Rebel News Podcast - EZRA LEVANT ｜ Trudeau provoked a trade war to keep the Liberal Party relevant

00:00:00.000 Hello, my friends. Well, the tariffs have come. I don't know how long they're going to be here,

00:00:04.880 and I think the response by every Canadian political leader, other than maybe Danielle

00:00:08.700 Smith, is a disaster. You know the old saying, don't get mad, don't get even, get ahead? That's

00:00:15.640 one of my favorite sayings. It's so hard to live up to, I'll admit, and Canada did not do that

00:00:20.520 today. We'll see if we can out-bully America. Not sure if it's possible. But first, let me invite

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00:01:39.940 help spread your message today. Don't wait. Advertise with Rebel News. Reach freedom-loving

00:01:47.140 patriots and support our independent journalism. Tonight, what's the best way to respond to Trump's

00:01:54.780 latest round of tariffs on Canada? It's March 4th and this is the Ezra LeVant Show.

00:02:02.300 Shame on you, you censorious bug.

00:02:05.580 U.S. President Donald Trump has hit Canada with a series of tariffs. It's the second or third time

00:02:19.560 he's done so. It's a bit hard to count since he immediately rescinded them last time. There's a

00:02:24.780 chance that can happen this time too. The response from Trudeau was predictable. Now I want to speak

00:02:31.000 directly to one specific American. Donald, in the over eight years you and I have worked together,

00:02:42.120 we've done big things. We signed a historic deal that has created record jobs and growth in both of

00:02:51.220 our countries. We've done big things together on the world stage, as Canada and the U.S. have done

00:02:58.940 together for decades, for generations. And now we should be working together to ensure even greater

00:03:09.120 prosperity for North Americans in a very uncertain and challenging world.

00:03:17.280 Now it's not in my habit to agree with the Wall Street Journal, but Donald, they point out that even

00:03:24.540 though you're a very smart guy, this is a very dumb thing to do.

00:03:32.400 We two friends fighting is exactly what our opponents around the world want to see.

00:03:40.220 Trudeau's not gone yet. In fact, it sounds like he might stick around a little bit longer.

00:03:44.560 As we know, the Liberal Party's going to be picking a new leader over the weekend,

00:03:47.840 but when is it going to be your last official day as Prime Minister?

00:03:52.660 That will be up to a conversation between the new leader and myself to figure out how long a

00:04:00.260 transition is needed. It should happen reasonably quickly, but there's a lot of things to do in a

00:04:07.260 transition like this.

00:04:08.140 Chrystia Freeland has her response ads out too.

00:04:11.080 Donald Trump's nickname for me is the killer.

00:04:13.640 I've never heard of Donald Trump calling her that. He's called her other things, that's for sure,

00:04:38.680 but I don't think he's called her that one. Here's Doug Ford's response.

00:04:42.060 To support the federal government's efforts, Ontario will also launch its first round of

00:04:47.580 retaliation. Starting today, LCBO, the largest purchaser of alcohol in the world,

00:04:55.700 will begin removing U.S. products from its store shelves. And as the exclusive wholesaler,

00:05:03.240 American brands will no longer be available in LCBO catalog, meaning other retailers, bars and

00:05:10.600 restaurants in the province will no longer be able to restock U.S. products. This is an enormous hit

00:05:18.200 to the American producers. Every year, the LCBO sells nearly $1 billion worth of U.S. wine, beer, cider,

00:05:27.820 seltzers and spirits, including more than 3,600 products from 35 states. As of today, every single one of

00:05:38.320 these products is off the shelves. He's cancelling rural internet too, because it's being supplied by

00:05:44.860 Elon Musk's company. As part of this government-wide procurement ban, we're going one step further.

00:05:50.440 We're ripping up Ontario's contract with Starlink. It's done. It's gone. We won't award contracts to

00:05:59.820 people who enable and encourage economic attacks on our province and our country.

00:06:05.700 I'm not sure if that's legal. I bet Doug Ford will still have to pay for it, even if he rips up the

00:06:10.320 contract. But if he's bravely going to commit people in rural Ontario to having no internet,

00:06:17.880 to even get back at Trump, I guess that's that. By the way, I fully support people being asked to

00:06:25.500 buy their own internet. I mean, Starlink is so cheap. I don't know why the government is

00:06:30.960 getting involved in the first place. Why was the government buying internet for people?

00:06:36.060 Here's Pierre Polyev, who has made the political calculation that he can't let the liberals outdo him.

00:06:42.220 At 12.01 a.m., President Trump stabbed America's best friend in the back. My message to the

00:06:50.020 president is this. Canada will fight back. We will defend our people and our economy, and we will put

00:06:58.220 Canada first. There's no doubt that our economy will suffer. But so will yours, President Trump.

00:07:05.920 In fact, you're already paying the price with trillions of dollars erased in stock market value over the last

00:07:11.740 month of these threats. Already Americans are paying higher gas prices. At midnight, a new

00:07:19.520 American gas tax kicked in on U.S. working class taxpayers and motorists. Your workers will soon 1.00

00:07:27.600 start losing jobs. Jobs they had upgrading Canadian raw materials, which, by the way, you were getting

00:07:33.660 at an incredible and ridiculous bargain. And your businesses will be selling fewer products to your

00:07:40.980 closest neighbour. And that's only the beginning. While Canadians are slow to anger and quick to 0.69

00:07:45.840 forgive, once provoked, we fight back. And we will fight back. Of course, I'm against tariffs on Canada.

