Canadian Leader Fires Shot at Trump With Plan to Tariff the U.S. Right Back

The leader of Canada’s New Democratic Party became the latest Canadian elected official to speak out against President-elect Donald Trump’s continued tariff threats, calling on his counterparts running in this year’s upcoming federal election to support countermeasures against the U.S.

Jagmeet Singh, the leader of the left-leaning minority party, called on Canadian leaders to impose “retaliatory tariffs” on U.S. imports and cut off exports of crucial minerals like cobalt and lithium.

“In order to continue to export all minerals and products to the United States without job-killing tariffs, we need to stand up to the bully now,” Singh said in a statement on Monday.

“If you think you can pick a fight with us, there’ll be a price to pay,” Singh said in a video posted over the weekend on social media. “If Donald Trump imposes tariffs on us, we should respond with retaliatory tariffs in kind.”

The NDP leader said that Canada was “not for sale,” and bragged about Canadian firefighters deploying to fight the ongoing wildfires in California.

“Right now, with the forest fires ravaging homes, Canadian firefighters showed up,” he said. “That’s who we are. We show up and support our neighbors.”

Singh’s left-leaning New Democratic Party controls only 25 seats in the Canadian House of Commons, but was a crucial partner for Justin Trudeau’s governing coalition. Singh withdrew from the coalition in December—one of the first signals of the collapse of Trudeau’s government.

Trudeau announced he would step down as prime minister and leader of the Liberals in January, and Canada will hold a federal election later this year. Polling averages published by the CBC show the party stagnating at the same level, while support for Pierre Poilievre’s Conservative Party surges.

Poilievre has also stood his ground against the threat of tariffs, and previously slammed Trump’s posturing.

“Canada will never be the 51st state. Period. We are a great and independent country,” the Conservative leader wrote in a post on social media, while blaming Trudeau and the Liberal-NDP coalition for weakening the country.

At a press conference last week, Poilievre called Trump’s proposed tariffs “self-harm” and outlined his own vision for fighting them by pressuring American businesses to stand up to the Trump administration and oppose the measures.

“We should go to the American workers in the Midwest, and their union and business leaders, and say ‘how many jobs are you prepared to lose by hitting Canadian energy with tariffs—energy that we sell to America at discounts that create six figure jobs for American workers. How many of those people will go out of work?”