Trump's Trade War with Canada: Bullying Backfires as Patriotism Surges

What do bullies do when someone stands up to their bullying and punches them in the face? They look for someone weaker to bully who won’t punch back.

Presumably that’s why Donald Trump has now taken on Canada, after Iran punched back so hard in the cage match the US president began more than six months ago as to leave him humiliated and baffled.

Trump wants to be the bully who humiliates others and forces them into submission. Needing to assert his dominance, Trump has now started a trade war with our northern neighbor, friend, second-largest trading partner (after Mexico) and, at least until now, reliable ally.

He’s hammering Canada on his Truth Social and in media appearances, saying Canada has “ripped off” the US for years, and signing an order to rename Lake Ontario “Lake America.”

This is pure bunk, of course – more empty Trump bravado and ignorant belligerence. Canada? Really? If Mel Brooks were still making movies, this would be a comedy. But as all else with Trump, it’s no laughing matter.

Trump apparently assumed that Canada would quickly surrender because it has more to lose. The tariffs Trump has imposed on Canada – along with those he’s threatening if Canada retaliates – affect a tiny portion of America’s total imports but a huge portion of Canada’s total exports.

Jamieson Greer, Trump’s US trade representative, says the duties are too small to pose a problem for the US and are “more [Canada’s] emergency than ours”.

But bullies like Trump rarely think about the effects of their bullying on the thinking and attitudes of their targets.

Trump’s bullying of Iran has not only reinforced its hardline regime but shown them that control over the strait of Hormuz is an effective means of gaining concessions from other Gulf states as well as the US, and likely strengthened their resolve to build a nuclear weapon.

Trump’s bullying of Canada, meanwhile, is igniting a patriotism that has often eluded that nation, which separatist factions have long threatened to pull apart.

Mark Carney’s decision to stand up to Trump – through “dollar for dollar” retaliation on goods coming from key industries in states including Ohio and Texas with competitive Senate elections – has led to a surge of support for the prime minister’s Liberal party. Liberals won three special by-elections on Monday.

Trump’s trade war with Canada has also dimmed the prospects of Canada’s separatist movements, at least in the short term. A candidate from Carney’s Liberal party edged out a Quebec separatist in one of Monday’s special by-elections, in a district hit hard by US tariffs.

This is a good omen for Canada ahead of 5 October’s vote in Quebec on whether the province’s secessionist party, Parti Québécois, gains additional seats in the province’s legislative body, and 19 October’s vote in Alberta on whether to hold a referendum to secede from the rest of Canada.

Trump may also have underestimated the negative reactions to his trade war at home. According to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll, 57% of Americans ‌oppose Trump’s moves to impose tariffs on Canadian imports. About 63% oppose his peevish order to rename Lake Ontario “Lake America.” Only 20% support the higher tariffs on Canadian goods.

The negative response is especially pronounced in border states whose economies are tightly interconnected with Canada.

In Michigan, for example, where overwhelming majorities oppose Trump’s tariffs on Canada, Democrats have launched new attack ads on the Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers for refusing to denounce the tariffs. The Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed called Trump an “asshole” for launching the trade war.

There’s still time for the US and Canada to avoid the worst of the economic and political fallout from this. Carney’s “dollar for dollar” retaliation goes into effect on 8 September but Trump’s counter-counter measure – threatened 50% tariffs on autos and auto parts – won’t go into effect until New Year’s Day.

Still, no one should expect an easy resolution to what may go down in history as the stupidest of all the stupid foreign policies Trump has initiated. And given the extent of Trump’s dumb international moves, that is saying something.

Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist and his newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com. His new book, Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, is out now in the US and in the UK

This article was amended on 2 September 2026. An earlier version said the provincial election in Quebec is on 8 October, but it will be on 5 October.