New tariffs on Canadian dairy and lumber are en route, according to an announcement from U.S. President Donald Trump. The latest round of tariffs is slated to take effect as early next week at the latest.
“Canada has been ripping us off for years on tariffs for lumber and for dairy products,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office Friday. “250 per cent, nobody ever talks about that. 250 per cent tariff, which is taking advantage of our farmers. So that’s not going to happen anymore.”
He said that they are in response to the “tremendously high” duties that Canada charges for exporting those products to the U.S.
“They’ll be met with the exact same tariff unless they drop it. That’s what reciprocal means,” said Trump. “And we may do it as early as today or we’ll wait until Monday or Tuesday. But that’s what we’re going to do, we’re going to charge the same thing. It’s not fair.”
The newly announced tariffs appear to be separate from previous tariffs Trump announced would begin on April 2, after granting Canada and Mexico another one-month reprieve on Thursday.
Trump said that Canada’s trade representatives have been “very difficult to deal with.”
He said that Canada is “charging us over 200 per cent for dairy products” but that the issue had been “well taken care” by the time he last left office in 2020.
“But under Biden they kept raising it,” said Trump, before claiming that Canada’s dairy tariff was “250 per cent” moments later.
“So where do you hear that? You don’t hear that. They have a tremendously high tariff, we’ll give you the exact numbers in a little while,” he said.
Additionally, they will be tacked onto the 25 per cent across-the-board tariffs on Canadian goods and the 10 per cent on Canadian energy, which were imposed on Tuesday.
“They make it impossible for us to sell lumber or dairy products into Canada but our numbers are a tiny fraction of that, almost non-existent,” said Trump.