THE WHITE HOUSE — President Donald Trump doubled down on his desire to see Canada become America’s 51st state in his Oval Office meeting with Prime Minister Mark Carney, but that proposition would guarantee Democrat dominance in American politics for the rest of time.
“I believe it would be a massive tax cut for the Canadian citizens, you get free military, you get tremendous medical cares and other things,” Trump said. “There would be a lot of advantages, but … it would be a massive tax cut.”
Trump also spoke about how there should never have been a straight line “artificially drawn” across the top of the United States, and that getting rid of that border is “the way it was meant to be.”
Carney met with Trump in the Oval Office on Tuesday after requesting a meeting amid the two governments trading tariffs and Carney’s recent election win. But that win is precisely why the United States cannot afford to integrate far-left Canadians into the homeland.
Carney, who leads the Liberal Party, and Conservative Party challenger Pierre Poilievre both ran on who hated Trump more instead of focusing on Canadian issues. Carney even decried what he called the “American betrayal” in his victory speech, and Poilievre, the leader of the opposition in Canadian Parliament, could not even retain the seat that he had held for more than 20 years.
That kind of politics guarantees numerous far-left Democrat members of Congress in the House, and two constant Democrat senators if Canada were to become the 51st state.
Trump’s overtures toward making Canada a state were cordial, yet persistent in the Oval Office meeting. He said that “it takes two to tango,” that the issue would not come up “unless somebody wants to discuss it,” and that no matter what, Carney’s persistence that the joining of the two nations will not happen would not affect their current discussions.
“Time. Time will tell. … But I say: Never say never,” Trump said. “I’ve had many, many things that were not doable, and they ended up being doable and only doable in a very friendly way, if it’s to everybody’s benefit. You know, Canada loves us, and we love Canada. That’s, I think, the No. 1 thing that’s important. But we’ll see, over time, we’ll see what happens.”
Carney, for his part, responded, saying, “As you know from real estate, there are some places that are never for sale. We’re sitting in one right now. … Having met with the owners of Canada over the course of the campaign, the last several months, it’s not for sale, it won’t be for sale, ever.”
While Carney maintains that Canada is “not for sale,” an economic reorientation between the two countries will force Canada to prove it can survive on its own, without the “subsidizing,” as Trump said, provided by the American people.
Trump alluded to some potential issues with Canada’s ability (or lack thereof) to survive on its own in the meeting, saying that Carney’s predecessor, former far-left Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, told him once that a 25 percent tariff on cars coming from Canada “‘would mean the end of Canada.’ He actually said that to me.”
“They have a surplus with us, and there’s no reason for us to be subsidizing Canada,” Trump said. “Canada’s a place that will have to be able to take care of itself economically. I assume they can.”
Tariffs were another big topic of discussion at the meeting, with Trump promising that there was nothing Carney could say to have tariffs dropped and making it clear that tariffs are about building back the American industrial base and promoting American goods and citizens over other countries.
Reindustrialization and balancing trade between the United States and other countries, including Canada, has been a major initiative of the administration’s, both for national security reasons and in order to promote the American family and cultural well being.
Trump pointed to the massive trade deficit between the two countries, saying, “We don’t do much business with Canada, from our standpoint, they do a lot of business with us.”
We want to make our own cars. We don’t really want cars from Canada, and we put tariffs on cars from Canada, and at a certain point, it won’t make economic sense for Canada to build those cars. And we don’t want steel from Canada because we’re making our own steel, and we’re having massive steel plants being built right now as we speak. We really don’t want Canadian steel, and we don’t want Canadian aluminum and various other things because we want to be able to do it ourselves.
While confirming that the United States and Canada would always be friends and that things like military expenditures made to protect Canada would not change, Trump also pointed out that certain things about the relationship will have to change in order to justify policies toward the country to the American people.
“It’s hard to justify subsidizing Canada to the tune of maybe $200 billion a year,” he said. “We protect Canada, militarily, and we always will … that’s not a money thing, but we always will. But, you know, it’s not fair. But why are we subsidizing Canada at $200 billion a year — or whatever the number might be — it’s a very substantial number. And it’s hard for the American taxpayer to say, ‘Gee whiz, we love doing that.’”
Breccan F. Thies is a correspondent for The Federalist. He previously covered education and culture issues for the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. He holds a degree from the University of Virginia and is a 2022 Claremont Institute Publius Fellow. You can follow him on X: @BreccanFThies.
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