US President-elect Donald Trump and Canadian High Minister Justin Trudeau met in Florida to talk about considerations about medication and migrant flows.
Canada’s ambassador to america has mentioned that High Minister Justin Trudeau used to be in a position to put across the variations between Canada’s border problems and Mexico’s all through a dinner with US President-elect Donald Trump.
The assembly, held at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago lodge in Florida on Friday, used to be organized to deal with the incoming US President’s threats to impose price lists on all merchandise from Canada and Mexico over considerations about medication and migrant flows.
Trump closing week mentioned that he would impose a 25% tariff on all merchandise coming into america from Canada and Mexico as one in all his first government orders.
Kirsten Hillman, Canada’s ambassador in Washington, mentioned that Trudeau had effectively made the case to Trump that there’s no comparability between the Canada-US border and Mexico-US border.
“The message that our border is so massively other than the Mexican border used to be in reality understood,” Hillman mentioned.
Hillman reemphasised Trudeau’s argument, highlighting that just about no fentanyl is trafficked from Canada to america. She famous that whilst there are occasional seizures, government say the ones shipments are for private use, now not a part of prison trafficking. Hillman mentioned 99.8% of the fentanyl seized through US government originates from Mexico.
“Additionally with admire to folks, unlawful folks crossing illegally … 0.6% have been of overall interceptions from Canada,” Hillman added.
US customs brokers seized 43 kilos of fentanyl on the Canadian border closing fiscal yr, in comparison with 21,100 kilos on the Mexican border.
Immigration arrests paint a identical image: america Border Patrol made 56,530 arrests on the Mexican border in October on my own, whilst 23,721 arrests have been made on the Canadian border between October 2023 and September 2024.
“The info are arduous to disclaim,” Hillman mentioned.
Border safety and commerce deficit
Hillman additionally defined Canada’s dedication to improving border safety, with plans for added helicopters, drones, and regulation enforcement staff. She additionally pointed to an settlement between Canada and america permitting migrants stuck crossing illegally into america to be returned to Canada — a coverage that Mexico and america would not have.
The USA’s commerce deficit with Canada used to be additionally raised all through the dinner, Hillman mentioned.
She mentioned that $75 billion (€71 billion) of closing yr’s deficit contains vital power exports and positioned commerce stability in context.
“We’re one-tenth the scale of america, so a balanced commerce deal would imply in step with capita we’re purchasing 10 occasions extra from america than they’re purchasing from us.”
Canada is the highest export vacation spot for 36 US states, with day by day cross-border commerce amounting to $3.6 billion Canadian (€2.4 billion). Canada could also be the biggest overseas provider of metal, aluminium, uranium, and demanding minerals essential for US nationwide safety.
Moreover, roughly 60% of america’ crude oil imports and 85% of its electrical energy imports come from Canada.
Canada is one of the international’s maximum trade-dependent international locations, with 77% of its exports destined for america.
Whilst Trump known as the discussions “productive” on Sunday in a social media publish, he gave no indication of backing down from his tariff threats.
Hillman mentioned the dinner between Trump and Trudeau used to be a success, if now not absolute best.
“If he (Trump) clearly mentioned there could be no price lists that might had been higher, however there used to be no lifelike expectation of that,” she mentioned.