Trudeau says Canada won’t be 51st state, even though Trump is a ‘successful negotiator’

Outgoing Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau suggested that President-elect Trump’s suggestion that Canada become America’s “51st state” was a distraction from the threat of tariffs.

“I know as a successful negotiator he likes to keep people a little off balance. In the 51st state, that’s not going to happen,” Trudeau said on MSNBC’s “Inside with Jen Psaki” on Sunday. “It’s just a starter. Canadians are incredibly proud to be Canadian. But now people are talking about that, instead of talking about the impact (of) the 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum that come to the United States, whether it’s oil and gas or electricity.”

“No American wants to pay 25 percent more for electricity or oil and gas from Canada,” Trudeau said in the interview with Psaki, President Biden’s former White House press secretary. “That’s something that I think people need to pay a little more attention to. And maybe the idea of ​​a 51 state distracts a little bit from a very real issue that is going to raise the cost of living for northerners Americans and it will damage a business relationship that works very well.”

Trump has threatened to impose 25% tariffs on all Canadian imports. The president-elect also said that if Canada were to merge with the US, taxes would decrease and there would be no tariffs.

The president-elect has also taken a shot at Trudeau, referring to him as the “governor” of Canada. Last Monday, Trudeau announced that he would resign as Canada’s prime minister once his Liberal Party elects a new leader on March 9.

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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announces his upcoming resignation to the media outside Rideau Cottage on Monday, Jan. 6, 2025, in Ottawa. (AP/Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

“From my first conversations with him in 2016, he told me how much he admires Canada, how much he appreciates and likes us, so there’s a certain amount of flattery in that he thinks we’re as great as we are.” , Trudeau said of Trump on Sunday. “He’s right, we’re great. We’re also very, very proud to be Canadian. If you talk to any Canadian, you ask them to define what it is to be Canadian, they’ll talk about all kinds of different things. But one of the things we’ll point out is, ‘ and we’re not Americans.'”

turned on Trudeau’s trip to Mar-a-Lago in November, the Canadian prime minister said the issue of Canada annexing the US did come up, but Trudeau said that when he joked that Canada might annex Vermont or California as some kind of trade, Trump ” he immediately decided it wasn’t so funny anymore and we moved on to a different conversation.”

“It’s not out of the blue that he’s doing this, but my focus has to be not on something that he’s talking about that will never happen, but more on something that might well happen, that if he decides to go ahead with tariffs that raise the costs of almost everything for American citizens, that on top of that, we’re going to have a strong response to that,” Trudeau said.

“We stand ready to respond with tariffs as necessary,” Trudeau said.

Canadian officials say if Trump follows through on his threat of punishing tariffs, Canada would consider retaliatory tariffs on American orange juice, toilets and some steel products.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau leaves his hotel as he heads to meet with President-elect Donald Trump in West Palm Beach, Florida on November 29, 2024. (CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP via Getty Images)

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Trudeau recalled that Trump previously placed tariffs on steel and aluminum imports during his first term, and Canada responded by placing tariffs on bourbon, Harley Davidson motorcycles, orange juice, letters and other items that Trudeau he argued that Canadians could easily find replacements.

“It ended up causing a lot of losses to American companies for whom Canada is their number one export partner. We’re the number one export partner to about 35 different states in the US, and anything that thickens the border between us ends up costing American citizens and American Jobs is not what President Trump was elected for,” Trudeau said. “I know he was elected to try to make life easier for all Americans, to support working Americans. These are things that will hurt them.”

Justin Trudeau during the funeral of the late former President Jimmy Carter at the Washington National Cathedral in Washington, DC on Thursday, January 9, 2025. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Trump said last week that the US doesn’t need oil, or anything else, from Canada, but almost a quarter of the oil the US consumes every day comes from Canada. The energy-rich western province of Alberta exports 4.3 million barrels of oil a day to the US, according to the Associated Press. Data from the US Energy Information Administration shows that the US consumes 20 million barrels per day and produces about 13.2 million barrels per day.

A founding partner of NATO and home to more than 40 million people, Canada is also the top export destination for 36 US states. Nearly $2.7 billion in goods and services cross the border every day.

Trump has said he would reconsider his tariff threat if Canada made improvements in managing security at the Canada-U.S. border, which he and his advisers see as a potential entry point for illegal immigrants. legal

Trudeau has said that less than 1% of illegal immigrants and fentanyl cross into the United States from Canada.

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However, after his meeting with Trump at Mar-a-LagoTrudeau announced increased spending on border security, expressing a willingness to address Trump’s concerns in hopes that he would reconsider his tariff threat.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.