How Trump Changed Canada’s Political Trajectory

The election last week that produced Mark Carney as Prime Minister of Canada was held under the shadows of the unusual politics of the President of the United States of America (USA), Donald Trump, and his Make America Great Again (MAGA) mantra, which suddenly turned American allies into adversaries.

Many worldwide are still trying to understand why he chose to take on Canada so early in his administration. One reason he gave for his hostility towards that hitherto friendly nation is subsidy. Trump claimed that the United States subsidised Canada with more than $100 billion annually.

However, the United States government’s foreign assistance website corrected this falsehood. It stated that America has not spent more than $35.1 million in a single fiscal year on financial assistance for Canada since at least 2001. In the most recent reported fiscal year, 2022, which ran from Oct. 1, 2021, to Sept. 30, 2022, the United States sent $32 million in foreign assistance to Canada.

Trump also claimed that Canada was taking undue advantage of the United States regarding trade relations. It is worth noting that the United States’ trade relationship with Canada is one of the largest in the world. In 2023, the goods and services trade between the two countries totalled US$916 billion. U.S. exports were valued at US$440 billion and Canadian exports at US$476 billion, resulting in a US$36 billion trade deficit with Canada. It is also on record that Canada has historically held a trade deficit with the United States every year since 1985 in net trade of goods, excluding services. The trade relationship between the two countries crosses all industries, and both nations are among the largest trading partners globally.

It is on record that the Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement laid the groundwork for a multilateral and multicultural agreement between the United States, Mexico, and Canada. On January 1, 1994, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was enacted. The agreement has helped to increase trade amongst all three member countries. Although the countries have some dysfunction, especially in automobiles and agriculture, the trends are negligible, as the agreement has arguably been a boon for all nations involved. Trump decided to blow this relationship that had stood the two countries in good stead over the years through an ill-conceived, ill-advised and rudely delivered tariff policy that is isolating USA from its allies.

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So, in our opinion, it is not precisely correct for Trump to claim that Canada was ripping the United States off or that Canada was surviving on subsidies from the United States. These were the grounds upon which he began to covet that country as the 51st state of America.

To most international observers, the 25 per cent tariff on all exports from Canada to the USA was a surprise, as it was embedded in needless acrimony. The tariff regime was intended to correct what Trump perceived as a trade imbalance between the two countries, favouring Canada. Unfortunately, it ignited a trade war that is still raging and formed an impenetrable cloud of hate that changed the politics of Canada, perhaps for good. Canadians are making it clear that their sovereignty is not negotiable and are prepared to protect it whatever it takes. They have also designed the slogan “Buy Canada” to reject American goods and services.

Before Trump’s political and economic misadventure, because that is what it is beginning to look like, conservatives in Canada were having a field day dominating the political landscape. They appeared poised to take over power from the liberals. Curiously, the leader of the conservatives, Pierre Poilievre, who had expected to lead his party back to power after a decade-long absence, even lost his Ottawa seat in parliament.

Until recently, outgone Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, a liberal, was having difficulty containing the wave of conservatism sweeping across the Western world, including his country. Political pundits predicted that he would have been beaten in the just-concluded election.

But all that is now academic as the liberals in Canada, riding on the crest of widespread disapproval of Trump’s model of conservatism, changed the political tide in their favour with a vow to fight it out with the United States whichever way the wave flows.

From all indications, Canadians are interpreting Trump’s attitude towards them as shocking and an outright betrayal of loyalty to a country they considered a friend. The new Prime Minister, Carney, used this as his manifesto to galvanise his party and the country into a united front, which led to his victory at the polls.

Carney claims, “America wants our land, resources, water, and country. President Trump is trying to break us so America can own us. That will never happen.” The new Prime Minister made an unmistakable point when he said, “But we also must recognise that our world has fundamentally changed. “

As a newspaper, we dare say this change is not only in Canada. The Conservative Party is losing ground in the United Kingdom. Trump is giving conservatism a bad name, and the United States will be the worse for it.