It seems many politicians, and most of Canada’s hapless journalists, didn’t get the message from Donald Trump. He doesn’t want a fight on tariffs, he wants a solution on the border, and he’s threatening us with tariffs if we don’t offer one.
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Acknowledging that basic reality isn’t bending the knee to Trump, it’s acknowledging reality.
“As everyone is aware, thousands of people are pouring through Mexico and Canada, bringing crime and drugs at levels never seen before,” the president-elect posted.
“On Jan. 20, as one of my many first Executive Orders, I will sign all necessary documents to charge Mexico and Canada a 25% tariff on all products coming into the United States, and its ridiculous open borders.”
Trump went on to say that the tariffs would stay in place until issues with illegal drugs and illegal migrants crossing the border were dealt with.
The reaction of too many, from NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh to the majority of journalists asking questions of politicians and who don’t understand what is going on, was to demand retaliation. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused Singh of panicking and said he was engaging in constructive ways to protect Canadian jobs.
I wish I had more faith in Trudeau’s words.
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He’s right that Singh was panicking, but I didn’t hear anything in his words on Tuesday that made me think he understood what was happening. Not even in Trudeau’s description of his call with Donald Trump that took place sometime after 8 p.m. Monday night.
“We obviously talked about laying out the facts, talking about how the intense and effective connections between our two countries flow back and forth,” Trudeau said to reporters as he headed into a cabinet meeting on Parliament Hill.
While he described it as a “good call” and said they talked about challenges, Trudeau didn’t mention anything about the need to deal with the border or our dysfunctional immigration system that is now causing us problems with the Americans. Neither did he discuss border concerns when they were raised by Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who noted that Trudeau’s reckless policies have put us in this position.
In the last fiscal year, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Service reported that 199,000 people crossed into the United States, most seeking Title 8 asylum status. This is an 82% increase from 2022 when the number was 109,500. Just a few years ago, the northern border, as the Americans call the Canada-U.S. border, was responsible for about 1% of illegals, and now we are at close to 10%.
We have tens of thousands of people who come to Canada on visitor, student or temporary foreign work visas who are now heading across the American border to claim asylum in the U.S. This basic fact, this problem within our failing immigration system, is putting the rest of the Canadian economy at risk.
Do we want to risk the jobs of oil workers in Alberta, auto workers in Ontario, forestry workers in British Columbia or New Brunswick because of the number of temporary foreign workers or international students abusing the system and claiming asylum in the United States.
“Where is the plan?’ Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre asked.
He pointed to problems with the border on immigration, the Trudeau government’s drug liberalization policies, our lack of defence spending and more that have irritated the incoming Trump administration. These are all problems that we should be dealing with for our own needs, rather than at the request of the incoming Trump administration in the United States.
Canada can avoid the Trump tariffs if we are smart and act in ways that are also in our best interests.
At this point, I see no evidence that the Trudeau government is willing or able to do the work to avoid Canadian workers being hurt badly by these threatened tariffs.