Can't make this shit up... Insane!

Trump warns Canada over bridge, deal he says will eliminate hockey

Brett Rowland

President Donald Trump warned Canada over plans for a bridge and a deal with China that he says would eliminate ice hockey and the Stanley Cup in the latest trade tensions between the neighboring nations.

Trump threatened to hold up the opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge connecting Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, saying the transit project was unfair. The bridge project has been underway for years and was expected to open early this year.

"Canada is building a massive bridge between Ontario and Michigan. They own both the Canada and the United States side and, of course, built it with virtually no U.S. content. President Barack Hussein Obama stupidly gave them a waiver so they could get around the BUY AMERICAN Act, and not use any American products, including our Steel," Trump wrote in a lengthy social media post on the topic. "Now, the Canadian Government expects me, as President of the United States, to PERMIT them to just 'take advantage of America!' What does the United States of America get — Absolutely NOTHING!"

Trump said he will begin talks on partial American ownership of the bridge project, which is operated by the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority, a not-for-profit Canadian Crown corporation that manages the bridge through a public-private partnership. Canada is paying for the project, estimated to cost $5.7 billion. The bridge is publicly owned by Canada and the state of Michigan. Canada plans to recover its up-front building costs from toll revenues over time.

"We will start negotiations, IMMEDIATELY. With all that we have given them, we should own, perhaps, at least one half of this asset," Trump wrote on social media. "The revenues generated because of the U.S. Market will be astronomical."

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said she plans to speak directly to Trump about the matter. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Tuesday the situation would be resolved after he spoke with Trump.

Trump also slammed Ontario for refusing to sell U.S.-made booze. The Liquor Control Board of Ontario banned the sale of U.S.-made products last year. Ontario Premier Doug Ford has said he'll keep the ban in place until Trump's tariffs are lifted.

Trump's more dire warnings came over a deal between Canada and China. In January, Carney and Chinese officials announced a deal to ease tariffs they had put on each other's products. China reduced tariffs on Canadian agricultural products, and Canada agreed to import 49,000 Chinese electric cars at a 6.1% tariff. The deal represents less than 3% of the new-vehicle market in Canada, according to the Prime Minister's office. However, Carney said it was a starting point.

At the time, Trump threatened Canada with 100% tariffs on imports. Trump said Monday that the future of Canada's most popular sport, ice hockey, is at stake.

"The first thing China will do is terminate ALL Ice Hockey being played in Canada, and permanently eliminate The Stanley Cup," Trump wrote on his social media platform.

Canada's economy is directly tied to the U.S. Most of its exports go to the U.S. Trump imposed 35% tariffs on Canadian goods in early 2025, except for products covered by the 2020 trade deal, the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement.

Those tariffs hit Canada's economy hard. Canadian exports dropped, business investment slowed, and tariff uncertainty dragged the nation's economy, according to a recent report from the International Monetary Fund. Carney has publicly pivoted away from the U.S. since early 2025, when Trump hit America's northern neighbor with tariffs over drugs and illegal immigration. Since then, Carney has discussed the "rupture" between the two neighbors and sought out deals with countries around the world, including China.

It has been a roller coaster ride for outgoing Canadian Ambassador to the U.S. Kirsten Hillman, who is leaving Washington this month after six years as Ottawa’s top envoy to the U.S.

Hillman, who assumed her post in 2020, recalled “hard” and “volatile” trade talks with the U.S. and Mexico during President Trump’s first term, but she said “we didn’t have any fundamental questioning of the fact that predictable and open trade among the three countries was good for America and with Canada and from Mexico.”

All parties seemed to agree that North American trade, Hillman said, “made American businesses more competitive and more prosperous and communities stronger.”

That sense of stability, however is “not the case today,” she said during an interview on Jan. 20 at the Canadian Embassy, from her office overlooking the Capitol.

“I think Canadians took for granted that a strong, predictable, open relationship with Canada based on a sort of mutual benefit would always be something that Americans not only believed in, but would kind of fight for, and I think that that is no longer the case. And I think Canadians have had a range of reactions to that, from sort of disbelief to anger to sadness,” Hillman said.

