Donald Trump has created yet another mess that will cause the rest of us harm. Despite posturing as a smart businessman and deal-maker, Trump failed to make a deal on his tariffs with our closest ally, Canada. The result will be higher prices for everybody.
President “Deal-Maker” had claimed to have made one. “On Tuesday he declared that the two nations had reached a deal aside from working out some details and had extended an earlier deadline that would have introduced the new tariffs,” The New York Times reported. “Just hours before the two sides announced negotiations had been suspended, Mr. Trump said he thought a deal could be reached.” Prime Minister Mark Carney “never echoed that,” The Times noted, in a separate article.
Whether Trump was lying, deluded, ignorant, or too busy “traveling with Natalie” to fully grasp the situation won’t matter to our wallets. The end result is the same: price hikes The Times describes as “prohibitive” for Americans already struggling with Trumpflation.
Trump’s “deal-making” will now impose new 50% tariffs on a variety of goods, “including wine, dairy, cement, clothing and hockey equipment,” as per the BBC. That’s in addition to existing U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum, autos, and lumber.
In return, Carney has promised to retaliate “dollar for dollar.” That includes some steel products, AP says, as well as “the dairy, appliance, agricultural equipment, pulp and paper and electronics sectors.”
Not that any of this is likely to keep President Billionaire up at night. He’s too busy obsessing over putting his name on The Kennedy Center, building his golden ballroom – and pretending he has not lost the Iran War he started for no good reason.
