As Canada braces for President Trump’s Liberation day tariffs to take effect some Canadian political leaders are suddenly supporting proposals to remove all tariffs.
Maxime Bernier, who served as foreign affairs minister in former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government and now heads the right-wing People’s Party of Canada (PPC), told Fox News Digital in an interview from Halifax that it is “absolutely” the time for Canada to remove all tariffs against the U.S.
He said the 25% duties the Canadian government, under then-Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, imposed on the U.S. in early February to counter Trump’s 25% tariffs against Canada “won’t hurt the Americans – it is hurting Canadians.”
New Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said in a statement following his March 28 call with the president – the first contact between both leaders since Carney was elected Liberal leader by his party nearly three weeks before – that Canada would implement retaliatory tariffs in response to Wednesday’s U.S. “trade actions.”
The PPC leader said that Trump should be told that “the real reciprocal response” to tariffs is “zero on our side, zero on your side.”
Bernier said that instead, Carney and his main rival, Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre, are being “fake patriots using a dollar-for-dollar trade war against Trump” and telling Canadians: “That’s the best thing to do.”
“We cannot impose counter-tariffs,” said Bernier, who also served as industry minister in the Harper government.
“The Americans are 10 times bigger than us. We won’t win a trade war,” he said, underscoring that retaliation will lead to a recession in Canada.
Former Canadian Conservative politician Tony Clement, who served alongside Bernier in Harper’s Cabinet, told Fox News Digital that “from an economic point of view,” removing Canadian tariffs “makes a lot of sense” and “may come to that at some point, but the public isn’t there right now.”
“From a point of view of the emotional wounds of Canadians created by Trump and his annexation talk and tariffs, I’m not sure that a political voice would survive if it went down that public-policy route,” said Clement, a former Canadian industry minister in the Harper government.
“The mood of the people is outrage. I’ve never seen people in Canada this incandescently mad at the United States,” he said, who is campaigning in the Toronto area for Poilievre’s Conservative Party ahead of the April 28 general election. “There is complete distrust of whatever Trump says because it can change within 24 hours.”
Eliminating Canadian tariffs, without a quid pro quo from Trump, could “show weakness to a bully,” added Clement, who, prior to entering federal politics in 2006, served as a Cabinet minister in former Ontario Premier Mike Harris’ Progressive Conservative government.
In the statement released following his recent conversation with Trump, Carney said that both leaders “agreed to begin comprehensive negotiations about a new economic and security relationship immediately following the election.”
Conservative strategist Yaroslav Baran, who served as communications chief for Harper’s successful Conservative 2004 leadership campaign, and director of war room communications for the Harper-led Tories during the 2004, 2006 and 2008 federal election campaigns, told Fox News Digital that under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), “trade in goods and services ought to be tariff-free” between Canada and the U.S., excluding carveouts on the Canadian side for dairy, eggs, poultry and softwood lumber.
However, Baran added that he “can’t semer Ontario Premier Mike Harris’ Progressive Conservative government.
In the statement released following his recent conversation with Trump, Carney said that both leaders “agreed to begin comprehensive negotiations about a new economic and security relationship immediately following the election.”
Conservative strategist Yaroslav Baran, who served as communications chief for Harper’s successful Conservative 2004 leadership campaign, and director of war room communications for the Harper-led Tories during the 2004, 2006 and 2008 federal election campaigns, told Fox News Digital that under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), “trade in goods and services ought to be tariff-free” between Canada and the U.S., excluding carveouts on the Canadian side for dairy, eggs, poultry and softwood lumber.
However, Baran added that he “can’t see the removal of all Canadian tariffs on U.S. products as long as the U.S. has tariffs on Canadian products.”
Ford is a fool.
President Trump has already offered zero for zero. But it seems the Canadians want their gravy train to continue while the US gets left in the lurch.