Trump ‘not looking to renew’ CUSMA, Ford signs MOU with Pennsylvania

U.S. President Donald Trump says he doesn’t want to renew the Canada-Mexico-U.S. Trade Agreement (CUSMA).

That deal has shielded Canada from much of Trump’s global tariff regime.

“Well I’m not looking to renew it,” Trump said in the White House Wednesday when asked about the upcoming review.

The U.S. president repeated the rhetoric that America doesn’t need products from Canada or Mexico.

“We don’t need their cars. We don’t need their lumber. We don’t need their energy. We don’t need anything that they have,” Trump says.

CUSMA requires that by Canada Day, the U.S., Mexico and Canada must all say if they want to renew the pact for 16 years or renew annually.

Canada and Mexico have already said they want the 16-year renewal, but Trump has said there is only one thing that’s good about the agreement.

“It was a great deal for one reason. It gave the right to terminate,” Trump says about the agreement his previous administration negotiated.

Prime Minister Mark Carney and U.S.-Canada Trade Minister Dominic Leblanc has not commented on Trump’s latest lambasting of the trade deal, but Ontario’s premier has.

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“Where I totally disagree is we do need each other,” Premier Doug Ford says.

“I do not believe that the president is right in suggesting that we don’t need each other. I think our economies are linked and they should be linked,” says Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro while in queen’s park on Wednesday.

Shapiro signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding with Ontario aimed at deepening economic ties in areas like energy, critical minerals and advanced manufacturing.

Both men praised the already established trade relationship, Shapiro calling it balanced and mutually beneficial.

“I want to make sure the USMCA is strengthened to be fair … and I believe that this process was laid out in a way where it would have an opportunity to make tweaks, to make changes,” the governor says.

Ford was also asked about reports that Donald Trump was behind the last-minute cancellation of a reception between the premier and American billionaire Ross Perot Jr. in the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington.

“If that’s the case, so be it, I know I have an incredible relationship with Ross Perot Jr.,” says Ford.

“If those rumors that President Trump forced the chamber to cancel the meeting are true, then I think Premier Ford should wear that as a badge of honour,” says Ontario’s Economic Development Minister Victor Fedeli, who was also in attendance at the MOU signing.

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