Washington D.C.: US President Donald Trump has said he will slap a 35% tariff on Canadian goods starting 1 August. Trump announced the latest levies on Canada on Thursday in a letter posted to social media and addressed to Prime Minister Mark Carney.
He also tied the tariffs to what he called ‘Canada’s failure’ to stop the flow of fentanyl into the US, as well as Canada’s existing levies on US dairy farmers and the trade deficit between the two countries. ‘If Canada works with me to stop the flow of Fentanyl, we will, perhaps, consider an adjustment to this letter. These Tariffs may be modified, upward or downward, depending on our relationship with Your Country,’ Trump said.
The US has already imposed a blanket 25% tariff on some Canadian goods, and the country is feeling the pain of the Trump administration’s global steel, aluminium and auto tariffs. He also recently announced a 50% tariff on copper imports, scheduled to take effect next month. It is unclear if the latest tariffs threat would apply to goods covered by the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA).
Canada sells about three-quarters of its goods to the US, and is an auto manufacturing hub and a major supplier of metals, making the US tariffs especially damaging to those sectors. Trump’s letter said the 35% tariffs are separate to those sector-specific levies.
