Juno News - Ford takes BIG SWING at U.S. amid trade dispute

00:00:00.000 well Prime Minister Carney ducked questions from reporters today asking whether he misled

00:00:10.440 Canadians on the Gordie Howe bridge revenue sharing deal did you mislead Canadians sir

00:00:19.680 well the agreement reads as follows economic participation Canada will provide annual

00:00:26.280 economic participation payments outside the 2012 Canada-Michigan crossing agreement equal to 50%

00:00:33.900 of net bridge and crossing related revenues for the first 15 fiscal years of bridge operations.

00:00:41.640 There's no reference to debt repayment. Earlier this month, Carney said the revenues would only

00:00:49.180 be shared after the debt is paid. It's not splitting the tolls of the bridge. It is an

00:00:56.140 agreement for 15 years to split net revenues. Splitting of tolls, any sharing of the toll

00:01:03.800 revenue won't happen until all of the debt, all of the debt is repaid. We will split net revenues

00:01:11.820 over the course of the first 15 years. Well, Canadian taxpayers paid the entire $6.4 billion

00:01:18.360 cost of construction of a bridge. Conservative leader Pierre Paglia posted this.

00:01:24.120 Last night, we learned that you, Prime Minister, signed an agreement granting the United States 50% of the net revenues derived from the bridge and cross-border activities during the first 15 years of the bridge's operation, even before the debt is repaid.

00:01:43.920 This is a straightforward sharing of profits on a bridge that was built 100% with our tax dollars.

00:01:51.600 Well, Premier Daniel Smith of Alberta has rejected calls to weaponize Canadian energy in retaliation against U.S. tariffs.

00:01:59.640 This in response to Premier Doug Ford, who said Canada could use its energy to inflict economic pain on the Americans.

00:02:08.000 We have to hit back. We have to, rather than be on our back heel, as I said, we have to go forward, take the offense.

00:02:16.100 We are an energy powerhouse, and we could dismantle the U.S. if we wanted to, if we all work together.

00:02:23.900 No matter if it's the electricity, and I'm not speaking for the other provinces, I'm going to be very clear.

00:02:29.480 The potash, the oil, we're their number one customer in the world.

00:02:34.520 They need to feel the pain rather than us constantly feeling the pain.

00:02:38.460 In response, Premier Smith, whose province leads the country in oil production, told Juneau News, it's a hard no.

00:02:47.960 Our guest today is Catherine Swift, president of the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada.

00:02:53.440 Welcome, Catherine.

00:02:55.040 Hi, Mark. Nice to be here.

00:02:57.360 Well, we've got a certain contradiction here between what Doug Ford is saying, which is we could destroy the United States.

00:03:05.940 we can dismantle the United States if we use our energy and if we all get together and have a

00:03:12.340 united front against the USA. And Premier Smith, whose province, of course, leads all provinces in

00:03:20.500 terms of oil production, says, not so fast. I don't think we're going to go there. It's a hard

00:03:26.540 no. What do you make of this? Well, there's so many contradictions these days in our country

00:03:32.520 that it's kind of hard to keep track. But I don't really understand where Ford's coming from. First

00:03:38.480 of all, the notion that we're going to dismantle the U.S., good grief. How ridiculous is that? 0.88

00:03:44.840 And why do both Ford and Carney in particular, there's other premiers that do it too. Eby does 0.79

00:03:49.960 it too out in B.C. But why do they insist on continuing to poke the U.S. administration?