00:07:52.440 I wrote an op-ed to that effect in the Wall Street Journal a couple of weeks ago. I just wrote a book

00:07:57.500 about it. It's not in Canada's interest to be given import taxes for anything we sell to the states,

00:08:04.320 but that's not going to convince the U.S. My book argues that it's not in America's interest

00:08:10.560 to have these tariffs. It's not the America first move. Smacking around Justin Trudeau is great, but

00:08:16.520 look, he's going to be gone in a few days. Smacking around Mark Carney and Chrystia Freeland will be great

00:08:22.260 also. But they're not Canada. They're the worst of Canada, and they know it, and they're hiding from

00:08:28.500 their own MPs and their own voters. They know they're that hated. Canada and the United States

00:08:32.860 have had trade frictions before under both Republican and Democrat presidents. But I think

00:08:37.780 it's different for a few reasons this time around. I think it's hitting us a bit differently this time

00:08:42.560 because it is coupled with Donald Trump yanking Trudeau's chain, calling him Governor Trudeau, and

00:08:48.480 talking about making Canada the 51st state. That, I think, has changed tariffs from something about

00:08:54.420 the economy to something more personal for a lot of Canadians. I get it. It's audacious, or even more

00:08:59.940 than audacious. It's implying that Canadians should break their bonds of citizenship and national loyalty

00:09:06.560 and join up with America. Now, Trump always says it with loving adjectives. I don't know if you noticed

00:09:12.500 that. You'd be a cherished state. Stuff like that. But it really is an astonishing proposition if you

00:09:19.080 take it literally. I suppose it's akin to asking someone who is already married to divorce their

00:09:25.700 spouse and marry you instead. It's more than just presumptuous, even if it's only a joke. I mean,

00:09:31.640 let's use that analogy for a bit. If someone actually did come up to you and told you to divorce your

00:09:37.740 spouse and marry them instead and actually started to make a case for it, what would you say? By the

00:09:44.220 way, here's Trump's case for it. Canada's been very bad to us on trade, but now Canada's going to have

00:09:49.160 to start paying up. And Canada's been tough on the military because they don't have a very, they have

00:09:54.880 a very low military cost. They think we're going to, you know, protect them with our military, which is

00:10:00.700 unfair. So Canada's going to be a very interesting situation because, you know, we just don't need

00:10:08.960 their product. And yet they survive off the fact that we're, you know, we do 95 percent of what they

00:10:15.460 do. And Canada is just absolutely, I say it and sometimes people smile and sometimes they say great

00:10:21.600 idea, but Canada, their taxes would come down greatly. Their security would go up greatly.

00:10:27.680 Amazing things happen to Canada and really Canada in this particular, why would we pay $200 billion a year

00:10:36.860 in subsidies to Canada when they're not a state? You do that for a state, but you don't do that for somebody

00:10:43.160 else's country. So I think Canada is going to be a very serious contender to be our 51st state.

00:10:50.420 Trump talks about a stronger economy, which is obviously true. And he talks about a stronger military, which is

00:10:55.320 obviously true. And I think on at least one occasion he has suggested swapping Canadian dollars for U.S.

00:11:01.000 dollars at par, which would be like a 50 percent profit for Canadians. Now put that in terms of

00:11:06.740 asking someone who's already married to marry them instead. It's outrageous, isn't it? Even if the

00:11:12.860 proposer says, you'll move out of your small home into my large mansion and I have a job that pays much

00:11:19.540 better and I'll give you more attention and I'm better looking. Now some people would find that

00:11:25.080 absolutely outrageous. It's an indecent proposal, as the movie about that same theme was called.

00:11:31.000 But there might be some people who's saying, even if they say it in their minds, you know what?

00:11:36.780 I'm with a bit of a deadbeat. We're always short of money and it's not going to get any better.

00:11:40.820 Maybe I'll take a lead. As in what if someone was already quietly unhappy in a marriage

00:11:46.380 and had been contemplating a divorce anyways? We call those people separatists in Canada.

00:11:52.640 So go back to the 51st state part of the analogy. Are there Canadians who are feeling that Canada

00:11:58.240 is a bit of a dead end, that there's no chance of prosperity, that there are a lot of

00:12:02.100 problems that aren't likely to be fixed? You know, crime, inflation, housing prices,

00:12:07.380 crazy immigration policies, wokeness everywhere. I showed you that poll the other week, 1.00

00:12:12.440 that particularly young men are the most receptive to Trump's proposal. Young men

00:12:17.820 who are obviously thinking about how hard it is to buy a house, start a family, get ahead. Here's

00:12:23.120 Trump saying, join us and you'll be rich and free and safe and respected and wanted and part of a

00:12:28.240 country that's proud of itself. Compare that to what Trudeau has to offer. How does Trudeau treat

00:12:34.240 those same people? The polls show that young men from the West are the most receptive. I mean,

00:12:39.620 Trudeau has treated them so poorly and so will Mark Carney. I mean, just close your eyes for a

00:12:44.460 moment and imagine what Alberta would be like if it were part of the United States, a country that

00:12:48.360 actually develops oil and gas and builds pipelines. Imagine how prosperous that place would be as

00:12:54.640 opposed to being treated as an enemy from the kind of guy who says words like people kind.

00:12:59.740 So that's why we came here today to ask you to also look into the policies that religious

00:13:05.940 charitable organizations have in our legislation so that it can also be changed because maternal love

00:13:13.020 is the love that's going to change the future of mankind. So we'd like you to look for that.

00:13:18.680 We like to say people kind, not necessarily mankind because it's more inclusive.

00:13:23.100 There we go. Exactly.

