Don’t look now, but as most Canadian leaders are lockstep behind a strategy to counter possible American tariffs, here comes Canada’s female Donald Trump with different ideas.
And if Liberal Party members choose her to become prime minister on March 9, Ruby Dhalla says while she won’t negotiate when it comes to illegal immigrants, she is ready to talk with Trump with an eye to making a deal instead — as her opponents have vowed to do — of pursuing punitive counter tariffs.
Her out-of-the-box ideas sound more like they’re coming from the 47th president than someone running for the Liberal leadership in Canada.
It’s refreshing and needed at this critical time.
“Tariffs are coming,” Dhalla, a former Liberal MP, said Tuesday on X. “Trump understands power and how to make a deal. Just look at Colombia. Trump is a businessman. I’m a businesswoman. We need someone who has run a successful business and knows how to negotiate a good deal for Canadians and our country.”
With Trump threatening to impose a 25% tariff on Canadian goods on Saturday, Dhalla says she wants to take a different approach than what her fellow leadership hopefuls are offering.
Her plan to sit down with Trump comes on the heels of Dhalla’s earlier tough stance on unlawful migrants who come to Canada without proper status. As the daughter of legal immigrants, who came to Canada from India, Dhalla has no patience for those who enter illegally.
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And, as a candidate for the Liberal leadership and the job of prime minister, she has drawn a harsh line in the sand.
“As prime minister, I will deport illegal immigrants and clamp down on human traffickers,” she said in a social media posting. “That’s my promise to you.”
You don’t hear anything as hardcore from front-runners Mark Carney or Chrystia Freeland.
“I want people to know their borders are safe and secure, and they will continue to be, come what may in the world,” Freeland told the CBC following Trump’s November election victory and after her departure from Trudeau’s cabinet in mid-December.
Also, in November, Mark Carney on immigration said: “I think what happened in the last few years is we didn’t live up to our values on immigration. We had much higher levels of foreign workers, students and new Canadians coming in than we could absorb, that we have housing for, that we have health care for, that we have social services for, that we have opportunities for. And so we’re letting down the people that we let in, quite frankly.”
Dhalla, a two-term MP during the Chretien years, has separated herself from the rest of the Liberal pack in saying that she would deport 500,000 illegals – much like Trump is currently doing in the United States.
These moves by the 50-year-old chiropractor and businesswoman, says political commentator Marc Patrone on Sauga 960, positions her as the outlier in the Liberal race.
Dhalla agrees.
“I am the outsider candidate,” said Dhalla on her X account. “I do not have the establishment backing me. If you are endorsed by 16 members of Trudeau’s cabinet, you are not an outsider but an insider. It’s Trudeau 2.0.”
Her approach is closer to that of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, and will ensure a good debate between the candidates.
Freeland has gone to social media to say, “Donald Trump is using uncertainty to unsettle Canadians. We must do the same,” and “U.S. exporters need to worry whether their businesses will be the ones we hit.”
Her platform also called for Canada to “publish a detailed, dollar for dollar relation list,” convene a “summit with Mexico, Denmark, Panama and the European Union,” direct “all federal government agencies to stop purchasing any goods from American companies, ban American firms, including America-based branches of international firms from all government projects,” and “defend Canada’s cultural sector and artists from Donald Trump’s billionaire buddies.”
If her pledges lead to no more American sports teams competing in Canada, tech billionaires not permitted to operate their social media platforms, streaming services, or film their television shows or movies here, it will be a very different Canada.
“Trump will not listen to Trudeau’s team or anyone from the old establishment,” said Dhalla on X. “We need change. Real change.”
Dhalla said she has a different game plan.