{"id":809554,"date":"2026-07-18T06:51:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T06:51:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/809554\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T06:51:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T06:51:14","slug":"side-deal-to-share-gordie-howe-toll-profits-with-u-s-doesnt-include-provision-for-debt-repayment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/809554\/","title":{"rendered":"Side deal to share Gordie Howe toll profits with U.S. doesn\u2019t include provision for debt repayment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Canada solely financed the $6.4-billion Gordie Howe International Bridge, which connects Windsor and Detroit.Paul Sancya\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

A 15-year side deal struck by Canada and the United States on the new Gordie Howe International Bridge will see Ottawa cut Washington cheques that amount to half the toll revenues minus operating costs for the span connecting Windsor and Detroit.<\/p>\n

But Canada, which solely financed the $6.4-billion bridge, will not be subtracting any provision to repay debt from the annual payments to the United States, sources say.<\/p>\n

That contradicts what Prime Minister Mark Carney said Sunday about debt when he played down the amount of money that would be sent to the U.S. for 15 years under this side agreement. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe get the revenues. Then the servicing of the costs of the bridge and paying the debt of the bridge, and then what\u2019s left over, there\u2019s a split of that for 15 years,\u201d Mr. Carney told CTV last Sunday, adding later: \u201cThere\u2019s not going to be a lot of net to split.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gordie Howe bridge to open July 27 after Canada, U.S. reach deal<\/a><\/p>\n

A senior Canadian government official, speaking on background, said the 2012 deal between Canada and Michigan, where all tolls collected go to Ottawa until the costs of the bridge are recouped, remains unchanged. The Globe and Mail is not identifying the source because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.<\/p>\n

The official said net revenues are all revenues collected with respect to the bridge minus all incurred operating costs of the bridge. There is no subtraction for debt servicing, they acknowledged when asked.<\/p>\n

The official called the new side deal with the U.S. a parallel agreement to the 2012 Canada-Michigan agreement and said it stipulates that an amount equal to half the net revenues from the bridge will be paid into a U.S.-run economic development fund. <\/p>\n

The mandate of the fund would be to increase economic development and trade between Canada and the U.S., but it will be up to the U.S. how the money is spent, the official said.<\/p>\n

The official emphasized that the money paid to the United States would not come directly from the toll revenues but would come from Canadian government coffers in an amount equal to half the net revenues from tolls. <\/p>\n

The Canadian official said this agreement is structured in such a way that it should provide incentives to the United States to want to increase traffic on the Gordie Howe bridge, because expanding toll revenue will mean bigger payouts to the U.S. fund.<\/p>\n

Splitting Gordie Howe bridge profits with U.S. \u2018good deal\u2019 for both countries, minister says<\/a><\/p>\n

The 2012 agreement between Canada and Michigan suggested that it could take Ottawa 50 years to recoup the money it had spent on the Gordie Howe bridge. That was before the new profit-sharing deal with the United States announced July 10 \u2013 one Mr. Trump called a \u201cMUCH BETTER DEAL for America\u201d on social media.<\/p>\n

A second government official, speaking on background, acknowledged that this side deal could result in Canada taking longer to recoup all the costs of the bridge, but they declined to say how much longer this might take. This will depend on a number of factors including bridge traffic levels. The Globe is not identifying the official because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.<\/p>\n

Bloomberg News was the first to report Friday, citing a copy of the agreement, that the side deal splits profit from the bridge with no provision to cover Canada\u2019s debt-service costs on the project.<\/p>\n

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, in an open letter to Mr. Carney made public Friday, urged the Prime Minister to release the text of this side agreement.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s time for you to release the deal so Canadians can see for themselves what you negotiated away to the Americans,\u201d Mr. Poilievre wrote in the July 17 letter.<\/p>\n

The timing of the Gordie Howe bridge\u2019s debut was thrown into doubt in February, when Mr. Trump threatened in a social-media post to prevent it from opening and said Canada should give the U.S. government \u201cat least one half\u201d of the asset.<\/p>\n

Mr. Trump\u2019s threat came shortly after Matthew Moroun, chairman of the company that owns the rival Ambassador Bridge, donated US$1-million to a pro-Trump campaign group and reportedly met with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.<\/p>\n

A later planned opening in June was again delayed by the White House. As The Globe reported at the time, citing a U.S. industry source, the American government slammed the brakes on the opening because Mr. Lutnick and Pete Hoekstra, Washington\u2019s ambassador to Canada, wanted to first negotiate a deal to help Michigan\u2019s Moroun family mitigate their losses from competition by the new, publicly owned bridge.<\/p>\n

The bridge is named after Canadian hockey legend Gordie Howe, who played for the Detroit Red Wings for 25 seasons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Canada solely financed the $6.4-billion Gordie Howe International Bridge, which connects Windsor and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":809555,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[49,48,44,714],"class_list":["post-809554","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-news","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809554","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=809554"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809554\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/809555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=809554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=809554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=809554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}