00:13:24.340 So some people in unhappy marriages might actually consider a marriage proposal even if it were

00:13:31.980 outrageous. Just like 40% of young men in Western Canada prefer Trump's offer of patriotic prosperity

00:13:37.640 to Trudeau's woke feminism and socialism and his failed state. Let me talk about Pierre Paglia for

00:13:44.080 a moment. A couple of weeks ago, I was at his Ottawa rally, his Canada first speech there. Big speech,

00:13:49.340 good speech, big turnout. They're making ads out of it. Here's a clip.

00:13:53.420 We will be a self-reliant, sovereign country that stands on its two feet. We will reward work,

00:13:59.300 unleash entrepreneurs, harvest our resources, make our own goods, trade with each other, build homes

00:14:05.300 for our youth, rebuild our borders and military, honor our history and raise our flag. What binds us

00:14:12.500 together is the Canadian promise that anyone from anywhere can do anything. That hard work gets you a

00:14:20.380 great life in a beautiful house on a safe street wrapped in the protective arms of a solid border

00:14:26.260 border defended by brave soldiers under a proud flag. To preserve that flag and its promise, we must work

00:14:34.140 together, fight together and win together. That is what it means to put Canada first.

00:14:40.140 I thought it was a good response to Trump and a good message to Canada. But I think Trump

00:14:49.020 derangement syndrome has turned into a pandemic. It's absolutely nuts, at least in our ruling class

00:14:54.380 in Canada, at least in Ontario and Quebec. I think they hate Trump. They don't like the 51st state

00:15:00.980 indecent proposal, even though half of them vacation in Florida. And they saw how Trump manhandled

00:15:07.300 Vladimir Zelensky a few days ago. And they're mad about that too. And they're mad that Trump isn't

00:15:13.320 controllable in the same way most politicians are, that he's a disruptor, that he says the quiet part

00:15:18.560 out loud about everything. In this case, America is tired of lifting such a big load for the world,

00:15:23.360 from national defense to one-sided trade. Trump made this social media post just today about the

00:15:30.320 fact that there are basically no U.S. banks with a retail business in Canada. Why, he asks.

00:15:35.700 There are a ton of Canadian banks in the U.S. I see TD Bank and Scotia Bank everywhere. Why

00:15:41.040 can't we have competition up here? I mean, where we could choose a U.S. bank instead of our atrocious

00:15:47.220 Canadian banks. Why not U.S. cell phone companies? I wish we had competition. Do you really love

00:15:52.540 Rogers and Bell and Shaw? Now, those are retail commerce questions. But mainly, I think the U.S. is tired

00:16:00.160 of paying to be the world's policeman. And people are outraged that he's asking for thank

00:16:05.700 all those who mooch. Here was J.D. Vance the other day. 1.00

00:16:09.040 Mr. President, Mr. President, with respect, I think it's disrespectful for you to come

00:16:12.580 into the Oval Office and try to litigate this in front of the American media. Right now,

00:16:16.160 you guys are going around and forcing conscripts to the front lines because you have manpower

00:16:21.140 problems. You should be thanking the President for trying to bring it into this conflict.

00:16:24.980 Have you ever been to Ukraine that you say what problems we have?

00:16:28.120 I have been to. Come once. I've actually watched and seen the stories. And I know what happens

00:16:35.240 is you bring people. You bring them on a propaganda tour, Mr. President. Do you disagree that you've

00:16:40.720 had problems bringing people into your military? We have problems. And do you think that it's

00:16:44.720 respectful to come to the Oval Office of the United States of America and attack the administration

00:16:49.660 that is trying to prevent the destruction of your country? You know, if a guy gives you $300

00:16:54.160 billion or $100 billion or whatever it is, you can say thank you. You can say thank you

00:16:58.520 an extra time even more than you think you should. I'll just tell you right now, if anyone

00:17:03.200 wants to give me $100 billion or let's be more realistic, if you want to give me $100, I'll

00:17:08.740 say thank you to you more times than I need to. That's a deal. So what's the best way to fight

00:17:13.200 back? Well, fighting back against President Donald Trump and the world's most powerful economy

00:17:18.720 probably won't work out well for Canada, especially given the personal vitriol

00:17:23.460 that Mark Carney and Chrystia Freeland are directing at Trump. I mean, he responds in

00:17:29.540 kind to that, doesn't he? He escalates. There's an old saying that I try to follow

00:17:34.700 in life, although it's sometimes pretty hard. I don't know if you ever heard it. Don't get

00:17:38.380 mad. Don't get even. Get ahead. Have you ever heard that? Oh, it's hard to do. I think

00:17:47.780 Canada's liberals and others like Doug Ford, who's still in campaign mode for some reason

00:17:52.440 even though he won this election. I think they're at the get mad or maybe the get even

00:17:56.880 stage. It feels good for a politician to rail against a foe, especially one as controversial

00:18:01.640 as Donald Trump. But is it actually getting Canada ahead? I think Alberta Premier Daniel

00:18:08.860 Smith has it right. Don't insult anybody. Just bite your lip. Focus on the actual irritants,

00:18:15.360 lack of seriousness on border controls for drugs and illegals. Acknowledge the obvious that we

00:18:20.320 are short on our NATO spending obligations. I mean, listen to Trudeau here. Listen to the

00:18:25.440 tense he uses, sort of future past tense. What is this? I have tripled spending in the

00:18:31.700 past for the future. What is he even saying here? We will use every tool at our disposal

00:18:36.760 so Canadian workers and businesses can weather this storm. From expanding EI benefits and making

