The President of the United States threatened this Wednesday to impose “high tariffs” on Europe if the EU’s project to strengthen ties with Canada materializes. Donald Trump also does not rule out going as far as, he said, “cutting trade” with the traditional ally.
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Trump made these statements in response to journalists’ questions after landing en route to a rally in North Carolina. It was one of his classic potentially serious threats dropped casually: he gave no further details on how he plans to carry it out, nor where he will draw the line that both allies must cross to lead him to intensify an already open trade war against them.
Trump’s statements come hours after the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, announced this Wednesday her intention to “open the door to Canada” to become the first “associated member of the European Union.”
This transatlantic proposal, also still undefined, responds to the desire of the North American country, whose Prime Minister, Mark Carney, has stated that he seeks a “unique relationship” with the community club amid renewed tariff and existential attacks from Trump, who has fantasized about turning the northern neighbor into another state of the Union.
“Canada has been a terrible trading partner,” Trump told reporters waiting for him at Charlotte airport. “If I consider that [this EU and Canada project] is a hostile act, I will impose very severe tariffs or even cut trade with Europe in many areas. So, if they do it — if Europe takes that step with bad intentions (if the intention is good, there is no problem) — we will impose very high tariffs on Europe; it is a possibility.”
This Thursday, Carney is scheduled to give a speech to the plenary of the European Parliament in an extraordinary appearance. It will be a day after Von Der Leyen told him, during her speech on the state of the European Union in the European Parliament: “I would like to work with you to pave the way for Canada to become the first associated member of the EU.”
In February, Carney spoke at the Davos forum about a scenario of “breakdown of the world order”; the “end of a beautiful story and the beginning of a brutal reality in which geopolitics among great powers is subject to no limits.” He also argued that “other countries, particularly middle powers like Canada, are not powerless.” “They have the capacity to build a new order that embodies our values, such as respect for human rights, sustainable development, solidarity, sovereignty, and the territorial integrity of states,” Carney concluded.
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