00:03:55.900 It's like the 98-pound weakling on the beach, you know, kicking sand in the face of the big

00:04:00.240 muscle man and expecting not to have any impact from it. It's utterly ridiculous. It's hurting 0.99

00:04:05.220 Canada. Sure is hurting businesses, I'll tell you. Our business members, our manufacturers,

00:04:10.260 and in other sectors as well, are just at their wit's end. They've endured this now for a year,

00:04:17.120 this uncertainty, tariffs, not knowing what's going to happen tomorrow. We've got a federal

00:04:21.820 government that clearly is refusing to negotiate. They haven't negotiated in any meaningful way at

00:04:26.580 all. And they tried to pretend they were for a while because we speak to Canadians in the embassy

00:04:31.940 and in the US embassy and everything, but they're not. They're clearly not. And I think it's finally

00:04:36.260 coming out quite blatantly that they're not making an attempt to do that. And there's all kinds of

00:04:41.120 theories as to why that's happening. But Ford, I mean, good on Danielle, because why would he speak

00:04:47.420 on behalf of the so-called energy superpower, which is clearly Alberta? What nerve he's got

00:04:54.220 to do this. He seems to be fashioning himself as Captain Canada, and yet he doesn't have the right

00:04:59.800 or the ability, frankly, to do that effectively. So I don't know where he's coming from. It's not

00:05:05.980 like he's got an election now for about three years. So I mean, maybe if there was an upcoming

00:05:11.160 election, he'd want to look like the tough guy, but that's not even the case. So I'm not really

00:05:16.540 sure of his motivations, but what I can definitely tell you, it's not helping Ontario and it's not

00:05:21.820 helping Canada. I mean, at one point he did threaten to cut off energy, electricity, of course,

00:05:28.140 because he export electricity power to New York, New York States, Minnesota, as well as Michigan.

00:05:35.460 And he was threatening to cut them off. And then after Trump threatened huge tariffs on top of

00:05:43.160 what he was already doing, he backed off. So that was a retreat on his part. But unfortunately,

00:05:48.620 we're seeing him basically use a strategy that has failed, really, for a year and a half now.

00:05:56.420 He hasn't changed. It's basically bash, bash, bash. He may take a little time off, but at the

00:06:02.620 end of the day, then he'll get back on Fox or CNN and take shots at Trump. And now he's back

00:06:10.400 to calling him names. I mean, none of this has worked. It's all been an abject failure in terms

00:06:16.320 of strategy, but I don't think he knows any other way to do this. You know, in his mind, you know,

00:06:21.720 we can inflict damage on the United States if we do this and if we do that. And his other complaint

00:06:27.980 is with his partners in Canada, really, with fellow premiers and so forth, who don't seem to

00:06:36.000 be as eager as him, even from the feds. He seems to be at odds with Carney, who at one point said,

00:06:40.960 well, we'll see at the end of 29 days if, you know, Trump makes good on these threats around

00:06:47.840 these latest tariffs, whether or not we'll respond in kind. But I don't think there's much of an

00:06:51.680 appetite on his part to retaliate because of the fact that it hasn't worked. So Ford kind of stands

00:06:58.280 alone here. And, you know, they're aware of it south of the border. They could see what he is

00:07:04.400 saying. They've heard what he's saying. I don't know if they take him very seriously, but it can't

00:07:08.940 be hurting our can't be helping our position in terms of negotiating with the americans at a time

00:07:13.880 when we need we need a deal yeah we need a deal desperately our business members keep telling us

00:07:18.760 that we're losing jobs and businesses whether they're just going under uh whether they're

00:07:23.440 moving to the u.s which as we know quite a few are or are contemplating it according to that kpmg 0.99

00:07:28.400 study that came out just a couple of weeks ago uh and that whole electricity threat was so stupid 0.99

00:07:34.360 it would hurt Ontario at least as much, if not more, than the U.S. states. Because the reason 0.98

00:07:41.600 that with our stupid cockamamie electricity system in Ontario, which, mind you, the Liberal 0.99

00:07:47.440 government screwed up royally with their green policies and made us pay much more than we should 0.98

00:07:53.080 have been paying, we actually make some money on electricity that we export to the U.S. that

00:07:59.760 Otherwise, we'd be wasting. We'd be in the hole. So even threatening that was dumb. And yes, I call it the cut off our nose despite our face policy, because that's really what it is. We're hurting ourselves here. And is it just bravado? I don't know. Like I say, I don't understand it. The numbers are very clear. The facts are clear. We're getting hurt in Canada, in Ontario by our refusal to negotiate. And a lot of people are saying, well, no deal is better than a bad deal.