00:18:43.820 them more flexible to providing direct supports to businesses, we will be there as needed to

00:18:50.640 help. But Canada, make no mistake. No matter how long this lasts, no matter what the cost,

00:18:58.580 the federal government and other orders of government will be there for you. We will defend Canadian

00:19:05.320 jobs. We will take measures to prevent predatory behaviour that threatens Canadian companies because

00:19:12.780 of the impacts of this trade war, leaving them open to takeovers. We will relentlessly fight to protect

00:19:21.380 our economy. We will stand up for Canadians every single second of every single day because this country

00:19:30.660 is worth fighting for. Yeah, you know, you don't have to grovel before Trump. You have to be respectful,

00:19:36.700 not because of Trump, but because of America. If you want something from America, that is,

00:19:42.260 but if you don't, then don't. But we do, don't we? We want their free army, don't we? We want access

00:19:48.100 to their American markets for our cars, don't we? Ironically, oil is the largest export to the U.S.,

00:19:54.340 and they need that more than we need them. But we undid our pipelines to the ocean that could have sold

00:19:59.620 our oil to other customers. Trudeau did that, didn't he, come to think of it? But you don't have

00:20:04.740 to grovel, but you have to deal. Like a grown-up, if you want to protect your dairy cartel, your banking

00:20:12.420 cartel, your cell phone cartel, if you want to put taxes on U.S. digital streaming services,

00:20:19.940 fill your boots, but expect countervailing measures from Donald Trump.

00:20:24.740 But like I've said all along, there is a moral hazard here. The liberals will lose the trade war,

00:20:31.220 but they think they can win the election battle over it. I saw an estimate today of up to one

00:20:37.620 million job losses out of this trade war. I think that's high. But still, imagine a party that is so

00:20:44.420 desperate to hang on to power that it would incur that damage, or even 100,000 jobs lost, or even 10,000

00:20:49.780 jobs lost, rather than just fixing the border and addressing some specific irritants, just so

00:20:55.700 the liberals can find a way to rule over us for a few years longer. I don't think Donald Trump

00:21:02.100 realizes the dynamic up here, especially with that 51st state thing. He made a social media post the

00:21:07.540 other day about Wayne Gretzky not wanting a 51st state or something. I think Wayne Gretzky told Trump

00:21:13.540 that that whole 51st state thing is emotionally roiling Canadians and that he should cool it. Well,

00:21:20.180 Trump doesn't really care. He's got a lot of things on his plate. He doesn't really care

00:21:25.220 for this reason. Canadians are incredibly proud of being Canadian. One of the ways we define

00:21:30.660 ourselves most easily is, well, we're not American. There is such a depth of pride that that's not

00:21:37.780 actually an issue. So the nine-year prime minister of Canada, son of a prime minister of Canada,

00:21:43.540 it's asked what makes a Canadian Canadian. And all he says is, we're not like you. We're not you.

00:21:47.940 We're not American. The implication being we're better than you. Don't Canadians really think 1.00

00:21:53.300 that? I mean, look at the motto of that company, Chapters Indigo. The world needs more Canada.

00:21:58.580 Or the conceit, best healthcare system in the world. Or this one, we're nicer than Americans.

00:22:04.500 We're more generous. Are you sure about that? You sure? You sure we're not just more smug?

00:22:09.940 Anti-Americanism is in our bloodstream. Remember Rick Mercer? He had a whole series about it,

00:22:15.380 talking to Americans. Boy, were they dumb. As if Canadians could find Ukraine on a map.

00:22:25.700 Just read it to yourself and then if you want to.

00:22:27.860 This part here? Yeah.

00:22:29.620 To the right, Honorable Paul Martin Jr., Prime Minister-in-waiting.

00:22:33.300 Given that 2001 has been declared the year of the senior citizen, we demand that the government of

00:22:37.780 Canada discourage the Canadian tradition of placing senior citizens on northern ice flows and leaving

00:22:42.740 them to perish. Yeah, I'll sign that. So what are you studying again? History. Right, very good.

00:22:47.060 I definitely believe that senior citizens shouldn't be placed on ice flows. And you're a prof here?

00:22:53.140 Yeah. How many years? Nine. You like it? Yeah, it's good. Good school? Yeah.

00:22:57.940 Would you be interested in visiting Canada's national igloo? Absolutely.

00:23:02.740 How many times has the Canadian intelligentsia mocked Trump, called him a rapist?

00:23:08.420 Which is what the Globe and Mail calls him every day. Maybe Trudeau is right. Maybe his core identity

00:23:14.260 is just not being American. And this trade war is his way to prove it. And possibly his way to hold

00:23:22.820 on to power a bit longer. I think Trudeau needs to exit this stage of public life already. I think he

00:23:30.580 needs to go and we need an election immediately. I think it's outrageous the parliament has been

00:23:34.340 dissolved this past month while the Liberals go through their internal party practices and their

00:23:39.620 election process. I think any Canadian leader who thinks the way to negotiate with Trump is to

00:23:45.540 threaten him back, I think that's a fool. They're getting mad. They're not getting even. You know,

00:23:51.700 Doug Ford, I don't know if that's actually going to solve the problem. You're not going to get even with

00:23:56.580 a $20 trillion economy. That's the US economy. Sorry, an orange juice and bourbon boycott is not going to

00:24:02.900 bring America to its knees. They're getting mad and getting even, but they're not getting ahead.

00:24:08.180 Actually, they are getting ahead themselves, for themselves.

