Trump's Ridiculous Bullying of Canada Is Backfiring

Writing in his Guardian US column, former US secretary of labour Robert Reich argues that Donald Trump's trade offensive against Canada is generating significant political blowback on both sides of the border — a case he builds on a combination of polling data, by-election results, and approaching provincial votes.

A new Reuters/Ipsos poll cited by Reich finds that 57% of Americans oppose Trump's tariffs on Canadian imports, with 63% opposing his executive order to rename Lake Ontario "Lake America" and only 20% supporting the higher levies. The opposition is described as particularly pronounced in border states whose economies are closely tied to Canada's.

In Michigan, Reich writes, Democrats have launched attack advertisements targeting Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers for declining to condemn the tariffs. Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is quoted calling Trump an "asshole" for launching the trade war.

Trump's US trade representative, Jamieson Greer, has said the duties are too small to harm the United States and are "more [Canada's] emergency than ours".

On the Canadian side, Prime Minister Mark Carney's decision to pursue "dollar for dollar" retaliatory tariffs targeting goods from Ohio and Texas — states with competitive Senate elections — has, according to Reich, produced a surge in support for the Liberal Party. The Liberals won three special by-elections on Monday, including one in a Quebec constituency hit hard by US tariffs, where a Liberal candidate edged out a candidate from the separatist Parti Québécois.

Reich contends that the trade conflict has, at least in the short term, subdued Canada's separatist movements. Two votes loom as tests of that claim: on 5 October, Quebec holds a provincial election in which the Parti Québécois is seeking additional seats in the province's legislature, and on 19 October, Alberta votes on whether to hold a referendum on secession from Canada.

Key dates and outstanding measures

Carney's retaliatory tariffs are scheduled to take effect on 8 September. Trump has separately threatened 50% tariffs on automobiles and auto parts, though those measures are not set to come into force until New Year's Day. Reich's column, characteristically polemical in tone, nonetheless notes that time remains to avert the worst economic and political consequences of the dispute.

Reich is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, and a former member of the Clinton cabinet. The views expressed are his own.