00:08:26.900 Well, first of all, there's no reason we should get a bad deal if we're playing our cards right.

00:08:31.940 If we are negotiating, yeah, Trump's an unpredictable, no question, a difficult cat to deal with. 0.89

00:08:38.200 However, to not be dealing with him at all as a response is just pure foolishness.

00:08:43.340 At least if you're in the game, first of all, you have better information.

00:08:47.040 And secondly, you'll be making some progress.

00:08:49.520 We are more likely to get a bad deal than the stance we're taking now.

00:08:53.460 And some Canadians actually think, no, if we don't ever get a deal, no biggie. Well, they had better give their head a shake because this deal is super important to our Canadian economy, our businesses, our jobs. And without that deal, that deal has helped Canada a great deal. It's helped the US too. So it's not like they're, you know, they're invulnerable. They're not invulnerable. But proportionately, we are way, way worse off without a deal than they are.

00:09:21.320 So we do need a deal. Of course, we need a good deal. We've had good deals in the past.

00:09:25.880 The last one, Trump negotiated, and he boasted about it himself, as I'm sure you remember.

00:09:30.280 Best deal we've seen in the history of the universe or some such extreme statement.

00:09:36.200 And it was a good deal, and it helped Canada a great deal. Our auto sector is getting hammered,

00:09:40.300 getting absolutely hammered. Ford should be paying a little bit of attention to that,

00:09:45.120 because that's largely Ontario-based. Yeah, I mean, our auto sector,

00:09:49.100 your point is going to get slaughtered if we don't get a deal because of course that deal is

00:09:54.480 the main reason why for instance toyota is in canada and other automakers they rely on that

00:10:01.580 deal if if they don't have that heavily market uh there's no reason for them to be here you know

00:10:07.020 they'll move those jobs no no no no in fact they're they're really yeah you're absolutely

00:10:12.000 right the the old auto pack that was that was negotiated back in the 60s uh and which the trade

00:10:17.660 deals have pretty much carried forward. Granted, the industry's changed, so there's been some

00:10:21.420 different players and different market sharers and all that kind of thing. But there would not

00:10:26.800 be an industry in Canada, period, if we don't have a deal with the U.S. Absolutely. And so,

00:10:34.220 you know, the question of what to do next, and it's also a real illustration of how

00:10:39.480 different, how divided Canadians are, specifically the premiers are, when you've got

00:10:46.080 forward, kind of shaking his fist, saying, you know, we all got to get together here. Can't just

00:10:50.420 be me. And then you've got premiers Mo and Danielle Smith saying, wait a minute, you know,

00:10:58.700 it's not just our economies that are, but, you know, Alberta's economy, the Western economies

00:11:03.740 that are benefiting from oil, the whole country is, as you well know, that's how we see the

00:11:07.600 groceries right now, basically, you know, is through energy sales. I mean, you cut that off.

00:11:14.000 we're screwed. We're screwing ourselves. Just like, as you mentioned with the electricity 0.99

00:11:19.000 threat, you know, you cut off electricity, that's surplus energy that we generate at a very high

00:11:25.980 cost. We were able to offset some of those costs of production of these renewables, so-called

00:11:32.560 renewables, by selling it to the United States. And they've been buying it and helping us deal

00:11:38.340 with this surplus energy that we pay exorbitant rates for in terms of production. So none of this

00:11:44.360 makes sense. If you're Mark Carney right now, you see basically Doug Ford, who sounds more and more

00:11:52.100 like a loose cannon. What do you do? That's a good question. At one point, they were kissing

00:11:59.020 cousins, as you may recall. They were very cozy. And Trump was right in Carney's camp and so on.