00:24:10.660 And will continue to be important to diversify our economies. But we can't replace an economy that is

00:24:16.500 responsible for 80% of our trade overnight. And it's going to hurt. My message to Canadians is that we

00:24:21.620 have a higher pain threshold than our partners to the south of us. We can continue to fight. We will have

00:24:28.420 to bring the fight and it will hurt Americans as well. Not to mention, and it's important to

00:24:35.060 reiterate that 35 of those states, their primary trading partner is Canada. So it will hurt them.

00:24:40.340 And we hope that logic will prevail.

00:24:41.700 Mark Miller is right for his own life. I mean, he can endure pain because he's a member of parliament.

00:24:48.500 He's a cabinet minister who makes six figures. He's getting an automatic pay raise on April 1st.

00:24:54.180 You know, the MPs have rigged it that way. Every April 1st, they get a pay raise. So yeah,

00:24:58.980 Mark Miller is getting ahead. You betcha. And his old boss might stick around and his new boss might win.

00:25:05.060 They are getting ahead. It's just the rest of Canadians who have to lose. Those 1 million job 0.69

00:25:10.100 losses, or even if it's 100,000, there won't be any MPs amongst them, won't that be?

00:25:14.980 The answer here is to reduce the temperature, resist the urge to insult the most powerful country in the

00:25:19.780 world and make the case to their president in his language. America first. And they're best friends

00:25:25.860 the Canadians. It's like Batman and Robin. We're not as big or as tough as Batman. And if you punch

00:25:30.180 Batman, if Robin punches Batman in the nose, it's not going to work out well. But if Robin can be

00:25:35.300 respectful and self-confident and helpful and avoid inflaming things, Robin will do just fine.

00:25:43.460 You know, Vladimir Zelensky's meltdown in the Oval Office, that was a cautionary tale

00:25:47.380 for what happens when you go in chippy and sullen. There was a big deal waiting for him,

00:25:52.580 but that deal's gone now, I'm afraid. I'm worried about Trump's terror. Sure I am.

00:25:58.340 But I'm actually much more worried that the insane escalatory personal reactions by Canadian 1.00

00:26:03.700 politicians are going to make it far worse. I mean, just think about this for a moment.

00:26:08.820 Today, I'm writing to every senator, every congressman and woman,

00:26:14.260 and the governors from New York State, Michigan and Minnesota, telling them that these tariffs persist.

00:26:21.860 If the Trump administration falls through on any more tariffs, we will immediately apply a 25%

00:26:28.900 surcharge on the electricity we export. We will not hesitate to shut off their power as well.

00:26:37.460 I'm encouraging my fellow premiers to follow suit.

00:26:40.500 Is that really going to scare Trump? Or would it actually result in a reaction from the United

00:26:45.700 States to the same effect to Canada? Say, cutting off oil pipelines from America to eastern Canada.

00:26:52.340 You know that Ontario and Quebec get their oil largely through pipelines that go through the states.

00:26:58.100 Those Ontario and Quebec politicians probably don't know that.

00:27:03.060 They're so smart they prepare oil piped in from the U.S. as opposed to Energy East pipelines that

00:27:07.700 they killed. Ontario and Quebec helped kill the Energy East pipeline, so they get their oil from America.

00:27:13.300 Montreal, their oil comes up from a pipeline in Maine, in the state of Maine.

00:27:21.140 Do you doubt for a second that the United States would respond

00:27:23.940 in a devastating matter if Ford actually did turn off the electricity?

00:27:28.980 Boy, they're foolish. Yeah, we're not sending our best, are we? I hope we get out of this okay.

00:27:35.060 Well, tariffs are kind of tax. Interestingly, it's a tax paid for on the importing countries side of

00:27:55.140 things. So for example, if there's a tax on oil shipped from the oil sands in Canada to a

00:28:02.020 refinery in the U.S., it's the American side that pays the tax. That refinery pays it. How,

00:28:09.220 and this is the heart of my book, Deal of the Century, The America First Plan for Canada's Oil Sands,

00:28:15.060 how does that help your U.S. refineries if you're making them pay an import tax? It's not like they

00:28:20.820 can replace that four million barrels a day with American sources, at least not for years to come.

00:28:26.980 And countervailing tariffs, that is, okay, you put tariffs on us, we're going to put tariffs on you,

00:28:33.380 on orange juice, on bourbon. Those are a couple of the examples I've heard. Well,

00:28:37.220 okay, so who pays that tax? That's Canadians who pay it. And you can see that prices are going to go

00:28:42.820 up on both sides of the border. To support the federal government's efforts, Ontario will also

00:28:48.020 launch its first round of retaliation. Starting today, LCBO, the largest purchaser of alcohol in

00:28:56.820 the world, will begin removing U.S. products from its store shelves. And as the exclusive wholesaler,

00:29:05.300 American brands will no longer be available in LCBO catalog, meaning other retailers, bars,

00:29:12.500 and restaurants in the province will no longer be able to restock U.S. products. This is an enormous

00:29:19.940 hit to the American producers. And it's sort of, oh yeah, you're hurting your citizens. I'm going to

00:29:26.340 hurt more, even my citizens, even more. That's a strictly Milton Friedman-esque free market libertarian

00:29:34.500 analysis. Let's go to a man who thinks about taxes all the time. His name is Franco Teresano,

00:29:39.780 and he is the boss of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Franco, good to see you. Did I

00:29:44.580 properly explain what a tariff is? It's just a tax paid for by an importer and therefore

00:29:51.060 the customers of that importer, right? Yeah, that's exactly right. A tariff is just another

00:29:56.260 form of tax that your own citizen pays, right? So when President Donald Trump imposes tariffs

00:30:02.100 on Canadian goods brought into the U.S., well, that's largely just American businesses and American

00:30:07.620 consumers who pay that tariff, who pay that tax. So conversely, when our federal government in Ottawa

00:30:14.500 announces retaliatory tariffs, well, who feels the pain of that? It is largely a tax on Canadian

00:30:21.060 citizens, a tax paid on Canadian businesses, and therefore a tax paid by Canadian consumers.

