Americanswers! Are the US and Canada in an all-out trade war?

**Justin Webb** (0:00)
The Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney, is getting serious and getting blunt.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:03)
We cannot accept what they've offered, and we will not give what they've asked.

**Justin Webb** (0:10)
He's talking about a trade war, but it's a serious trade war. And that is something that we go into in this edition of Americanswers. We're not doing it with Matt Chorley this week, he's still away, but we've still got a huge range of subjects. So, for instance, we also talk about America's national debt and efforts to get it down, or at least to try to persuade the politicians that they ought to think about getting it down.
And also, what does left field really mean? Welcome to Americanswers.

**Marianna Spring** (0:41)
Americast from BBC News.

**SPEAKER_5** (0:44)
You hear that sound? Oh, I think when I hear that sound, it reminds me of money.

**SPEAKER_6** (0:49)
We didn't start this war, but under President Trump, we are finishing it.

**SPEAKER_3** (0:53)
This is a big cover up and this administration is engaged in it.

**Justin Webb** (0:56)
This guy has Trump Derangement Syndrome.

**Anthony Zurcher** (0:58)
I have four words for you.

**SPEAKER_6** (1:02)
Turn the volume up.

**Marianna Spring** (1:08)
Hello, it is Marianna in the worldwide headquarters of Americast in London.

**Justin Webb** (1:12)
It's Justin sitting right next to her.

**Anthony Zurcher** (1:14)
It's Anthony flying solo here in the American headquarters of Americast in Washington DC.

**Justin Webb** (1:20)
Right. We go straight to the Northern American headquarters potentially one day maybe, which is Canada, because we've had a question from Paul who says, when Donald Trump initially placed tariffs on just about everyone, it was proven to be unconstitutional and Congress only can define US tariffs. Now the president's placing 50% tariffs on Canada. How? Why is this different? Or is he just ignoring Congress again?
Anthony, that's one for you.

**Anthony Zurcher** (1:47)
Well, it's different because he's citing a different law. There are a variety of different laws where Congress delegated or authorized the president to have terrorist power. And the first time he went about doing it, it was a law that dated back to the 1970s. And that use of that law is what the Supreme Court said was illegal. It didn't say, it said that Trump didn't have the ability to impose terrorists as much as he wants whatever he wants willy-nilly under this provision. But there are other provisions.
They require a little more fact-finding, a longer timeline for implementing them. And that is what Trump's trying to do now. That doesn't mean that the Supreme Court could come back and say, these are unconstitutional as well, and then Trump's back to the drawing board. But it is just going to be a series, apparently, of this administration trying to find new ways of justifying the terrorists that he clearly wants to impose.

**Justin Webb** (2:40)
Yeah, and it is going to bite, isn't it? Because it's a lot of stuff that this 50% is going to cover. Obviously, cars are a big ticket item, aren't they? But a lot of other things as well.

**Anthony Zurcher** (2:50)
Cars and steel are the big ones and Trump just announced 50% tariffs on Canadian exports into the US. Although I will note in a Truth Social Post that he put up just a few minutes ago while we're recording this, he said, they're not going to kick in until January 1st, which four months from now, that's a long time for negotiations to take place. That's a lot can happen in four months, including congressional midterm elections here in the US that could either strengthen Trump's hands in theory or totally put a new check on his power with Democrats taking back control of Congress. But there's also other things that Trump wants out of Canada, wants them to drop their dairy tariffs to allow American dairy farmers to sell products there, wants more agricultural exports into Canada. And so that's been the basis of these negotiations. It just kind of reached ahead in the past week where talks broke down, Canada pulled away, said we're not going to do this.
And Trump now is with this new threat with the January 1st deadline, seems to be setting the framework for what could be all out trade war.

**Justin Webb** (4:01)
Yeah, and we had a little snippet of Mark Carney there, didn't we? But before we got going, but let's listen a bit more because he is quite invigorated about all of this, more invigorated than the smooth and diplomatic Mark Carney, who certainly we knew when he was governor of the Bank of England. But he's an all in all a tougher character now. Let's listen to his longer reaction.