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President Trump with Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2019. Photo: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
TORONTO—The call started friendly. President Trump acknowledged Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was about to step down, and invited the leader to meet afterward “for old times’ sake,” said a person who listened to the call.
Then the tone soured. The 50-minute conversation between Trudeau and Trump—with Vice President JD Vance and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick listening—turned into a debate over how Canada blocks American producers from its dairy markets and Canada’s claims about how little fentanyl comes into the U.S. from the northern border. There was yelling and profanity, the person said.
Later, Trump called their chat “somewhat friendly,” while Trudeau dubbed it “colorful.” In reality, it was an explosive exchange between two global leaders whose dislike for each other has spilled into public view as Trudeau prepares to leave office during a low point in American-Canadian relations.
The spat has helped Trudeau’s low approval numbers, which have jumped since the tariff war began, reflecting Canadians’ anger about Trump’s repeated suggestions that the U.S. should annex Canada. Trump has taken to mockingly referring to Trudeau as “governor,” a reference to the president’s call for Canada to become the 51st state.
Trudeau, who initially took the jab in stride, now only refers to the president by his first name.
“I’ve been having conversations and working with Donald for over eight years now. And a lot of it is rolling with it, a lot of it is figuring out how to move forward constructively despite certain unpredictabilities that often come in,” Trudeau told reporters Thursday. A day before, he called Trump’s tariffs on Canada “a dumb move” and launched a painful retaliation on the U.S.
Trudeau’s get-tough approach with Trump has been criticized in Washington and contrasted with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum’s sunnier relationship with Trump, who praised his Mexican counterpart after a call with her Thursday. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Thursday called Trudeau a “numbskull” whose tough approach with the U.S. will lead to higher tariffs on Canadian imports
Peter Navarro, the White House senior adviser on trade and manufacturing, appeared on CNN this week and criticized Trudeau for using words like “dumb” to describe Trump’s tariff policy and disrespectfully only using the president’s first name. Navarro had some advice for the prime minister. “It would be really useful if he tones stuff down,” he said.
Canadian officials have reacted more aggressively to Trump’s tariff threats because they are taking seriously his threats to annex Canada. Trudeau and other officials have said the Trump administration has suggested it could tear up a 1908 treaty that helped set the countries’ border, raised the specter of pulling military cooperation and threatened to jettison decades-old water treaties.
“This isn’t a joke anymore,” Canadian Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly told the BBC.
Canadian officials said pushing back against Trump helped Canada win a good deal in 2018 when the U.S. forced the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum’s relationship with the U.S. president is sunnier than the one Canada’s prime minister has with him. Photo: Luis Barron/Zuma Press
A Trudeau adviser on U.S. relations said his tone is measured compared with Trump’s talk of taking over the country.
“Aggressive is ‘I’m going to annex your country.’ Firm is ‘Over my dead body,’ ” said Flavio Volpe, president of the Automotive Parts Manufacturers Association, part of the Prime Minister’s Council on Canada-U.S. Relations.
The U.S. on Tuesday leveled a 25% tariff on Canadian and Mexican goods, making good on a threat to punish the countries for what he claimed were lax border policies that allowed a flood of fentanyl and migrants to pour into the U.S. He partially pulled back on those tariffs on Thursday, but said he would come back with more tariffs as part of a global policy on April 2.
It is unclear if Trump’s dislike for Trudeau is influencing his policy decisions, but the president seems to be singling out Canada as his trade agenda gathers speed. On Friday, he said Canada has been “ripping us off for years on tariffs for lumber and for dairy products,” and pledged reciprocal levies unless Canada changed its policies.
“And we may do it as early as today, or we’ll wait till Monday or Tuesday, but that’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to charge the same thing. It’s not fair,” he said.
Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at a news conference earlier this week; he will be stepping down soon after his Liberal Party picks a new leader on Sunday. Photo: Dave Chan/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Trump and Trudeau are in many ways opposites. The U.S. president is a 78-year-old populist billionaire who has shaken global agreements on security and climate change while shutting the door to immigrants. Trudeau, the 53-year-old son of a former prime minister, became the global face of progressive causes that Trump disdains, like diversity and immigration.
Their relationship was never warm, said Wilbur Ross, commerce secretary during Trump’s first term.
“I just think on a personality basis they didn’t hit it off,” said Ross, who watched both leaders at meetings and sat in on phone calls.
Relations worsened following a 2018 Group of Seven industrial nations summit hosted by Canada. After leaving the summit, Trump was en route to a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore, when he watched a news conference during which Trudeau criticized U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum and said Canada would retaliate.
“Canadians, we’re polite, we’re reasonable, but we also will not be pushed around,” Trudeau said.
Trump fired off a tweet from Air Force One, calling Trudeau “Very dishonest & weak.” Trump then told aides he wouldn’t endorse the summit’s final communiqué.
Ross said the personality differences continue to color the public negotiations between Canada and the U.S., and said the aggressive Canadian tone could backfire. “I think Trudeau has made a huge mistake,” he said. “The last way anybody is going to get Trump to do something they want is to try to bludgeon him into doing it. It just doesn’t work.”
Trudeau’s time as Trump’s foil is quickly coming to an end. He will be stepping down soon after his Liberal Party picks a new leader on Sunday. The leading contender to replace Trudeau, a former central banker, Mark Carney, has seen his fortunes rise as he has based his candidacy on the idea of who is best able to stand up to Trump.
When pressed in a recent television interview about how he would take on Trump, Carney declined to say what he would do about the tariffs, and said he would concentrate on things he could control, like cutting Canadian taxes and improving infrastructure to boost the economy.
“We can’t control President Trump,” he said.
