‘We will win,’ Carney says of Trump’s trade war with Canada

Prime Minister Mark Carney speaks about tariffs during a news conference on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Thursday April 3, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld

OAKVILLE — Liberal Leader Mark Carney worked to ease anxiety among pensioners and other Canadians worried about their savings evaporating with market turmoil, declaring that Canada “will win” the trade war initiated by U.S. President Donald Trump

Carney pledged to make Canada’s economy stronger by building domestic infrastructure and bolstering other trade relationships in the face of Trump’s tariffs throughout week two of the federal election campaign, including during a Friday evening rally in Scarborough, Ont.

“We didn’t ask for this fight. But Canadians are always ready when someone else drops the gloves,” he told a room of supporters and a dozen candidates.

“In this trade war, just like in hockey and in soccer, we will win.”

It’s a sentiment he has been sharing for weeks, saying a government led by him would secure the economy and ensure young people are part of that.

“Trump is trying to fundamentally restructure the U.S. economy, and in the process he’s reshaping -- disrupting, really -- the international trading system that we’ve known all our lives,” Carney said at a training centre in Oakville, Ont., Saturday.

“And while it’s progress that further tariffs were not imposed on Canada earlier this week, the president’s actions will reverberate here in Canada and across the world.”

Standing in front of a group of workers, Carney said a Liberal government would provide a new apprenticeship grant of up to $8,000 and increase access to union-led training initiatives.

He also promised to establish a new $20 million capital funding stream for colleges to support new training spaces for apprenticeships.

“Our task as a nation over the coming weeks and months and years is to think bigger, and to act bigger, to build Canada strong,” Carney said, referring to his campaign slogan.

“That starts right here. That starts by investing in our workers -- crane operators, bricklayers, welders and those in the specialized trades that are essential to the future of Canada.”

The Liberal plan would also increase labour mobility between provinces and territories, in an effort to “build one Canadian economy” -- a reference to removing interprovincial trade barriers that have become increasingly a topic of concern since Trump was elected.

The announcement follows a week of Carney signalling to Canadians he is serious about strengthening the economy in the face of threats from the White House, spending much of his week in factories and training schools.

In Vaughan, Ont., on Monday, Carney said his government would double Canada’s rate of residential housing construction over the next decade to nearly 500,000 new homes per year.

He also promised to create a new federal housing entity that he said would speed up affordable housing construction and provide financing to homebuilders.

And in Winnipeg the next day, Carney used his appearance to cite his party’s previous promises to cut taxes, double the pace of housing construction, eliminate the GST for many first-time home purchases and expand dental coverage.

It’s a narrative he’s been trying to build on the road: Canada will only get through threats from the U.S. with him at the helm and Canadian workers behind him building up the country and fighting back against what he says are unjustified attacks on the Canadian economy and sovereignty.

“The next decades are going to be very busy for those in the skilled trades in Canada. We are not just going to create hundreds of thousands of jobs in the skilled trades -- we’re creating hundreds of thousands of careers,” he said.

But the week was not without missteps: the Liberals lost a handful of candidates when comments they’ve previously made have come to light. The same is true for their rival Conservatives, who lost a handful of candidates themselves.

One of their candidates, Aaron Gunn, remains under fire for his social media posts Indigenous Peoples say amount to residential school denialism.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre stood by the North-Island Powell River candidate saying those accusations amount to “misinformation.”

Carney himself also had to speak to the topic of residential schools after reporting from CBC News and APTN that shows his father was the principal of a day school in the Northwest Territories.

The reporting also shows the elder Carney defended residential schools, and called reports about abuses suffered as being one-sided.

“I love my father, but I don’t share those views, to be absolutely clear” Carney said Saturday.

“To be clear, it’s a long, painful part of our history,” Carney said, adding the damages of residential and day schools continue to affect descendants.

“At the core of my government, as it was the case as the core of the previous government, will be to advance that process of reconciliation. That’s a fundamentally and deeply-held personal commitment of mine.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 5, 2024.