset. Emotions don’t carry you very far. And we had made progress, to repeat,” he said.

“We are ready when appropriate to pick that up,” said Carney. “And I’ll just re-emphasize that it is the responsibility of the government of Canada to have these negotiations.” He said “others will have opinions” and he welcomes “free advice. Unsolicited advice is entirely appropriate. Every Canadian is a stakeholder in these negotiations.”

Last Thursday night on social media, a rankled Trump blasted the Ontario ad, featuring a 1987 pro-free trade speech by Reagan, expressing fears it would influence deliberations of the U.S. Supreme Court on the validity of tariffs.

Ford said Monday it was “ridiculous” to suggest a commercial could sway the courts.

The ad, which has been airing on many U.S. networks, accurately quotes Reagan, an advocate of free trade and an opponent of the tariffs Trump has embraced.

“High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliation by foreign countries and the triggering of fierce trade wars,” Reagan warns in the 38-year-old address.

In a part of the speech that is not included in the Ontario ad, Reagan, president from 1981 to 1989, says he had been promoting increased trade with then-prime minister Brian Mulroney.

In 1988, Reagan and Mulroney signed the free trade agreement that is the precursor to the current Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, known as CUSMA.

On the ad itself, Trump insisted Monday, “Ronald Reagan loved tariffs. He used them sparingly … He made a mistake in that and again, I was the biggest fan of Ronald Reagan, but on finance, on trade, it wasn’t his strong suit. But he liked tariffs, and they totally changed that to say that he didn’t because they’re catering to the Supreme Court.

Trump called Canada “one of the most difficult countries to deal with” saying “as much as I love Canada itself and the people of Canada … a lot of bad representatives, they did a fake ad yesterday. They were caught. The Ronald Reagan Foundation was the one that caught him, and it was totally the opposite of what was said.

“So I don’t like that. That’s dirty pool,” the president said.