美加贸易战未见缓和迹象，特朗普再挑地名之争

For the latest on the tariff back and forth, we're joined by Bloomberg colleagues on both sides of the border. We've got White House correspondent Jeff Mason back with us from Washington and executive editor for Canada, Derek DeCloet. He's joining us from Toronto. Jeff, I think we're gonna start with you. Why are we renaming the Great Lake? Why is this where the president is focused? And it seems to me that has gone down not particularly well even among some of the president's supporters.

Why indeed, Christina? I I think I would answer that by saying this is not the first time the president has sought to rename a body of water. He, at the very beginning of his term, sought to change the name of the Gulf Of Mexico to the Gulf Of America. And when I say sought, he did effectively, at least on US maps and in this country. And with the with the Lake Of Ontario, now the Lake Of America, according to president Trump, it's his latest step basically to kind of undermine Canada or or dig at Canada during these trade negotiations while also putting naming rights on a body of water, which which actually I think he believes is another way of showing US dominance.

So that's a a long way of saying there are two things going on here. Number one, he wants to get to Canada over these trade talks, which he's been very unhappy at. And number two, he has shown since the very beginning of his second term a desire to put names on things, either his own, or US names, to to show dominance of the country that he leads. And, Derek, what's the view like from the Canadian side of the border?

We saw Carney pushing back strongly on x, giving a bit of detail behind the name of Lake Ontario calling out that it is more than 400 years old, but also saying, quote, we know that America is changing their trading relations, their foreign policies, their national monuments, their hydro nims. Canadians also know that naming reality means calling it Lake Ontario then, now, and always. Derek, what say you? Yeah. I mean, first of all, that caused everybody to go to their dictionaries to to, understand the word hydrolyms.

Yeah. It was not on the top of my list. I don't know. Both have a first time I read it. So to be fair. Yeah. Okay. Continue. We're on the same page there. Yeah. Know, this in Canada is seen mostly as as trolling, you know, as not particularly being serious. You know? But people are definitely engaged with it. They're definitely talking about it. The front page of the Toronto Star yesterday in all caps letters had the words Lake Ontario forever at a picture of somebody, you know, jumping into the lake and having a having a nice summer day.

So, you know, so there's that. There's there's almost like a like a bit of amusement, you know, frustration because it's not like this is the the first time that that Trump has, you know, has trolled Canada. It's it's the first time he's tried to to rename a great Lake, but, you know, we've we've been hearing since he came back to the White House about the fifty first state and all and all these sorts of things. So the feeling here is like a combination of, like, you know, anger, frustration, but also, like like, to be honest, a bit of eye rolling at at these tactics because, yeah, because as as Carney pointed out, Lake Ontario is a name that goes back before the declaration of independence and before the creation of Canada.

Derek, I'm also wondering I mean, we chuckle a little bit, but this does underline a really serious issue. And in trade wars, generally, everybody loses. We've got a story on Bloomberg right now that economists are telling Carney. They think Canada can weather the storm. Canadians are great at hunkering down for a long winter, but do we think there's still hopes for talks? What is the status of these negotiations if there are any at this moment, and and what is Canada trying to get realistically from this president?

Yeah. I mean, our information is there are no current talks and that the the Kearny government doesn't really believe that you will have serious talks again until after after the US midterms. You know, what Canada wants I mean, there there is an acknowledgment, including an acknowledgment in that in that tweet that that that social media post that that was read earlier that The US is is changing, it's changed its whole philosophy, and nothing will be tariff free.

Like, you know, at at the beginning of this trade war, people in Canada were saying, but we have tariff free trade. And now now they've sort of, you know, given up on on that argument. What Canada wants is to is to have tariffs low enough that they can save the auto industry here, including plants of General Motors and Ford and, you know, and Honda that are, you know, quite productive and and quite economically important, and then to buy time economically so that the country can diversify its its trading relationships.

You know, there there's a very ambitious goal set out by Mark Cearney to double the amount of of non US exports from Canada over ten years. That takes time. You have to build infrastructure. You need new ports. You need new oil pipelines. And so that is sort of the the the long range plan. And, Jeff, Jameson Greer threatened further tariffs and a ban on Canadian goods. Last I checked, it's the end of August. Midterms are not too far.

Doing more to increase prices potentially and cause more inflation, in particular, in swing states should be top of mind, you would think, for president Trump. What's the read from the White House from DC right now? You would think that it would be at the top of mind for president Trump, but he has been dismissive of the impact of his policies on the economy, exhibit a being the Iran war when he's asked about the impact on the on voters, on gasoline prices.

He sort of swatched those questions away because he feels so strongly that the Iran war was the right decision. I think that that same principle applies here with the tariffs on Canada. He feels that The United States has been taken advantage of can has been taken advantage of by Canada, and that's a reason for being a hardliner in these talks and for directing the penalties, the trade penalties against against Canada that he has directed.

So all that said, that doesn't take away the fact that it's creating economic pain in swing states that are important for his party going into the midterms. So there will be an effect of that. There will be consequences for that, and we'll have to see if that's something that drives either side, back to the table before the the midterm elections or, whether it comes after that. Derek, we just see Canada back down on a potential seafood retorious retaliatory tariff.

Excuse me. I'm wondering if this could be the way this goes. We've seen this kind of before where especially, you know, when The US was negotiating with China, everybody starts big, and then you start to carve away some of those sectors that leaders see they need. Do you see this going more of a piecemeal as you go through this? Is that a more realistic approach? And are there any particular sectors that are gonna get hit really hard by this in Canada?

I mean, there there could be a process like that where where they sort of take away things or, like, try to deescalate step by step, and that's probably a process that would, you know, not be led by Donald Trump and Mark Cearney, but it would happen at much lower diplomatic levels. Although the the dropping of the of the fish and seafood counter tariffs by Canada was based in part on the concern and feedback that that it would hurt fish processors in Canada that take stuff from the from The US and then and then then process it.

There so there was an economic argument there. There there is going to be, though, without question, you know, assuming that the new US tariffs stay on, came on a week ago, and the counter tariffs from Canada come on on September 8, there's definitely gonna be economic

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