00:12:06.160 Now he is a loose cannon. And I would talk to him if I were Carney and say, tone it down,

00:12:13.140 it's not helping. But Carney doesn't help himself either, not just himself, us, the country. He

00:12:19.080 doesn't help the country. He's hired a very well-known democratic operative to sit in the

00:12:24.100 prime minister's office. Well, let's just poke the US administration in the eye yet again. How

00:12:30.100 do they think this is going to be helpful? There's a lot of ways to be diplomatic and

00:12:34.880 they're not pursuing any of them. Also, this whole energy superpower thing makes me crazy

00:12:38.800 because federal government and Ford also keep trumpeting how we're such an energy superpower,

00:12:45.280 but we're not because government policies are preventing it. It is not a mystery as to why

00:12:52.660 our economy is in the tank right now. We could be doing a ton better off if they would just get rid

00:12:58.620 of all the laws, regulations, red tape that is holding back not just oil and gas, that's a big

00:13:04.400 one, but also our mining. When you think, in some instances, it takes 20 years to get a mine

00:13:10.100 permitted. There was one out in BC recently that was, they thought they were all, they'd gone

00:13:15.580 through all the laborious processes and everything. And this is gold, by the way. And this is a very

00:13:20.760 valuable mine. It's also got a fair bit of copper, apparently. Anyway, some First Nations group with

00:13:28.520 about, I think it was 60 members, suddenly says they're not consulted. And so our courts, which

00:13:33.600 are another huge problem. They decide, oh, well, remember that mine that you've been dealing with

00:13:38.320 for years, all of our regulatory burdens that you're going to get going on that will bring

00:13:44.040 huge wealth to communities in BC and Canada? Oh, sorry, we got another First Nations complaint

00:13:49.820 here that we have to deal with. I mean, come on. No wonder Canada has a reputation of the country 0.86

00:13:54.680 that nothing can get done. Yeah, absolutely. And it's self-inflicted, Mark. It's self-inflicted.

00:14:00.060 it doesn't have to be this way we should be the richest country in the world our governments are 0.99

00:14:06.140 preventing that yeah instead we look like the dumbest country in the world we do we look like 0.95

00:14:10.460 that one of the things danielle said a while ago she said other countries look at us and say 0.97

00:14:13.920 are you out of your mind what you're doing and and she was right yeah other countries are looking at

00:14:19.640 us and saying you're nuts you're not taking advantage of all this god-given wealth as well as

00:14:24.460 you know our manufacturers they're solid companies and they're in dire straits right now companies

00:14:30.440 that have been around for decades too they're not just startups or whatever so bankruptcies

00:14:34.780 at record high levels you know i can cite all kinds of data at what point folks canadians don't

00:14:40.560 you see all this data and think you know gee i think we got a big problem with our government

00:14:44.920 in canada and yet we see approval ratings for carney i don't believe them because they're just 0.98

00:14:49.560 ridiculous. But at what point does reality sink into people? Absolutely. I have to ask you as

00:14:55.580 well about the Cordy Howe bridge, the negotiations, because it certainly appears that the Prime

00:15:01.740 Minister was caught in a lie. I mean, if he wasn't lying, then he didn't understand the deal,

00:15:06.500 which is almost just as bad, because now that we see the actual wording of the agreement,

00:15:11.840 there really is no reference to revenues split after canada has recouped its uh losses in terms

00:15:20.540 of construction costs and so forth he just saw it's just a split basically for the first 15 years

00:15:26.800 first for 15 years of uh operation and so now i guess uh carney doesn't seem all too eager to

00:15:36.280 answer the question what are you supposed to happen here i mean did he think that it was never

00:15:40.620 going to be released to the public? Is that why he told Canadians that, no, we're going to recoup

00:15:46.940 our losses first before we split tolls with the Americans? Well, Carney has developed quite a

00:15:56.780 reputation in a relatively short time of being a big fat liar. He has lied about so much. Yes, 0.98

00:16:02.060 he's lied about so much. When he stood up from the House of Commons and said, we have the best

00:16:05.740 affordability in a decade. I thought, God Lord, buddy, if you're going to lie, at least make it

00:16:11.060 a difficult one to prove. That one was the easiest one to prove in the world. But the bridge

00:16:16.260 situation, the original deal, there was a deal on the table. When Harper funded that bridge back in

00:16:21.980 the day, and it's been, you know, now it's built, and goodness knows it's going to be good for both

00:16:26.220 economies. We needed, you know, they had that one, the ambassador bridge was the monopoly,

00:16:31.340 And that was just ridiculous. We were being held to ransom. But having this bridge is great for both economies. And there will be competition for a change. But the original deal that was struck was that we would, initial revenues, net revenues, of course, were going to go to pay off Canada's 6.4 billion, as you mentioned, and then revenues would be split between the two countries.

