Ella Scott
President Donald Trump has refuelled plans for the United States to ‘absorb’ Canada after claiming earlier this year he’d use ‘economic force’ to accomplish the unprecedented feat.
On Tuesday (October 7), Trump, 79, met with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, 60, in the Oval Office to hash out trade deals. The meeting follows the Republican administration's initial increase in tariffs on Canadian goods to 35 per cent, with the country retaliating with its own heavy levies on US exports.
This trade war began back in February, when Trump claimed the sweeping tariffs on Canadian goods were related to border security.
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The 47th POTUS later scaled the duties back to apply only to goods not covered by the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA).
Currently, sector-specific levies on Canadian goods are in place, including a 50 per cent tax on metals and a 25 per cent duty on automobiles.
According to Trump, there is ‘mutual love’ between the US and its North American ally despite the ongoing fiery trade negotiations.
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He claimed ‘people of Canada will love us again’ once details of the trade deal between the two countries are publicly aired.
“I think they’re going to be very happy,” he told reporters in Washington. “They talk about competitiveness; he’s [Carney] a very competitive person.”
As reported by BBC News, Trump acknowledged that trade talks with Canada are ‘more complicated than maybe any other agreement’ the US has broached, in part because of the two countries' competition for the same business.
“The problem is that they want a car company, and I want a car company," he said. "They want steel, and we want steel... in other countries, they're very far away and there's no problem.”
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He also suggested that the CUSMA trade agreement could potentially be renegotiated.
Ahead of the 2.5-hour meeting, Carney called his peer a ‘transformative president’ before listing off some of his achievements accomplished during his second term in office.
According to BNN Bloomberg, it was at this point that Trump referenced the possibility of Canada becoming America’s 51st state again.
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“And the merger of Canada and the United States,” he appeared to joke.
Trump’s latest comment about Canada being absorbed by the US comes months after he first threatened to use ‘economic force’ to accomplish the annexation, as per CBC.
During a press conference in January, Trump was asked if he was 'considering military force to annex and acquire Canada' after refusing to do the same to the Panama Canal and Greenland.
He then replied: "No. Economic force."
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In another conference in Palm Beach, he mused that the merging of the two countries would 'really be something', adding: "You get rid of the artificially drawn line and you take a look at what that looks like and it would also be much better national security. Don't forget: We basically protect Canada.”
In response, former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said at the time there wasn’t a ‘snowball's chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States’.
"Workers and communities in both our countries benefit from being each other's biggest trading and security partner,” he added via X (formerly known as Twitter).
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Trump later acknowledged he had ‘no right’ to absorb the country into his own, as per the outlet.
Both the polarizing politician and Trudeau’s successor remained tight-lipped on any tangible outcomes where the Tuesday tariff meeting was concerned.
The latter hinted, however, that the conversation was ‘successful,’ ‘positive,’ and ‘effective.’ It is currently unknown whether trade negotiations have been concluded or when details will be made public.