Following a tense G7 leaders meeting held in Quebec over the weekend, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland said that Canada plans to retaliate against U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum beginning on July 1.
“The Government of Canada is absolutely committed to standing strong to defending our workers and our industry and our retaliatory tariffs will come into effect – perfectly reciprocal, perfectly measured, a dollar for dollar response on July 1, which is Canada Day, perhaps not inappropriately,” said Minister Freeland.
Which U.S. goods Canada plans to target with retaliatory tariffs is not yet known. But the renewed focus on slapping new duties on U.S. imports comes after a difficult meeting between Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and U.S. President Donald Trump. On Saturday, following a bilateral meeting between the two leaders, President Trump tweeted that Prime Minister Trudeau is “very dishonest and weak.”
Minister Freeland responded to the U.S. President’s Tweet in a series of interviews on Sunday, saying: “In terms of the approach that governments choose to take, Canada does not believe that ad hominem attacks are a particularly appropriate or useful way to conduct our relations with other countries.”
The current trade spat between Canada and the U.S. comes as the two countries, along with Mexico, work to revise the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which President Trump has repeatedly threatened to tear up if a new deal on the decades old trade pact cannot be reached.