00:16:54.260 and Trump and his cabal decided they wanted more out of it. They got more out of it. Another

00:17:01.480 concession Carney made with nothing in return. I mean, he was supposed to be the great negotiator.

00:17:07.140 He did that with the digital sales tax, as you may recall. The US didn't like it. It was a bad

00:17:11.980 policy anyway. It was a good thing for Canada that US opposed it. It was a dumb policy for

00:17:16.080 all kinds of reasons. But Carney backed off on that with nothing in return. This is not a way 0.98

00:17:21.320 negotiate i'm sorry you should get something back when you give up something like that same with the

00:17:26.760 bridge we got nothing and we caved so now you're right right now revenues get shared from the get

00:17:33.400 go and then i guess canada is going to well who knows our finances are in such a mess who knows

00:17:38.040 what's going to happen but i think they'll be devoting at least some of it i hope to the debt

00:17:43.320 that we owe to to the debt we incurred by building by paying all the costs of building the bridge

00:17:48.040 But Carney clearly lied about it, thought he'd get away with it because most of our media,

00:17:52.220 present company excluded, most of our media is so beholden because they're being bribed,

00:17:58.160 basically welfare. It's basically welfare on the taxpayer's dime that we never agreed to.

00:18:02.640 We never agreed to spend billions and billions to bail out media. And of course, they're super

00:18:08.340 complimentary to Carney and they lie for him. They lie for him too. I thought it was rather

00:18:12.740 interesting that it was a U.S. media outlet, Bloomberg, that got a hold of the actual

00:18:18.720 agreement and came out and called Carney a liar, effectively, because he was totally shooting the

00:18:23.960 breeze about the conditions of this agreement because he knew the truth wouldn't look good

00:18:28.400 on him, and it doesn't. Well, you make a great point about the media having egg on its face as

00:18:33.580 well. Thank you so much. I wonder when they're going to get tired, Mark. I wonder when the

00:18:37.660 legacy media in Canada or get tired of being made look like fools because they parrot Kearney's 0.98

00:18:43.520 bologna. Well, it seems like they have an endless capacity for it. Well, 30 pieces of silver, eh? 0.96

00:18:50.860 Thank you, Catherine. Great chatting with you again. Great to chat with you, Mark. Take care.

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00:20:06.240 Our guest today is Joe Varner, senior fellow at the McDonald-Laurier Institute. Welcome, Joe.

00:20:12.420 Great to be with you, Mark. Well, the hostilities have intensified in Iran now with Trump,

00:20:19.920 well, America really drawing almost everything it has at Iran, hoping for some capitulation on

00:20:26.880 that country's part. So far, they have not capitulated. They've hit back. We've had a few

00:20:32.820 more casualties from the Americans. Thousands have died in Iran. And now the Americans appear

00:20:39.540 to be turning their attention towards the Pickaxe Mountains, an area which is believed to house

00:20:46.520 nuclear technology or is that your understanding now? Yeah, so what's been reported in the past

00:20:56.280 since about 2020, the Iranians have been digging under a mountain called Pickaxe Mountain in 0.88

00:21:02.740 English. It's about two kilometers from their main nuclear enrichment facility in the Tantz. 0.91

00:21:08.400 And this mountain is about 1,600 meters high.

00:21:15.060 They have burrowed underneath it somewhere between 80 and 100 meters, about 350 feet.

00:21:23.700 And the facility is about one square mile to one and a half square miles in size.

00:21:34.440 and it's defended by fortifications and anti-aircraft guns.

