Commitment comes after week of chaotic messaging from U.S. president

U.S. President Donald Trump says he will end a month-long pause and slap a 25 per cent tariff on most Canadian goods as of March 4, claiming he needs to take action because “drugs are still pouring into our country” despite evidence that a crackdown at the border is working.

Trump said in a social media post Thursday that fentanyl imports are killing people and the U.S. “cannot allow this scourge to continue to harm the USA” and he will levy a 25 per cent tariff on Canada “until it stops, or is seriously limited.”

He also says his threatened reciprocal tariffs on specific goods set to come into effect in April “will remain in full force and effect.”

The commitment comes after a week of chaotic messaging from the president.

  • Cyborganism@lemmy.ca
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    21 hours ago

    LOL! Well first of all Trump wildly exaggerated how much fentanyl was being brought into the US from Canada.

    The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) says it seized 4.9 kilograms of fentanyl on its side of the U.S.-Canada border between Jan. 1 to Oct. 31, 2024. The agency says that’s a 775 per cent increase from the same time period in 2023. 4.1 kilograms was intercepted outbound this year before it could be smuggled toward the Netherlands, they said in an online breakdown.

    Source

    More stats here

    They set up a border fentanyl “Czar” and spent a few millions to have a increased presence at the border with little impact. Because there’s already so little fentanyl crossing from Canada to the U.S.

    CBSA launches Operation Blizzard to target fentanyl and other synthetic narcotics

    There’s a lot more coming into Canada from the U.S. actually. But the main and biggest source is China.

    • ahal@lemmy.ca
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      20 hours ago

      I’m not disagreeing that trumps claims are bullshit? I’m wondering what the “lots of time and money” were. AFAIK, we spent a few million dollars to fly some helicopters around. We might just have very different definitions of what “a lot of money” means in the context of federal spending.

      Besides, if those millions of dollars bought us one extra month of no tariffs, that’s the investment of the century. Quite the opposite of a waste of time.

      • Cyborganism@lemmy.ca
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        20 hours ago

        Let’s agree to disagree on that one.

        The end result is the same. It only delayed the inevitable, made us waste our time and resources that we could’ve used for better things, and we’re still going to have a fucked up economy and make our lives a living hell.

        I’m already pretty mad that I had to survive through the economic crash of 2008 at the start of my adult life and I had to cancel all my life goals of having a family and shit. And now I have to deal with this bullshit when I finally achieved financial comfort. Fuck all of this. I’m mad as hell.

        • Franklin@lemmy.ca
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          18 hours ago

          Nah we didn’t bend to jack shit, Trudeau did what we were already doing and Trump called it good enough and now Trump’s changing his mind because he’s pulling from Putin’s bag of tricks: soft power projection by questioning our sovereignty. Trudeau made the right call but unfortunately it doesn’t matter.

          • OldTellus@lemmy.ca
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            19 hours ago

            Agreed. This was never about drugs, we can’t stop what isn’t happening. Trudeau bought us a month to get our shit together and prepare for the inevitable, Which we’ve done. At least we won’t be completely blindsided this time.