{"id":136413,"date":"2025-05-06T13:55:57","date_gmt":"2025-05-06T13:55:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-and-carney-to-meet-at-white-house-in-closely-watched-encounter-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2025-05-06T13:55:57","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T13:55:57","slug":"trump-and-carney-to-meet-at-white-house-in-closely-watched-encounter-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-and-carney-to-meet-at-white-house-in-closely-watched-encounter-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump and Carney to meet at White House in closely watched encounter – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Vibe at meeting could hint at future relationship between the two countries and their two leaders
Canada\u2019s prime minister, Mark Carney, was due to meet with the US president, Donald Trump<\/a>, on Tuesday in a closely watched encounter at the White House that could hint at the future relationship between the two countries and their two leaders.
Over the weekend, Trump said it was \u201chighly unlikely\u201d he would use military force to annex Canada<\/a>, a key trading partner and political ally. In recent months, the president has repeatedly threatened to use economic coercion to weaken Canada to the point that it accedes to Trump\u2019s wish to make it the 51st state.
\u201cI think we\u2019re not ever going to get to that point, something could happen with Greenland \u2026 I don\u2019t see it with Canada, I just don\u2019t see it, I have to be honest with you,\u201d he said.
Carney crafted much of his federal election campaign on Canada\u2019s collective outrage over the US president\u2019s threats to the nation\u2019s sovereignty. During his victory speech last week, Carney used one of his campaign\u2019s most frequently delivered lines, telling exuberant supporters Trump wanted to \u201cbreak us, so that America can own us\u201d<\/a>.
\u201cThat will never, ever happen,\u201d he added, to shouts from the crowd.
Carney also used his first post-election press conference to once again quash any idea Canada was interested in becoming the 51st US state, a proposal repeatedly floated by Trump.
\u201cIt\u2019s always important to distinguish want from reality<\/a>,\u201d Carney said on Friday.
Colin Robertson, a former senior Canadian diplomat who has had numerous postings in the US, said Trump\u2019s relatively cordial tone since the election bodes well for the Canadian delegation and makes an Oval Office ambush less likely<\/a>.
Robertson speculated that Trump\u2019s background as a property developer has helped frame his perception of Carney \u2013 who he last week referred to as a \u201cvery nice gentleman\u201d.
\u201cAnybody I met in real estate, their favourite people are bankers. I suspect that immediately, Trump will look at Carney as a kind of \u2018super banker\u2019 and see him in a positive light,\u201d he said.
\u201cAnd Carney\u2019s also been very careful not to be personally critical of Trump, beyond talking about him that we\u2019re a sovereign country, and this is how we\u2019re doing stuff. That\u2019s worked very well for him. He pushed back when Trump questioned our sovereignty, but that pushback would be something the president understands, because that\u2019s how he behaves.\u201d
While much was made about Trump\u2019s awkward handshake<\/a> with Carney\u2019s predecessor Justin Trudeau, the pair had a famously frosty relationship.
In Trudeau\u2019s final days as prime minister, Trump repeatedly derided him as \u201cgovernor\u201d of Canada. And while the president had sometimes called the prime minister a \u201cvery nice guy\u201d, Trump also called Trudeau \u201ctwo-faced\u201d after he was revealed on video leading the laughter<\/a> at Trump\u2019s expense at a Nato summit.
Still, Carney\u2019s \u201cantagonistic\u201d rhetoric towards Trump might be something he might regret when faced with the economic realities of Canada\u2019s dependence on the United States, said Ryan Hurl, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Toronto.
\u201cI suspect he backs away from the idea that our relationship with the United States is \u2018over\u2019 and he might modify it to say that our relationship is \u2018changing\u2019,\u201d said Hurl. \u201cTrade negotiations are never completely static and hopefully he can present his negotiations with Trump as something that is better for Canada, and not simply as bending the knee to President Trump.\u201d
The headwinds the prime minister faces in Tuesday\u2019s White House meeting are already sufficiently strong, on both the economic and partisan fronts.
\u201cIf Carney presents himself as making concessions to Trump to preserve the trading relationship between the two countries, the Conservative party will be able to take advantage of this,\u201d said Hurl. \u201cBut if no agreements can be made, Canadians are going to start feeling the political the economic fallout very quickly.\u201d
Carney ran much of his brief federal election campaign on the idea that Canada needed to seek out new trade markets. And while a pledge to reshape Canada\u2019s economic structure was welcomed by voters, many of the structural changes implied by such a policy shift \u2013 including eliminating internal trade barriers and getting more Canadian products to foreign markets \u2013 will take time. \u201cYou can\u2019t just snap your fingers and change port capacity. That is a generational project,\u201d said Hurl.
Meanwhile, Trump is also starting to face domestic pressure: his decision to launch a trade war with allies and foes alike has started to harm him in public opinion<\/a> as US companies warn they are prepared to raise costs for consumers.
\u201cTrump has probably overreached on trade issues and we\u2019re really starting to see the pushback now. With questions over consumer confidence and the direction of the country, we can be part of the solution to Trump\u2019s self-inflicted problem,\u201d said Robertson.
He pointed to Canada\u2019s \u201crelatively strong\u201d bargaining position as the two delegations meet at the White House.
Canada\u2019s federal government has invested in increased border checks, and fentanyl interceptions \u2013 the supposed pretext for Trump\u2019s tariffs \u2013 have dropped further from a low starting point.
Trade officials anticipate the United States will request changes to the USMCA free trade agreement, which is due for negotiations in 2026. And despite Trump\u2019s repeated assertions that the United States doesn\u2019t need Canada\u2019s resources, experts say potash, steel and aluminum remain key purchases for American farmers and manufacturers.
\u201cAnd if, for example, they raise the issue of dairy<\/a> and supply management, we can ask, \u2018What do you want here? Do you want more access for dairy products? Because you\u2019re not using your quota right now. And you also practice supply management when it comes to rice and sugar and cotton. So if you want to negotiate this, then we\u2019ve got the process,\u201d said Robertson. \u201cAt the end of the day, what\u2019s really important about this meeting, as my kids would say, is the \u2018vibe\u2019 between the two. That\u2019s almost more important than whatever processes are committed to moving forward.\u201d
Those close to the prime minister say he is approaching the meeting like he did during debate preparations in the federal election: preparing for all possible iterations of the unpredictable president.
\u201cWith Trump, you\u2019re just never sure on any day where he is, what\u2019s going on in his head and who was the last person to talk to him before in the meeting,\u201d said Robertson. \u201cBut one thing we know about Carney, he has always been two things: disciplined and prepared.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Vibe at meeting could hint at future relationship between the two countries and their two leadersCanada\u2019s prime minister, Mark Carney, was due to meet with the US president, Donald Trump, on Tuesday in a closely watched encounter at the White House that could hint at the future relationship between the two countries and their two […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":136414,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-136413","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136413\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}