00:21:39.200 And in the last few days, it's been reported that after the 12-day war in June,

00:21:45.340 the Iranians moved some of their enriched nuclear material

00:21:48.300 and some of their centrifuges underneath the mountain 0.91

00:21:52.620 in these big caverns that they dug.

00:21:55.720 Some of the critics who opposed the war

00:21:59.800 say that Trump exaggerated the threat of nuclear development in Iran. So in other words,

00:22:06.360 they're saying Iran wasn't really that close to developing nuclear weapons. They've been saying

00:22:10.160 it forever. This is just more of the same. But now the fact that they're moving this technology

00:22:19.200 to this area and this mountain suggests to me that maybe they were close and maybe that the

00:22:25.240 nuclear threat was serious that's what it tells me what about you what do you think i don't think

00:22:31.280 that there's any doubt that if iran could have a nuclear weapon they would have one as quickly as

00:22:36.840 possible and if they could use it that they would certainly use it they've been indiscriminate in

00:22:41.780 the attacks that they've carried out they floated international law for 47 years they could care

00:22:46.920 less what the international community says in terms of the iranian nuclear program i mean you

00:22:53.820 hear a lot about the 440 kilograms of enriched material at 60%. And at 90%, you basically have

00:23:03.040 a nuclear bomb grade material. It's a very, very close match. It's not a big distance to go and

00:23:09.640 enriching it to 90% when you're at 60. And the fact of the matter is that's enough for 10-11

00:23:15.380 nuclear weapons. What you don't hear a lot about is the other stockpile of enriched uranium that

00:23:22.220 the Iranians have about 5,000, uh, uh, kilograms of, uh, enriched, uh, uranium at a 5% and another

00:23:33.420 thousand at 20%. And when you get to 5% enrichment, you're 80% of the way there in, in getting to the

00:23:42.020 90% enrichment point. And I know that sounds counterintuitive, but, but that's the case.

00:23:47.560 So they have a large stockpile that, you know, no one's too sure about where it is.

00:23:53.560 We've heard stories about, you know, they had fortified and buried caves where the material was thought to be.

00:24:02.620 But they have a lot of enriched nuclear material in uranium that they could turn into bombs.

00:24:10.120 And it would be hundreds.

00:24:10.860 And the other thing that you don't hear an awful lot about is the spent fuel rods at the Bashar Nuclear Power Plant.

00:24:18.660 Those rods probably have enough material for about 2,000 kilograms of plutonium if they're machined to produce plutonium.

00:24:32.240 And, you know, given the secrecy of the Iranian nuclear program, given their lack of respect for international norms, given the steps that they've taken to protect their nuclear program, we don't know if they have an enrichment or a reprocessing facility for that plutonium.

00:24:52.200 I don't think anyone's too sure. 0.58

00:24:53.700 And no one's too sure what's underneath the pickaxe mountain, which makes it a big target.

00:24:58.800 well we do know that the americans have pounded heavily iranian positions that they've taken a

00:25:07.840 huge toll on military sites i don't know how much how many of their other infrastructure they've

00:25:15.640 destroyed like bridges and that sort of thing but what's your understanding of the state of

00:25:21.280 things in iran right now under this heavy bombardment by the americans well so far the

00:25:27.780 bombardment's mostly been down along the coast and in the western part of Iran, where they had

00:25:35.320 missile fields, and in the south where they have defenses to, or not defenses, but they have

00:25:41.160 defensive capability to close the Strait of Hormuz and shut down the Persian Gulf. So most of the

00:25:47.300 strikes have been there, and now the Americans have been widening them, and I think that it's

00:25:52.740 likely that they're going to move forward and you're going to start to see more activity in

00:25:58.140 different parts of the country. It's not to say that the country hasn't seen, you know, airstrikes

00:26:03.580 in different little locations because it has, but most of the strikes have been down in the south

00:26:08.300 and the western side of Iran. And I think that that's now about to change. You've seen, you know,

00:26:14.820 two things. You've seen President Trump announce that, you know, for every ship that's hit in the