00:30:27.540 Now, Ezra, you know, I understand the emotion that a lot of people are having right now, right?

00:30:32.580 When someone throws a punch at you, what do you want to do? You don't want to back down,

00:30:37.220 you want to swing back. But unfortunately, what a retaliatory tariff from the federal government in

00:30:43.060 Ottawa will mean is not a swing that lands on Americans, it's a swing that will land on Canadians,

00:30:50.020 right? This will be another tax that does, in fact, make life more expensive here in Canada,

00:30:55.540 that does hurt Canada's economy. And look, I don't think it's going to work in forcing the U.S.'s hand

00:31:01.860 to back down. The U.S. economy is obviously 10 times bigger than our own. And I don't think the

00:31:08.980 Florida orange juice growers are going to bring the U.S. economy to its knees. You know, I mentioned

00:31:15.940 Milton Friedman earlier, he was a Nobel Prize winning economist who was really a champion of the free

00:31:20.420 market. He said that the right approach to tariffs and other trade barriers, and this is just a pure

00:31:27.780 economic, you know, economist point of view. There are other cultural and nationalistic

00:31:32.660 and political reasons to do things differently. He preached what he called the universal

00:31:38.740 declaration of free trade. He said that's sort of how Hong Kong did it in the 20th century.

00:31:43.540 They said, the whole world is free to sell things to us. We won't have any tariffs. If you want

00:31:48.820 to tariff us, that's your funeral. But we are going to be a free trade city. That's basically

00:31:53.540 how he described Hong Kong. And Hong Kong, of course, was a great success story in the 20th

00:31:57.700 century and to this day. As in, it's unfair that someone's putting tariffs on your exports to them.

00:32:05.300 It feels pointed. And Donald Trump is using his taunting, which he's good at. I mean,

00:32:09.780 he's good at giving people nicknames. He's good at, you know, he does that even to some of his own

00:32:14.500 team. Like he used to call Marco Rubio, little Marco. So that's how Trump rolls. It's a Manhattan

00:32:19.860 brawler style. So there's a real bunch of emotions in Canada right now. But just from a strictly

00:32:25.620 economic point of view, the pure libertarian approach is don't harm our citizens to get

00:32:33.140 back at Trump for harming his. Now, I know that's hard to not punch back when you feel punched,

00:32:38.660 but that's just the economist point of view. But it actually would go to inflation, wouldn't it? Talk a

00:32:43.220 little bit about what would happen if we put tariffs on U.S. imports.

00:32:47.300 Well, Ezra, number one, you don't win a fight by punching yourself in the face,

00:32:51.940 right? Like, I hate that I have to say that. You want to fight by getting stronger,

00:32:56.100 right? So think about it this way. An American tariff is sort of like a sales tax in the sense

00:33:01.860 that it's a tax on Americans that increases prices on American consumers. Well, if the U.S. government

00:33:07.380 raise sales taxes, the Canadian government's response shouldn't be to hike up our own sales

00:33:13.220 tax. No, like what we should be doing here in Canada is making Canada strong, making Canada

00:33:18.420 competitive. And that means slashing taxes, slashing government waste, slashing government

00:33:24.340 regulations and actually building pipelines here in Canada. Now, I'm glad you brought up how tariffs

00:33:30.340 will impact Canadians. Like there is no refuting the simple fact that when President Donald Trump imposes

00:33:35.780 tariffs, that will hurt Canada. There is no refuting that. But you know what's the one

00:33:40.180 thing that will make that worse? If the federal government imposes tariffs on Canadian citizens,

00:33:45.460 right? So look, a 25% across the board tariff from the U.S. government, well, that would cost each

00:33:51.940 Canadian about $1,300, okay? But if Canada were to retaliate, that would increase that cost to about

00:33:59.460 $1,900 per Canadian. So you can see that Trump's tariffs will hurt Canada. But what would make that

00:34:06.820 worse for Canadians right now who are struggling is retaliatory tariffs. Let me bring up some other

00:34:12.980 data here from the Peterson Institute, okay? So no retaliation from Canada. You're looking at

00:34:19.220 inflation of about 1.7%. If Canada retaliates, the inflation jumps up to about 3%.

00:34:25.140 3%. So make no mistake about it. I understand the emotion of fighting back. However, I don't think

00:34:32.100 the right solution is for our federal government to hammer Canadians with another tax, which is exactly

00:34:37.940 what retaliatory tariffs are. What I think will work is if we finally do what we should have been doing

00:34:43.700 in Canada for so long, ending the carbon tax, saying no to capital gains tax hikes, drastically reducing

00:34:50.420 income taxes and drastically reducing the size and cost of the state here at home.

00:34:57.220 You know, here's one more thing I'm worried about. I don't know if you remember,

00:35:00.260 but the first responses we heard from Doug Ford and Justin Trudeau and

00:35:04.500 Chrystia Freeland to these threats of tariffs. Remember, Trump made them in November. He said,

00:35:09.460 I want that border fixed up by the time my inauguration comes around or else it'll be hell to pay.

