Trump, Carney Float a Deal to End the Auto-Tariff War

TTAC News Staff
by TTAC News Staff

Just before the U.S. midterms, Canada and the United States are suddenly sounding chummy about the trade war they've been waging since summer. Make of that timing what you will.


Prime Minister Mark Carney said Sunday he'd held a constructive conversation with President Donald Trump about a possible trade deal, with both sides' negotiators due to hammer out an agreement over the next few weeks. Trump, landing in Iowa for a rally, offered his own characteristically precise assessment: "We have the concept of a very good deal with Canada."


For the auto crowd, the relevant piece is this: Washington and Ottawa have been talking about easing U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and automobiles. Neither side has announced any specifics. The negotiations also reportedly involve construction of the Keystone XL pipeline and the prospect of erasing tariffs that U.S. farmers pay on Canadian products.


"Part of the agreement is that our farmers will have to pay no tariffs," Trump said, though his own comments made clear final details aren't settled. He added the deal would be "great for our farmers, great for our country, and it'll be fine for Canada."

Carney framed his side around creating jobs, bringing down household costs, and protecting the country's language, culture, and sovereignty. "Our teams will now be working in the coming weeks to deliver that outcome," he wrote on social media.


The upbeat tone marks a turn from August, when Canada abandoned the talks after refusing U.S. demands that Carney called a threat to its sovereignty, its French-language protections, and its auto sector. Trump responded by slapping 50% tariffs on about $20 billion in Canadian goods, and Canada retaliated.


The sudden thaw also lines up with the political calendar. Trump's trade war has become an issue in Senate races in Michigan and Maine, where border-state voters feel the pain. Michigan Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers has pushed to end the tariff fight.

Robert Bothwell, a University of Toronto historian, urged skepticism, comparing the improved mood to "five minutes of variable sunshine. Rain later." As recently as Wednesday, Carney himself said a deal before Tuesday's vote wasn't in the cards.


[Images: WhiteHouse.gov, Canada.gov, author]


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  • Markets tanking. How interesting.

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  • MaintenanceCosts MaintenanceCosts 2 hours ago

    The decline is almost totally in what should now be considered AI stocks. Unfortunately, we were due for a correction there. Everyone knows at heart that the returns from the technology as it exists now cannot support the current rate of capital investment, and a fair amount of money is going to be lost. But apparently it took some anti-data-center politicians getting elected to get people to act on their knowledge.

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    • MaintenanceCosts MaintenanceCosts 19 minutes ago

      This new breed of Democrat is quite unlike Nancy Pelosi, and, while I have a lot of respect for her mastery of legislative discipline, that is a good thing. I would be pretty surprised if this new Congress doesn't manage to pass a ban on member trading, possibly against the wishes of the new speaker.

      There is a large contingent of Democrats that wants permitting reform to make transmission infrastructure and nuclear and renewable projects easier. In the last Congress, they were even willing to throw in some permits for fossil projects. But coal is going to be a bridge too far for every Democrat except Joe Manchin, and unfortunately the rest of it got defeated narrowly by an unholy coalition of environmental-degrowth leftist Democrats and NIMBY Republicans.

  • Golden2husky It was always about the bean counters. Any part with mechanical connections - accelerator, shifter, parking brake for example, all require a person to connect one end of the control to another part on the car. That connection also has to be designed so that no further adjustment is needed once connected. Hence all those items being electrical now...same guy connecting systems to the harness now just has a few more. While I'm ok with the gas and parking brake, I prefer a traditional shifter. I'm still not thrilled with all the touch stuff in my Honda. Frankly, I choose to take the old Acura unless we need the extra room...
  • Forward Air Controller General Motors recalled 67,380 of its electric vehicles over a software defect that can briefly stop braking while the car is movingso, these software-defined vehicles are just the BOMB, aren't they?Internal testing reproduced the glitch"So we just went ahead and fixed the glitch."
  • Forward Observer Here in the USA we are new at Socialism and might get a little too radical. Is the top of this vehicle resistant to pitchforks and torches?(cf. 'France')
  • MaintenanceCosts The decline is almost totally in what should now be considered AI stocks. Unfortunately, we were due for a correction there. Everyone knows at heart that the returns from the technology as it exists now cannot support the current rate of capital investment, and a fair amount of money is going to be lost. But apparently it took some anti-data-center politicians getting elected to get people to act on their knowledge.
  • Big Oil Trump really knows how to be responsive to voters. Gas and diesel prices are at all time highs due to his war on Iranian schoolgirls, and he decides to direct automakers to force consumers to buy more petroleum. It's the kind of policy you would expect from someone who replaced leadership in science with leadership in getting measles and diarrhea.
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