00:26:20.260 persian gulf he's going to hit a bridge or a power plant and uh you've also seen him say that 0.99

00:26:26.560 he's going to strike pickaxe mountains soon and hard and the houthis now are threatening to cut 0.57

00:26:32.540 off i believe red sea transport for oil is that right i mean that and that's uh i think partly

00:26:39.260 what's going on with terms of oil prices right now they were going to go up anyway but i think

00:26:43.860 they're seeing an extra boost because I guess some of the alternate route for that oil might

00:26:52.720 be cut off. Is that right? That's right. So in terms of the Persian Gulf, you see 20% of the

00:27:00.060 world's oil and natural liquefied natural gas comes out of the Persian Gulf. In terms of the

00:27:07.580 Red Sea, it's the transit point for about 15% of oil, and it's the transit point for about 30%

00:27:17.660 of cargo back and forth to Europe. So by shutting off the Red Sea, the Houthis have threatened to 0.71

00:27:24.920 do, and they've done in the past, they force ships to go out and around Africa and up towards

00:27:33.700 europe and that takes an extra 10 to 12 days and it adds you know millions of dollars to the cost

00:27:40.340 and to insurance and right now the houthis seem poised to be doing that three tankers

00:27:46.580 saudi tankers from their their port on the red sea turned around and returned to port yesterday

00:27:52.740 and another four today um on another matter sometimes some of the rhetoric that we're

00:28:00.340 hearing from premier ford is particularly bellicose in light of trump's latest tariff threat

00:28:08.900 what he said was we could dismantle the united states essentially using our position as

00:28:17.700 an energy power i don't know if we're a superpower yet but we're certainly an energy power i mean

00:28:24.500 is that possible? Is he overstating things or could Canada really do that much damage to our

00:28:33.480 neighbors to the south if we decided to? Well, I think it's a bellicose threat. It's

00:28:39.020 something similar to what he's threatened in the past. I'm not sure who's advising the premier,

00:28:46.600 but I think if I was advising the prime minister, I would tell the premiers to

00:28:50.860 cut out the rhetoric, calm down, shut up, and let me negotiate a free trade agreement with the United

00:28:59.560 States. Because so far, you know, Premier Ford and a few others have been bulls that have brought

00:29:06.860 their own China shop with them and kind of torn apart the free trade talks. And I think that

00:29:11.860 they're in the process of doing this again, and it's not helpful. It's not their lane to be engaged

00:29:17.420 in international trade talks with the United States.

00:29:22.420 Yeah, it seems like Ford really only knows

00:29:24.880 one way of doing things,

00:29:26.900 and that is to use this kind of belligerent language

00:29:31.780 and make threats,

00:29:34.080 which he ends up not being able to keep,

00:29:36.460 like the electricity threat that he made last year or so,

00:29:40.600 threatening to cut them off,

00:29:42.620 cut off Michigan and New York and Minnesota.

00:29:45.120 it just doesn't seem like he knows any other way to do to to deal with this issue and so far it's

00:29:54.800 been an abject failure this approach has failed for the last 18 months or so and yet that's all

00:30:01.960 he can seem to know how to do like is how do you how do you account for this well i think that you

00:30:09.640 know, the, the, the premier has taken a lesson from the federal liberals and he's running

00:30:14.620 against, uh, uh, uh, president Trump, as opposed to, uh, running against, uh, liberals or NDP

00:30:21.860 in the province.

00:30:23.040 And the fact of the matter is, I mean, I, I think he's advised very poorly, uh, by people

00:30:29.420 that really don't have a great understanding of either international trade or international

00:30:33.940 affairs.

00:30:34.820 I mean, I, I don't know what to say, but what he has done has not been helpful.

00:30:40.280 And it may seem like great provincial politics and domestic politics.

00:30:46.120 And maybe if you have aspirations down the road for higher public office, it may seem like a great idea.

00:30:52.320 But in real terms, it's not been very helpful.

00:30:55.160 And it's been failure as a policy.

00:30:58.060 Yeah, and it's also divided one group of Canadians from another.

