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Political news, analysis, and opinions for Canadians

Day: 23 August 2026 (Page 1 of 2)

A deal with Trump isn’t the end of instability. It’s just the start of it

2026-08-23 /

Last week U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance made headlines when he told a closed-door fundraiser that Prime Minister Mark Carney had tried to “out-tough” Trump in negotiations. He also praised Conservative Party MP Jamil Jivani as a helpful advocate for trade and dismissed Official Opposition leader Pierre Poilievre as a “non-entity,” writes Stephanie Carvin in the Toronto Star.

Another of Vance’s points received less attention but was arguably more ominous: “the whole point of this is to change Canada’s behaviour,” he said, and shift the country “in a Trumpian direction.”

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PEI Premier Rob Lantz on the suspension of Canada-U.S. trade talks

2026-08-23 /

Statement follows:

“The breakdown of the Canada-U.S. trade negotiations was not the news any of us wanted to hear. I know this was a difficult decision for Prime Minister Carney, but I want to be very clear: it was absolutely the right one for our country.

Canada went to the table looking for a fair deal. But there are some things we should never be willing to trade away simply for the sake of reaching an agreement. We will never accept terms that undermine Canadian industry, Canadian workers or our national sovereignty.

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‘What had been agreed to was quite different from what was showing up in the documents’, says Wiseman

2026-08-23 /

Mark Wiseman, Canada’s ambassador to the US, said in a Bloomberg interview on August 23 that there was no one issue that led talks to collapse late on Aug 21, a development that triggered new tariffs and a potentially escalating trade fight.

“As we drilled down, what we discovered was that what our understanding of what had been agreed to was quite different from what was showing up in the documents,” he said.

“When that kind of happens once or twice, it’s kind of understandable, but when it happens consistently, and every interpretation is the most negative interpretation” then it “got to a point” where they walked away.

Americans, too, are wondering why they are embroiled in a trade war with Canada

2026-08-23 /

“This isn’t the end of anything,” said Christopher Ragan, the emeritus McGill University economist and author of Canada’s most widely used postsecondary economics textbook. “It’s the beginning of another policy tantrum from Donald Trump. He wanted a political win and didn’t get it. And the question now may be: If he can’t deal with little Canada, what can he do? But this shows we’re not prepared to cave to American pressure.”

Prof. Ragan said this episode may be a symbolic turn to a world in which countries everywhere grow more protectionist.

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76% of Canadians say the Carney government was right to ditch trade talks with the U.S.

2026-08-23 /

Three-in-four Canadians are endorsing the Carney government’s decision to walk away from trade negotiations with the United States late Friday night, confirming that long-expressed national resolve and desire to see Canadian negotiators take a “hard line” with Washington was more than theoretical.

New data from the non-profit Angus Reid Institute finds that support for Ottawa’s stance is at majority levels in every province in the country, bottoming out at 65 per cent in Saskatchewan and 67 per cent in Alberta.

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A warning to nations worldwide: Seeking a fair deal with the Americans is futile

2026-08-23 /

The calamitous collapse of trade negotiations between Canada and the U.S. is a warning to nations worldwide that pursuing any kind of dialogue with the current US administration is doomed at the outset, according to observers who say this recent episode indicates seeking a fair deal is futile, writes Olivia Bowden at The Guardian.

Andrea Lawlor, an associate professor of political science at McMaster University in Ontario, said: “No matter the closeness of the historical relationship, the American administration has signalled that it now priorities its interests above those of some sort of global economic coordination or harmony.

“It feels like these talks ‘failed’. However, I’m not sure there was really a success to be had.”

Trump’s bullying of Canada is failing, again.

2026-08-23 /

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has much more political permission to accept pain from a U.S.-Canadian trade war than Trump does.

Against Canada, Trump is fighting a trade war that very few Americans support, under leadership that most Americans reject, to achieve results that virtually all Americans would dismiss as pointless if not crazy, writes David Frum in The Atlantic.

Against Trump, Canadians are fighting a trade war that the great majority support, under leadership that commands broad assent, to defend their independence and self-respect. That’s a war that even the weaker side can win, especially if it needs to hold on only a few months longer to survive.

Trump falsely claims Canada wants “the benefits of being a state, without being one”

2026-08-23 /

Trump’s latest comments echo his repeated references to making Canada the “51st state” of America since returning to office, reports Nadine Yousif at BBC News.

Trade talks fell apart when it became clear the Americans demanded concessions that were never on the table.

“We were not prepared to compromise Canada’s sovereignty or undermine our key industries,” Prime Minster Carney said.

“We were not prepared to compromise on the protection of the French language and our culture.

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Wartime election would ‘destroy’ Ukraine, says President Zelenskyy

2026-08-23 /

Holding a wartime election in Ukraine while active fighting with Russia continues would “destroy” the country by splitting ​Ukrainians, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

His comments, released to reporters on Sunday, ‌were Zelenskyy’s first on the subject since ousted former Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov called for a wartime poll in a bombshell address last week, report Max Hunder and Dan Peleschuk at Reuters.

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