During a press conference from the Oval Office on Friday afternoon, President Donald Trump threatened to place reciprocal taxes on Canadian dairy and lumber as soon as Friday.
Trump told reporters that Canada "is charging us over 200 percent for dairy products… When I left, we had that well taken care of. But under Biden, they just kept raising it." He said that it was a 250 percent tariff for dairy products shipped from the US.
"They made it impossible for us to sell lumber or dairy products into Canada, but our numbers are a tiny fraction of that, almost nonexistent," he said, later adding, "Canada has been ripping us off for years on tariffs for lumber and for dairy products. 250 percent, nobody ever talks about that, 250 percent tariff, which is taking advantage of our farmers."
"So that’s not going to happen anymore. We’re going to be—they’ll be met with the exact same tariff unless they drop it, and that’s what reciprocal means. And we may do it as early as today, or we'll wait til Monday or Tuesday, but that’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to charge the same thing. It’s not fair, never has been fair, and they’ve treated our farmers badly."
This comes as Trump announced on Thursday that goods from Mexico and Canada covered under the USMCA Agreement will not have tariffs placed on them until April 2. That date is also the same day that reciprocal tariffs on other nations that place tariffs on American goods will go into effect. Ontario, in response to Trump's tariffs, will begin adding a 25% surcharge to Americans' electricity bills starting next week.
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