00:31:01.780 I mean, East and West, really, because the West seems to have no desire whatsoever to go nuclear.

00:31:08.800 and cut off oil sales to the United States,

00:31:13.220 which I think is what Ford seems to be suggesting here,

00:31:18.280 using and weaponizing our energy

00:31:20.700 as a way to inflict pain on our neighbor.

00:31:27.300 I mean, America has options as well.

00:31:29.860 I mean, they now have Venezuelan oil.

00:31:33.060 So, and I guess there's always that concern

00:31:35.720 that if we were to try something like that

00:31:38.500 And America was able to fill the void with other sources that we might, we'd lose that market, you know?

00:31:45.640 Yeah, I mean, I think the trick to negotiating with Donald Trump is, one, to expect him to be bombastic and to be aggressive.

00:31:56.900 Two, to make a lot of threats.

00:31:59.400 And I think, three, you know, the big lesson for me is to be calm.

00:32:03.920 Donald Trump has a great way of upsetting people.

00:32:06.520 And you've seen in some of the interviews with his former staff that he actually revels in it.

00:32:11.440 He enjoys it because he knows he can get someone's goat and pull them around and then negotiate.

00:32:18.820 And so he's done that very effectively with Canadians.

00:32:22.000 You know, Canadians don't like Donald Trump and there's a lot not to like.

00:32:25.280 And I get that.

00:32:26.940 But we do have a national interest.

00:32:29.580 And we do have a national interest in terms of our geography, our trade, our defense, our security ties.

00:32:36.520 Even our arts and culture ties. We've got great ties with the United States. The fact that the government is, you know, almost given up negotiating and seems to want to run and hide from the talks that are going on now between Mexico and the United States, I think is very concerning.

00:32:58.420 If I was a Canadian business that had to export to the United States and had to engage in trade, I think I'd be very worried about where Canada is right now in those negotiations because we're not.

00:33:12.780 And I think that's very sad.

00:33:16.000 you know there was a time and i'll finish up mark but there was a time when when you know canada had

00:33:24.160 had experts that could negotiate with the united states and the united states would be playing from

00:33:30.720 behind that does not seem to be the case any longer it seems like canada's playing from behind

00:33:37.040 and the united states is leading yeah i mean we certainly got the short end of the stick on the

00:33:43.520 the Gordie Howe bridge negotiations that we were lied to by the prime minister, who said,

00:33:50.060 no, no, the profit split is only going to happen after our debt is paid. That turned out to be

00:33:55.060 false. And now it seems like, to your point earlier about ragging the puck, I guess they

00:34:00.840 want to wait out until the midterms to see what happens. I guess they'll be hoping that the

00:34:05.640 midterms can go the Democrats' way, thinking that maybe that's going to help Canada's cause

00:34:11.660 negotiations it may not anyway last word to you all i would say is you know president trump was

00:34:19.020 at the height of his power the day he was inaugurated and and he he went to the white

00:34:26.380 house ever since then his you know power has gone downhill and it's likely to go downhill

00:34:33.820 in in the midterms it's a four-year blip in terms of canada u.s relations and i think that you

00:34:41.500 you know, Canada has to kind of step back, give its head a shake, and then say, we've got two

00:34:48.240 years left or 16 months left, whatever it is, and start making our plans based on that. You know,

00:34:55.220 we may not get a better deal from the Democrats. We may get another Republican in the White House,

00:35:00.840 but we've reacted adversely to a point that we put our own national interests at risk.

00:35:06.700 Joe Varner, thank you so much for coming on the show. We appreciate it.

00:35:09.620 Thank you, Mark. It's great to be with you.

00:35:12.380 From the MacDonald Laurier Institute.

00:35:14.580 If you enjoyed the show,

00:35:15.820 consider supporting independent journalism by becoming a premier member of

00:35:19.700 Juno News. Please go to junonews.com backslash straight up.

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00:35:28.260 Thank you so much. We'll see you next time.

Juno News - July 24, 2026

Ford takes BIG SWING at U.S. amid trade dispute

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