TORONTO – Ontario Premier Doug Ford says the U.S. ambassador to Canada should apologize to Ontario’s representative in Washington after sources say he shouted profanely about the province’s anti-tariff ad.
Sources who spoke to trade representative David Paterson after the incident at an event Monday in Ottawa but were not authorized to speak about it publicly told The Canadian Press that Pete Hoekstra yelled at Paterson over an ad Ontario was running in the U.S.
U.S. President Donald Trump called off trade negotiations with Canada last week, citing the ad that uses clips of former president Ronald Reagan saying tariffs do not work in the long term.
Ford ultimately pulled them, but only after letting them run through the weekend during the World Series.
Ford says today that he understands that exchanges get heated sometimes, but the right thing for Hoekstra to do would be to call Paterson and apologize because that kind of conduct is “unbecoming” of an ambassador.
Neither Paterson nor Hoekstra immediately returned a request for comment.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 29, 2025.
