Summary

In a virtual speech at the World Economic Forum, Trump suggested Canada could become a U.S. state to avoid his proposed tariffs on imports.

The remark elicited gasps from the audience.

Trump claimed the U.S. does not need Canadian lumber, energy, or vehicles, vastly overstating the trade deficit between the two nations.

He reiterated his intention to impose tariffs, potentially as high as 25%, on imports from Canada and Mexico starting February 1.

Economists warn such tariffs would raise prices for U.S. consumers.

  • skozzii@lemmy.ca
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    8 hours ago

    I still don’t think he realizes the tariffs he keeps threatening us with hurt his people way more…

    • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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      8 hours ago

      By “his people,” you mean most voters, yeah.

      But for high millionaires/billionaires, this is effectively a regressive tax that will benefit them.

  • Gammelfisch@lemmy.world
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    16 hours ago

    Putin’s Sock Puppet taking orders from Moscow to divide the NATO members. For starters, the Canadians should stop buying US made weapons, because the current US leadership is unhinged and unreliable. If anything, the Blue States should become Canadian Provinces.

    • ubergeek@lemmy.today
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      16 hours ago

      They don’t want us. As soon as NYS joins, NYC would dominate the votes, due to wild population differences.

      • HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works
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        3 hours ago

        Why wouldn’t Canada want any state to join our Confederation?

        Guaranteed if that were to happen we would be switching to a proportional representation federal vote to fix large population differences.

  • studentofarkad@lemm.ee
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    16 hours ago

    Did someone brainwash this dude to annex other countries or something? Its like he wants to leave a legacy behind of being the first president in the modern age to expand America.

  • x00z@lemmy.world
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    16 hours ago

    “Surrender to my imperialism or I’m going to ruin your economy”

  • Obinice@lemmy.world
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    16 hours ago

    We must strengthen NATO’s defences against the aggressive USA and significantly improve border defences, lest they catch us with our pants down when the time comes.

  • Queen HawlSera@lemm.ee
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    1 day ago

    How does this lower the price of my god damn eggs?

    Also he does know that Canada would be yet another blue state right?

    • Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca
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      1 day ago

      Each province/territory would insist on being its own state so Canada would at least probably become 10 blue states and 3 red states if not 11/2. Not sure how Manitoba would swing.

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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        16 hours ago

        Not sure how Manitoba would swing.

        Given that our current government is NDP after a disastrous period of the previous conservative government, I would expect Manitoba would generally vote to the left of most states.

  • HighFructoseLowStand@lemm.ee
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    1 day ago

    I would welcome fifty new Congressional districts, the overwhelming majority of which would vote Blue within an American political framework.

    • Jamablaya@lemmy.world
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      21 hours ago

      Yeah you don’t know much about Canada, I guess. roughly half would vote democrat, roughly half republican, varying by 5, 10 percent up and down each individual election same as you see every election down south. The Conservatives form government for 8-10 years every 8-10 years federally.

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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        16 hours ago

        Your guess is incorrect. The Overton window in Canada is quite a bit to the left of where it is in the US.

        Bernie would be considered a centrist in Canada.

        • Jamablaya@lemmy.world
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          5 hours ago

          It’s not a guess, you’re functioning on strereotypes. Joe Biden is roughly a centrist if he was in Canadian politics.

        • SpeakinTelnet@programming.dev
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          7 hours ago

          I wouldn’t call Bernie a “canadian centrist” since he aligns with what the NPD want to be, social democrats (left). Otherwise yeah, the american democrats pretty much aligns with Canadian conservatives.

    • vortic@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      You know, I’d never thought of it this way. If Canadians were willing, I’d whole heartedly welcome them!

  • HappySkullsplitter@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    So much political theater and me without my opera glasses

    Cutting off trade with Canada would devastate the US economy overnight

  • acargitz@lemmy.ca
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    1 day ago

    Why isn’t Canada summoning the US ambassador to demand official explanations?

    • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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      16 hours ago

      The Canadian prime Minister went and spoke directly to Trump.

      And Trump laughed him off.

      And how do you know the ambassador hasn’t already had those meetings?

      Canadian officials have been in communication with American governers, senators, congressmen and even mayors to discuss the situation and what sort of response they might expect.