After returning to the White House last year, Trump imposed 25 percent tariffs on all Canadian goods, later raising them to 35 percent and then 45 percent in October. In March, shortly before his election, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said the old economic relationship between the U.S. and Canada was “over.”

After a friendly Oval Office visit in May that was all smiles and compliments, relations between Trump and Carney have quickly soured. The Canadian leader delivered a provocative speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last month, calling on “middle powers” to unite against global hegemony, prompting Trump to lash out with tariff threats.

Trump, in response, revoked Canada’s invitation to join his Board of Peace, potentially leaving it out of efforts to broker an end to fighting in Gaza and beyond.

He also threatened to punish Canada for trade deals with China that he initially encouraged, and Monday, he threatened to block the opening of a major bridge between Ontario and Michigan unless Carney meets a litany of trade demands, including easing high tariffs on milk and lifting limits on U.S. alcohol sales.

Despite Trump’s antagonism, Hillman said she remained optimistic the U.S. and Canada would eventually return to a stable economic relationship.

“Probably not without a certain amount of volatility or, you know, commentary, but I think we’ll get there and that the reason we’ll get there is because it’s what’s best for Americans, American workers, American companies, American communities, American jobs,” she said.

The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a trade pact Hillman helped negotiate during Trump’s first term, is up for review this year. She noted how the deal had seen U.S. exports to Canada jump 20 percent.

“So I believe that in the end, the facts will govern the outcomes that we’re able to achieve,” she added.

However, Hillman conceded that among Canadian business leaders, “I don’t think there’s a sense that predictability is going to come back anytime soon.”

“Business leaders are telling me that they won’t go back, because … they won’t go back to putting too many eggs in one basket or expecting things to be as they always were, because they have come to realize that an administration can make changes, and that changes the entire business relationship that they have with the entire country,” she said.

The impact of Trump’s antagonism toward allies is also being felt in Canada’s security planning as Carney weighs the prudence of purchasing dozens of new F-35 fighter jets from the U.S.

During his speech at Davos, Carney said middle powers should both look inward to build stronger domestic economies while also diversifying trade relationships as a bulwark against undue reliance on major powers.

The forum would be both a platform and a testing ground for this new vision of a united middle power, as Canada and other NATO allies successfully pushed back on Trump’s threats to take Greenland by military force — forcing him to pull back on threatened sanctions against countries that sent forces to defend the island.

“[T]here are things that are being questioned today that haven’t been questioned before, and that is not just with Canada, but with allies around the world.” Hillman said.

Hillman insists the public tensions between leaders obscure a functioning relationship playing out between diplomats and trade representatives on both sides of the border.

“With the Trump administration, we do have very solid relationships in his team,” she said. “Doesn’t mean we agree with them all the time, but we have individuals who are responsive, who are willing to talk things through with us, who are willing to listen to the Canadian perspective.”

But Hillman conceded that there’s really one person who ultimately makes decisions in this administration: Trump.

“Our prime minister has a good relationship with President Trump, an open relationship with him, and we do have that at the cabinet level across almost every portfolio,” she said. “So that is essential, and that is helpful. It doesn’t solve every problem or concern or issue, but it is vital to do so, so that hasn’t changed.”

Carney told reporters in Canada on Tuesday that he spoke with Trump — both about the president’s threat to close the cross-border bridge and Tuesday afternoon’s Olympic women’s ice hockey game between the North American neighbors.

“This is a great example of cooperation between our countries,” Carney said of the bridge. “I’m not going into detail about those issues,” he continued, addressing the broader trade tensions between the U.S. and Canada.

The new point person for dealing with those problems will be Mark Wiseman, who, like Carney, has spent his career in the world of finance.

Hillman’s advice for her successor: “You have to get out of Washington.”

“America is a big, big place. Some of the most successful and personally gratifying times I’ve spent have been, in Texas, for example, in West Virginia. West Virginia is not Texas. Texas is not Washington state,” she said.

“You’ve got to get out there,” she added. “You’ve got to meet people. You’ve got to create connections. You’ve got to build alliances, not only for the purposes of advising the government, but for the purposes of having allies across the country.”