The new Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, and American president Donald Trump will meet in Washington on Tuesday for the first time. Expected for a long time, this meeting could put the table for the future of the relationship between the United States and Canada.
It was to be expected: the Canadian Prime Minister did not waste time before contacting his American counterpart. last Tuesday, the day after the Canadian elections, the two leaders spoke on the phone, where they agreed to meet in flesh and bone a week later.
The relationship between the two states has been tense since Donald Trump launched an economic war by imposing customs duties on billions of goods in Canada. The federal elections that have just ended mainly focused on the following question: which chief is best placed to negotiate with Donald Trump? As a response, the Canadians have chosen to elect the Liberal Mark Carney.
This first exchange at the White House will therefore be an opportunity for the Liberal chief to apply the plan he presented during his campaign. He said last week at a press conference that he would concentrate during their first meeting on “immediate trade pressures and future economic and security relations between [les] two sovereign nations ”.
Donald Trump, for his part, said that he was “not sure” to know why the Canadian Prime Minister wanted to meet him. “I imagine he wants to make an agreement, they all want to make an agreement,” he told journalists in the White House on Monday.
Canadian sovereignty
It will not be the first time that the two men will be discussing. They spoke on March 28, a few days before the entry into force of customs duties on April 2. At the end of this discussion, Mark Carney had first claimed that Donald Trump had “respected the sovereignty” of Canada. A few days before the election, Mark Carney had finally admitted that Donald Trump had “raised the question” to do Canada on 51e US state during this call.
During the discussion on Tuesday, “Mark Carney will want to obtain a mark of recognition on the sovereignty of Canada,” said the deputy director of the Observatory on the United States of the Raoul-Dandurand Chair, Christophe Cloutier-Roy. Since the discussion with Donald Trump will also be a way to contact his national audience, Carney will certainly want to obtain confirmation that the US head of state recognizes Canada’s sovereignty.
Mark Carney will want to obtain a mark of recognition on Canada’s sovereignty
As for the strategy that the Prime Minister should adopt, Mr. Cloutier-Roy believes that “this is not the goal of leaving for pulled knives”. “Donald Trump reacts badly when we shruate the tone,” he said, evoking the inconvenience between the American president and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky. The Canadian should endeavor to find a way “to avoid continuing tensions climbing”, in the words of the political scientist.
For his part, Donald Trump’s approach is “not easy to follow”, according to the American policy expert. If he had to make a prediction, Mr. Cloutier-Roy believes that the American will focus on his complaints, especially with regard to Canadian military spending, which he deems “insufficient”. The political scientist still notes that the president was quite favorable and open to discussion with Mr. Carney.
After the Canadian election, Trump would even have congratulated Mr. Carney for his victory and “agreed to Canada and the United States to work together,” said the telephone discussion.
Even if it is not a negotiation per se, Tuesday’s meeting risks establishing certain bases for the talks of the Canada-United States agreement, which is supposed to take place in 2026.