      A big part of the problem is that Trump doesn’t listen to the advice of anyone once he gets some stupid idea stuck in his head.

      • acargitz@lemmy.ca
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        16 hours ago

        But it’s all shit talking and “jokes”. Summoning the ambassador, the Canadian government as an institution can officially demand an official response from the US government as an institution. Sovereign state to sovereign state. This is serious business not a social media exchange.

        It would basically demand the US government to produce its formal demands of Canada. Anything else should be ignored as farts and white noise.

    • cley_faye@lemmy.world
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      18 hours ago

      The situation is embarrassing enough. No need to bring shame to the ambassador that most likely heard about it from some news outlet too.

    • Madison420@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      They don’t need explanation or translation for “he dumb and doesn’t understand money outside of wanting more”.

  • r0ertel@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    I’m going to keep posting this every time I see a reference to US tariffs against Canada.

    https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/15/beauty-eh/

    The TL;DR is that tariffs would violate the NAFTA / USMCA treaty in which Canada agreed to respect US copyright law in exchange for free trade. No free trade? Canada doesn’t need to respect US copyright any longer and can become a flourishing economy of products to compete with US products that are massively overpriced. Think printer ink and other stuff.

    • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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      16 hours ago

      The TL;DR is that tariffs would violate the NAFTA / USMCA treat

      The treaty that Trump himself negotiated and agreed to.

      That’s the treaty he is calling a “bad deal” and threatening to violate.

    • dan1101@lemm.ee
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      18 hours ago

      Yeah anyone mad at the US government right now should to take it out on the US corporations, not the citizens. Citizens can’t do much about this shitty administration until the next election but the corporations will have their feelings massively hurt every quarter if they don’t meet their profit expectations.

      trump will listen to corporations far more than citizens.

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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        16 hours ago

        Citizens could have done something about it in November. And almost half of them chose to sit on their hands.

        Of the ones who actually voted, half of those actively voted for this shitshow.

        Sorry to the few who tried to stop it, but the idiots that surround you have brought this on you.

        We will try to aim most of our retaliation at the Redhatter morons, but some of you will likely get caught in the crossfire.

        Please do whatever you can to fix your country’s shit, so we can get back to being friendly neighbours.

        .

        Also, please try not to break any more of the firefighting equipment we loaned you (and sent even after agent orange started threatening us).

    • runeko@programming.dev
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      1 day ago

      Yes, please, Canadian produced pharmaceuticals + 15% tariff = an order of magnitude cheaper than what we can buy in the States.

      • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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        17 hours ago

        That’s why buying drugs across the border is specifically illegal. Can’t have us buying our medicine at a fair value.

      • NotSteve_@lemmy.ca
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        2 days ago

        Idk if it’s just for individuals, but our ISPs generally don’t care about pirating already. I use a VPN to pirate here but just set to another city in Canada. I only even do that because I run jellyfin and have terabytes of downloads a month.

        Worst case scenario is the ISP sends you a notice that the media companies are mad, but that’s the end of it. They won’t pursue anything further because they don’t care

        • ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
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          2 days ago

          It’s not illegal to download something, it’s illegal to host something (seeding)

          ISPs are compelled to notify you of copyright notices but they can’t hand your information over so you can only get caught if you respond

          • lazylion_ca@lemmy.ca
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            1 day ago

            And even if you are dumb enough to respond to one of those emails, the liability is limited to something $50 per title. So it’s not worth the money to pay a lawyer to go after anyone. They will however try to trick you into a private settlement.

            • Doomsider@lemmy.world
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              1 day ago

              No no no, you must charge every user with willful commercial infringement and penalize them $250,000 per violation. It is the American way!

      • r0ertel@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        I was thinking to host pirate sites of US movies, software, etc. Get the US companies to tell the orange buffoon to behave or better yet, move the companies to Canada.

        I really like the article’s reference to manufacturing US DMCA-breaking technologies and forcing devices to host app stores in Canada where the government can declare the 30% Apple tax illegal.

  • Someone@lemmy.ca
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    1 day ago

    I bet he’ll end up sprinkling in a handful of very specific exemptions. These are what we need to slap export taxes on. Doesn’t need to be much, but match his 25%. At best it’ll hammer them where they need it, at worst it’ll keep things fair for all our exporters.