AP Photo/Alex Brandon & Artur Widak/NurPhoto via AP
President Donald Trump bragged about destroying the Conservative Party of Canada’s lead in the polls with his tariffs just days before the Liberal Party’s election victory on Monday.
The Liberal Party won Canada’s election on Monday, months after former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s party appeared to be dead in the water, with the Conservative Party in the lead.
While many analysts had predicted a Conservative Party victory, its lead in the polls was wiped out after President Trump raised tariffs against Canada and spoke repeatedly about annexing the country and turning it into the 51st state.
During an interview with The Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg on Thursday – just days before the Liberal Party’s electoral victory – Trump boasted about wiping out the Conservative Party of Canada’s lead in the polls.
“You seriously want them to become a state?” asked Goldberg, to which Trump replied, “I think it would be great.”
After Goldberg pointed out that it would be “a hell of a big Democratic state,” Trump boasted, “A lot of people say that, but I’m okay with it if it has to be, because I think, you know, actually, until I came along— You know, until I came along, remember that the conservative was leading by 25 points.”
He continued, “Then I was disliked by enough of the Canadians that I’ve thrown the election into a close call, right? I don’t even know if it’s a close call. But the Conservative, they didn’t like Governor Trudeau too much, and I would call him Governor Trudeau, but he wasn’t fond of that.”
Mere hours before the election on Monday, Trump made another call for Canada to become the 51st state of the United States:
Good luck to the Great people of Canada. Elect the man who has the strength and wisdom to cut your taxes in half, increase your military power, for free, to the highest level in the World, have your Car, Steel, Aluminum, Lumber, Energy, and all other businesses, QUADRUPLE in size, WITH ZERO TARIFFS OR TAXES, if Canada becomes the cherished 51st. State of the United States of America. No more artificially drawn line from many years ago. Look how beautiful this land mass would be. Free access with NO BORDER. ALL POSITIVES WITH NO NEGATIVES. IT WAS MEANT TO BE! America can no longer subsidize Canada with the Hundreds of Billions of Dollars a year that we have been spending in the past.
He concluded, “It makes no sense unless Canada is a State!”
