Donald Trump initially showed a modicum of respect to Mark Carney, who has a deep and impressive resumé in finance and banking.Evan Vucci/The Associated Press
Debra Thompson is a contributing columnist for The Globe and Mail.
The President of the United States is low-key obsessed with Canada, and it’s getting, like, a little embarrassing.
Back in 2017, Mr. Trump called then-prime minister Justin Trudeau “a man who has become a friend of mine” and said the two leaders had “a very good relationship.” The sentiment didn’t last long, perhaps because the Canadian leader represented, at the time, a lot of what Mr. Trump was not: young, popular, competent. Or perhaps Mr. Trump was salty that he couldn’t replicate former president Barack Obama’s bromance with Mr. Trudeau. Whatever the cause, after leaving early from the G7 Summit in Quebec in June, 2018, Mr. Trump tweeted that Mr. Trudeau “acted so meek and mild during our @G7 meetings,” before calling him “very dishonest & weak.”
Since his re-election in November, 2024, Mr. Trump has repeatedly floated the idea that Canada should become “the cherished 51st state,” including on the last day of the most recent federal election campaign. And, just like the guy at the bar who shoots his shot and is quickly shot down, Mr. Trump has disproportionately lashed out at the country that rejected his unwanted advances. The desultory tariff threats, the baseless claims about the fentanyl smuggling and human trafficking across the Canada-U.S. border, the US$61-billion price tag for joining the Golden Dome missile defence system, the all-caps social media declaration that “ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED” following an Ontario ad featuring former president Ronald Reagan – these aren’t exactly the moves of a confident strategist. They are the acts of a petulant president who doesn’t like being told “no.”
Mr. Trump exhibited some initial openness toward, and even admiration of, Prime Minister Mark Carney. After all, Mr. Trump doesn’t see the world in terms of ideology; instead, he understands power as personal. That instinct explains both his willingness to use the office of the President to punish those he views as his political enemies and why he initially showed a modicum of respect to Mr. Carney, who has a deep and impressive resumé in finance and banking. Mr. Trump responds well to money and power, since he sees himself as projecting the image of both.
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And because Mr. Trump trades in the currency of status and is infatuated with the idea that he is a master negotiator, he is forever lamenting that the United States is getting a “bad deal.” He approaches international relationships as transactions with clear winners and losers, and he is determined that the United States – by which he means himself – never appear to be on the losing end.
But this presidency has not been the cakewalk Mr. Trump may have anticipated. There have been pushback and protests. The courts have constrained him. He can’t even get Greenland. And while the real, material costs of the President’s politics are invariably borne by the most economically vulnerable segments of the American population, the reputational costs of bluster and blunder unmet are Mr. Trump’s to carry alone.
In that light, Canada can look like an inviting stage – one that Mr. Trump brazenly and mistakenly sees as an easy win.
Mr. Trump’s latest tirade about the Gordie Howe International Bridge, which connects Detroit and Windsor, Ont., fits neatly into this pattern. Mr. Trump was, once again, aggrieved that Canada is “taking advantage” of the United States. “With all that we have given them, we should own, perhaps, at least one half of this asset,” he said. “I will not allow this bridge to open until the United States is fully compensated for everything we have given them, and also, importantly, Canada treats the United States with the Fairness and Respect that we deserve.”
Mr. Carney has the unenviable position of trying to reason with someone with the reaction-oriented, prestige-hungry psychology of a content creator. Trust that this won’t be the last time Mr. Carney must find a way to soothe an inflated ego. Canada will be a recurring foil for as long as Mr. Trump holds office. To him, we are a country that is insufficiently grateful, “taking advantage” of American generosity, too cozy with America’s rivals, just too sovereign.
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Mr. Trump sees Canada as an easy target. We are, and always have been, geographically, culturally and economically close to the United States, even as our population, our economy and our military are much smaller. It is precisely this familiarity that makes the rejection sting and keeps Mr. Trump returning to his endless list of grievances again and again. It also makes Canada’s consistent rebuke of Mr. Trump’s advances more personal and more dangerous. Obsession is only fuelled by reaction. Even negative attention is attention desired.
But the border is not a bargaining chip, and our sovereignty is, as Mr. Carney already told Mr. Trump, not for sale.