In the aftermath of U.S. President Donald Trump’s disparaging remarks about Canada’s trade practices in several areas including dairy, softwood lumber and energy this week, the former Canadian ambassador to the U.S. and advisor to the current Liberal government says it’s important that Canadians don’t overreact.
In an interview with Evan Solomon, host of CTV’s Question Period, airing Sunday, Derek Burney described Trump’s comments as a “tirade.”
“It’s an outburst,” Burney said. “The kind of outburst that we’ve become accustomed to unfortunately, with a president who hasn’t stopped campaigning.”
Burney said he believes the U.S. president was telling his audience of U.S. farmers at a campaign-style event on Tuesday what they wanted to hear.
The former ambassador said Trump’s remarks were “unfounded in fact” and that he doesn’t think they signify the beginning of a trade war between the U.S. and Canada.
“This is all tactics. This is all ‘Art of the Deal’ [Trump’s book] softening the other guy up, keeping the other guy off balance, shakedown,” Burney said.
“We’ve got to resist it. We’ve got to be calm and make a factual case and a factual rejection of every inane statement he makes about us.”
Burney isn’t the only one taking the president’s criticisms with a grain of salt. In a roundtable scrum on CTV’s Question Period, Gordon Richie, one of the key negotiators for NAFTA, also pointed out Trump’s “Art of the Deal” book about negotiating in business. Richie said he found the comments “entirely predictable.”
“You begin even before the negotiations by throwing out outlandish demands so that you shake up the other guy,” Richie said. “This is textbook stuff and we really shouldn’t get too excited about it.”
Jean Charest, the former Quebec premier and partner in the law firm of McCarthy Tétrault, also agreed with Burney, during the discussion with Solomon, that Canadians should remain calm. He recommended the Canadian government focus on returning to a “common sense agenda” that will benefit the interests of both countries.
“We’d like to see NAFTA change in the area of services and government procurement,” Charest said. “We agree on that. We all want what’s better.”
Both Burney and Charest commended Canada’s current ambassador the U.S., David MacNaughton, for his letters to the governors of Wisconsin and New York laying out the facts about Canada’s trade relationship with the U.S. in the wake of Trump’s initial remarks on Tuesday.
Charest also stressed that Trump will not be able to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) alone. He said the president has to work with Congress, governors, mayors and the business community before he can make any major changes.
“Mr. Trump doesn’t seem to be able to get much done on this file in Congress,” he said. “He can’t get his trade representative named, he can’t get his mandate nailed down and he can’t agree with Congress on the agenda on whether they should be focusing on fiscal issues or going to trade first.”
Despite advising a calm approach when dealing with Trump, Burney did express his concerns about how the president’s “outbursts” could impact the economy in Canada.
“The most worrying thing about these kinds of broadsides is that they create instability. If you’re a business investor, you’re going to be sitting on your hands because you don’t know what to make of what this is all about,” Burney said.
Burney did offer one possible approach for dealing with the “unusual” U.S. president.
“What I would do with him if I were ambassador, is I would invite him to a hockey game so he can see how Canadians are first hand,” he said with a laugh.