00:35:14.500 So he sort of gave a two month heads up. And so those first reactions, Doug Ford, but especially

00:35:19.300 the federal liberals, remember what they said? They said they really wanted the trade war in my view,

00:35:25.220 because that lets them wrap themselves in the flag and be heroes. Instead of fixing the border,

00:35:29.620 they focused on the fight. They said, we're going to do what we did during COVID-19. We're going to have

00:35:37.620 massive transfers of wealth from borrowing and taxing to give it to those industries that are

00:35:45.300 affected. Like I can imagine these tariffs could be devastating to the auto industry if they remain.

00:35:51.220 So what we heard from Doug Ford and Justin Trudeau and Chrystia Freeland is

00:35:55.860 tens of billions of dollars paid to, well, I don't know, anyone, everyone, the industries in question.

00:36:04.020 I'm worried that if Trudeau or Mark Carney bring in countervailing tariffs or if Pierre

00:36:09.700 Pauliev does it, that it'll just be a tax windfall for the Canadian government. And it'll be

00:36:16.420 an excuse for them to tax and spend. That's all a tariff is. Just use the word import tax.

00:36:21.540 So if Trudeau or Carney or Freeland or even Pierre Pauliev bring in an import tax,

00:36:27.700 well, politicians love doing that. And there's nothing they love more than an emergency,

00:36:32.420 emergency. I'm sorry. I don't really have to. I don't want to do this, but it's a climate

00:36:36.500 emergency. I got to give you a carbon tax. I'm sorry. I don't really want to do this,

00:36:39.860 but it's a COVID emergency. So I got to have a tax increase and borrow. I'm sorry.

00:36:44.260 There's a trade emergency. You know, these emergencies keep on happening. What can I do?

00:36:47.940 I got to tax you more because I love spending. There's always an emergency when taxes are involved.

00:36:53.860 We will use every tool at our disposal. So Canadian workers and businesses can weather this storm

00:37:00.900 from expanding EI benefits and making them more flexible to providing direct supports to businesses.

00:37:07.460 We will be there as needed to help. But Canada, make no mistake, no matter how long this lasts,

00:37:16.420 no matter what the cost, the federal government and other orders of government will be there for you.

00:37:22.500 We will defend Canadian jobs. Well, look, we saw the government use the cloud of COVID to go on a

00:37:30.100 debt-fueled spending spree, right? Massive money printing. And what happened there? Well, I mean,

00:37:35.620 obviously so many businesses struggled, so many Canadian workers struggled, but we also saw the

00:37:40.260 printing press on overdrive, which led to the 40-year high inflation in 2022, right? During the pandemic

00:37:47.220 years. So look, I'm very concerned that politicians always have the incentive to use an emergency or a

00:37:54.660 crisis as a shield to expand the size and the cost of government. You know what I mean? Like,

00:38:00.740 think about who benefits from a tariff war, if we can call it that, right? Well, who benefits?

00:38:07.300 The power centers, right? Politicians get to show Canadians that they're fighting back,

00:38:11.700 that they're doing something. Bureaucrats, right? Now they have expanded roles, hire more bureaucrats, 0.82

00:38:17.620 spend a bunch of other people's money. Well, who loses in a tariff war where the US imposes tariffs

00:38:23.620 and then Canada retaliates? Who loses? The ordinary American and Canadian citizens. That's who loses from

00:38:30.740 this. Yeah. You know, I just wish parliament were in session right now so we could learn more about

00:38:37.060 what diplomacy, if any, was being used here. I mean, Justin Trudeau has been going over to Europe

00:38:44.100 for photo ops and flying around and doing all sorts of stuff. I don't know when the last time he's talked

00:38:48.900 to Donald Trump is. And we just don't know any of those questions because we don't have question

00:38:52.740 period. We don't have emergency debates. How we can make massive decisions like what the retaliation is

00:39:00.420 without the House of Commons even discussing it is shocking to me. I don't know. I'm just,

00:39:06.500 I do not feel like Canada is staffed up. I don't believe we're on solid ground. I don't think this

00:39:13.780 government has a mandate. I think parliament being dissolved is insane. And I think that the,

00:39:18.740 there's a huge moral hazard, if you know what I mean, because it's actually in the political

00:39:24.100 interest of the Liberal Party to have a big old fight with Donald Trump that is more politically

00:39:29.140 valuable to them to then just solve the problem. And I, I think we're going to be hit hard. But

00:39:33.860 as you said before, on April 1st, we're going to hit ourselves even harder with our own tariff

00:39:41.300 of sorts. I'm talking about the carbon tax pricing. One last thing, Franco. I saw Mark Miller the other

00:39:47.620 day saying Canadians can withstand a lot of pain. Here's a quick clip of that. Oh, is that we have a

00:39:52.580 higher pain threshold than our, our partners to the south of us. We can continue to fight. We will

00:39:58.980 have to bring the fight and it will hurt Americans as well. Not to mention, and it's important to

00:40:05.700 reiterate that 35 of those states, their primary trading partner is Canada. So it will hurt them.

00:40:11.060 And we hope that logic will prevail. Well, Mark Miller can stand a lot of pain because he

00:40:15.620 every year has given himself an automatic pay raise on April Fool's Day. It's so fitting.

