{"id":587513,"date":"2026-09-02T02:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T02:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/587513\/"},"modified":"2026-09-02T02:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T02:56:11","slug":"stop-trying-to-be-tough-carney-fires-back-at-trump-as-trade-fight-escalates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/587513\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Stop trying to be tough’: Carney fires back at Trump as trade fight escalates"},"content":{"rendered":"

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told the Trump administration to \u201cstop doing memes, stop throwing shade and stop trying to be tough,\u201d as he pushed back against a fresh wave of attacks from Washington.<\/p>\n

Carney said US-Canada trade talks could resume if Washington became serious about negotiations, but he also accused the United States of pursuing terms that he said could leave Canadian industries \u201cgradually wound down in Canada and wiped out”.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the Americans stop doing memes, stop throwing shade<\/a> and stop trying to be tough, and start being serious about having those discussions, we can have those discussions,\u201d Carney said. \u201cIt\u2019s not constructive, but that\u2019s their democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

His comments came during a fresh barrage from Washington since trade talks collapsed Aug. 21. Trump has moved to rename<\/a> Lake Ontario \u201cLake America\u201d and taunted Canada on social media, while US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Canada could not go \u201ctit for tat\u201d with an economy 13 times larger.<\/p>\n

US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth also mocked the Canadian military online, posting an image of two female cadets at a British Columbia training center with the words \u201cthis is real\u201d and a Canadian flag. Carney called the post \u201cbeneath their office”. The Pentagon stood by it, saying, \u201cThe X post speaks for itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Carney said the US approach in the talks would have left Canadian industries effectively as subsidiaries of American companies or imposed terms under which they would be \u201cgradually wound down in Canada and wiped out”.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not going to \u2014 of course, we\u2019re not going to accept those terms,\u201d Carney said.<\/p>\n

\"Ontario<\/p>\n

Ontario Premier Doug Ford and Niagara West Member of Provincial Parliament Sam Oosterhoff unveil a sign for Lake Ontario at the Fifty Point Conservation Area in Grimsby, Ontario. (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n

The prime minister said Washington sought an \u201cuncompetitive\u201d deal for key industries, including autos, while pushing changes affecting French-language and cultural protections. He said any of those issues was enough to block an agreement.<\/p>\n

Carney said Washington also sought limits on Canada\u2019s future trade deals. \u201cCanada is a sovereign state. We will strike free trade deals with the countries we wish to strike free trade deals,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He said there had been \u201cmutually beneficial\u201d elements of a deal before the talks broke down.<\/p>\n

Carney was also buoyed by yesterday’s Liberal sweep of three special elections, including a decisive win in Chicoutimi-Le Fjord, Quebec, where the Conservatives fell to third place.<\/p>\n

The victories brought the Liberals to 173 seats in the 343-seat House of Commons and reinforced Carney\u2019s position as he confronts Trump over trade and Canadian sovereignty.<\/p>\n

Nelson Wiseman, a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Toronto, said Trump\u2019s annexation threats carry particular weight in Quebec. \u201cQuebecers have the most to lose in an apocalyptic scenario where the US absorbs Canada, and the status of the French language disappears,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

US-Canada trade talks collapsed after the two sides failed to reach a deal, and Trump imposed 50% tariffs<\/a> on roughly $20 billion in Canadian goods. Canada\u2019s retaliatory tariffs on nearly $20 billion in US goods are scheduled to take effect Sept. 8, with duties ranging from 15% to 50%.<\/p>\n

Trump has repeatedly talked about making Canada the 51st US state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told the Trump administration to \u201cstop doing memes, stop throwing shade and stop…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":587514,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[219,42,43,64,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-587513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-economy","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-north-america","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=587513"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587513\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/587514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}