Canada should stop playing defence on Trump’s tariff threat, minister says

By Kelly Geraldine Malone
The Canadian Press in BNN Bloomberg
January 22, 2025
Category: Business & Politics
Region: Canada, United States

Francois-Philippe Champagne

Canadian officials are adopting a different tone after President Donald Trump ordered a study of the United States’ trade relationship with Canada, pushing the threat of devastating tariffs down the road — temporarily. “We need to move from a defensive position to offensive in the sense that we have a lot of good things to put on the table,” Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne said. Trump signed the America First Trade Policy Monday evening, providing Ottawa with some insights into his tariff agenda. The memorandum orders multiple federal agencies to study trade policies and trade deficits. It directs the secretary of commerce and the secretary of homeland security to assess migration and fentanyl flows from Canada, Mexico and China and recommend “appropriate trade and national security measures to resolve that emergency. It also signalled the U.S. trade representative to start consultations around the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement and “make recommendations regarding the United States’ participation in the agreement.”

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