00:40:20.340 So he'll do fine. He's a cabinet minister. He makes serious six figure income. He will

00:40:26.660 be able to do this without feeling the pain, but the pain will come from ordinary Canadians. 0.60

00:40:30.900 Last word to you, Franco. Oh yeah. It's a lot easier to say something like that when you take

00:40:35.700 a $300,000 taxpayer funded salary and your pad, your pockets with more pay every single year,

00:40:42.820 courtesy of the taxpayer. And look, I'm glad you brought up the carbon tax because what happens

00:40:47.700 April one still scheduled on the books, a 19% increase to the carbon tax. Look, you want to really fight

00:40:54.580 back. Well, we got to make Canada's economy stronger than ever. And the first way to do that

00:40:59.700 is to just stop blowing holes in our own economy with massive taxes and massive red tape. The carbon

00:41:05.620 tax folks alone last year cost our economy $12 billion. Okay. And folks, I know we're wrapping up

00:41:13.460 here. I just want to bring in Mark Carney again, because he wants to hammer businesses with a hidden

00:41:19.540 carbon tax. Well, we already know that Trump is trying to lure businesses to the United States.

00:41:24.660 He's the president. He wants to do that. Well, we shouldn't be helping Trump take our businesses.

00:41:30.100 And guess what? A hidden carbon tax on business will encourage greater production in the United

00:41:36.020 States and less production here in Canada. You know, just give me one more second on that. You know,

00:41:41.540 almost every week, Donald Trump has a huge announcement. He brings in some tycoon or some

00:41:48.260 investor or a bank president who announces $100 billion, $200 billion, $500 billion private

00:41:57.060 sector investment in the U.S. economy. He has not announced, as far as I know, government grants for

00:42:04.020 this sector or that sector. Maybe I missed it. But he's bringing in the head of SoftBank. He's bringing in

00:42:09.060 the Taiwan semiconductor people. That was a huge announcement yesterday. What was that, like $100

00:42:14.580 billion deal? Apple, so far he has announced in the last, I guess, five weeks, $1.7 trillion,

00:42:25.620 with a T, worth of private sector investment. That would be the equivalent, divide by 10 for the

00:42:32.180 Canadian proportion, right? That would be like $170 billion worth of private sector investment in

00:42:39.220 Canada in the last five weeks. It's unthinkable. I can't think of any company that's putting that

00:42:45.060 kind of dough into Canada. Trudeau's trying to give the simulation of it by giving government grants to

00:42:50.740 railroads or to electric vehicle batteries. So whatever else you say about Trump, I mean,

00:42:57.940 and you can disagree with tariffs. You can disagree with his approach. He's brought in $1.7 trillion

00:43:03.460 with the private sector investment in industrial investment. Like this is not just services stuff.

00:43:08.580 This is AI, microchips, making Apple products. We can't get that because no one has business

00:43:19.460 confidence. Whatever you say about Trump, there is optimism and confidence. And don't take it from

00:43:24.260 me, take it from all these foreign investors pouring into an America.

00:43:29.220 Well, Ezra, let me just bring up one more stat, okay? Because since 2015, we've seen $670 billion

00:43:37.220 in natural resources projects that have been suspended or canceled. $670 billion, okay? So what should

00:43:45.220 Canada do? Well, number one, folks, let's just remember, the solution is not to give our government

00:43:52.660 more power and more of your tax dollars, okay? What we should do here in Canada is what we should

00:43:57.860 always have been doing. Cut the regulations, cut the massive costs and size of government,

00:44:03.540 especially in Ottawa. And let's like actually get some real tax relief here, right? Scrap the carbon

00:44:08.660 tax, scrap the capital gains tax, cut income taxes, cut business taxes. And in Canada, we also got to cut

00:44:15.140 out this corporate welfare, right? Trudeau putting taxpayers on the hook for about $30 billion in corporate

00:44:21.220 welfare to multinational corporations to build battery factories. That's not how we should be

00:44:26.020 growing our economy, okay? We don't need these government bureaucrats playing investment banker 1.00

00:44:30.340 with our tax dollars. We need tax cuts and red tape cuts. There he is, Franco Teresano, the boss

00:44:37.460 of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. He's looking out for the little guy and God knows we need his help.

00:44:43.140 Keep up the fight, Franco. These are dangerous days. Hey, thanks, Ezra. Thanks for having me on.

00:44:48.100 All right. Always our pleasure. Stay with us. Your letters to me, next.

00:45:01.380 Your letters to me, TMAC says, she means central bank digital currency and social credit score,

00:45:07.940 digital ID. That is absolutely part of the rules-based international order. But in my mind,

00:45:14.180 there was a little factoid I didn't include. There was a tweet she had condemning Israel for its war

00:45:21.700 in Gaza for violating the rules-based international order. Like I say, it's a way for NGOs and weak,

00:45:29.860 ineffectual leftists to try and stop strong countries from doing what they want to do.

00:45:35.140 Not Russia or China, but just America, or in this case, Israel. Judith Taylor says,

00:45:40.180 well, Canada is buying Russian oil, but then sending money to Ukraine. How crazy is that?

00:45:45.700 Yeah, isn't that crazy? Eastern Canada still imports oil from Russia. And I'll remind you

00:45:51.380 that Justin Trudeau personally had a waiver on the sanctions. There were pipeline turbines from one of

00:45:58.660 Russia's energy pipelines that were, believe it or not, shipped to Montreal to be serviced in Montreal by

00:46:05.140 SNC-Lavalin, no less, and then shipped back. Canada helped Russian oil and gas by refurbishing

00:46:15.060 their pipeline. I mean, help me make it make sense. That's our show for today. Until tomorrow,

00:46:22.980 on behalf of all of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, to you at home, good night,

00:46:26.020 good night, and keep fighting for freedom.

Rebel News Podcast - March 05, 2025

EZRA LEVANT ｜ Trudeau provoked a trade war to keep the Liberal Party relevant

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