Canada Slaps 25% Tariff on Electricity to Americans in Three States

The leader of Ontario, Canada, made good on his threats to slap a 25% tariff on electricity sent to neighboring U.S. states on Monday. The tariffs are a direct response to President Donald Trump’s tariffs against Canada, a form of economic coercion with the goal of making Canada a state or territory of the United States.

The announcement of the 25% tariff on electricity to the U.S. was made by Ontario’s premier, Doug Ford, and energy minister, Stephen Lecce, at a press conference Monday. The electricity being imported to the U.S. primarily goes to three states: New York, Michigan, and Minnesota, though customers in other neighboring states like Wisconsin will also feel the impact. At least 1.5 million Americans will see the price hike, according to Canada’s CBC.

The new tariff will add about $10 per megawatt-hour to electricity heading from Canada to the U.S., generating about $300,000 to $400,000 per day in extra revenue, according to the CBC. That money will be used to support businesses negatively affected by American tariffs imposed by Trump.

President Trump has flip-flopped on tariffs against not just Canada but also other countries like Mexico in recent weeks. Last week, Trump “paused” a portion of the 25% tariffs he had announced for Canada, setting a new deadline of April 2, but Canada said it would not pause its own retaliatory tariffs until Trump dropped them entirely.

“Until these tariffs are off the table, until the threat of tariffs is gone for good, Ontario will not relent,” Ford said Monday. “We will not back down, pausing some tariffs, making last minute exemptions, it won’t cut it. We need to end the chaos once and for all. We need to sit down, work together, and land a fair deal.”

Initially, Trump said the tariffs were needed because Canada allowed fentanyl to be trafficked into the U.S., an absurd pretext for Trump’s goal of harming Canada economically in order to annex the nation. Less than 1% of fentanyl coming into the U.S. comes from Canada. But the flimsy pretext was needed to create a national security justification for the tariffs, the only way to violate the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA) with some thin veneer of legality.

Trump himself negotiated the USMCA, which was just a replacement for the free trade agreement known as NAFTA, first agreed to in the 1990s by President Bill Clinton. But Trump has said the USMCA allows Canada and Mexico to “take advantage” of the U.S., an absurd argument that simply makes no sense.

The press conference Monday by Ford and his energy minister Lecce addressed the possible repercussions for the Canadian economy. Lecce said they don’t need to worry about retaliation from the U.S. because Ontario has agreements with the province of Quebec that allow them to ramp up capacity during the hot days of summer without relying too much on U.S. electricity imports.

Ford noted that even if Trump somehow was successful in getting businesses to relocate from Canada to the U.S., America simply doesn’t have enough workers to fill the positions. The premier said he’d sat down with car manufacturers in particular who said that even if they wanted to move everything they had from Canada to the U.S., they couldn’t do it for lack of available employees.

Ford is a conservative who previously appeared to be an ally of Trump, which has turned him into an unlikely adversary of the American president’s policies. But Canadians have been understandably upset with Trump’s threats against their country, leading to a slew of actions that appear to befuddle some Americans. Canadians have been booing the U.S. national anthem at sporting events, and a nationwide boycott of American products has led to viral videos showing products like Lay’s potato chips sitting unsold in grocery stores in the country, despite being heavily discounted.

American booze has also been taken off the shelves in some provinces, something American alcohol producers have protested. Even if tariffs raise prices, those producers can still make money, though less, thanks to the tariffs. If the product isn’t even available to purchase, they make no money.

Ford noted that he has been talking with Republicans in the U.S. who really don’t like how Trump is harming American business right now.

“I talked to a tremendous amount of Americans,” Ford said at the press conference. “They totally disagree with what President Trump is doing. Stanch Republican Trump supporters totally disagreeing with President Trump on this policy. So I think we have a strong relationship. It goes back over 200 years.”

Ford also mentioned that Trump is hurting the stock market, which has plunged in recent weeks over the uncertainty and chaos introduced by the president. Asked by a reporter Monday what he would say to President Trump, Ford implored him to look at what’s happening to the stock market.

“I would say, you know, one of his measuring sticks are the markets,” Ford said. “The markets have dropped trillions of dollars. He has to understand. He’s a smart guy. He may like them or dislike them, but make no mistake. He understands the markets.”

Ford may be trying to stroke Trump’s ego, but there’s no real evidence the president is a smart guy. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 480 points for the day at the time of this writing. And there are indications that Trump and his goons may be trying to intentionally harm the U.S. economy to suppress wages and buy up assets for cheap in an economic downturn. Trump was asked by Fox Business over the weekend if he could rule out a recession, and he made no promises, calling this a “transition” period.

The Canadians are taking this seriously, just as they should. President Trump has made it clear he’s an imperialist threat to liberal democracies around the world. And he’s not just “joking” as some apologists often said shortly after the November election, when Trump first floated the idea of invading Panama, annexing Greenland, and making Canada the 51st state. As it happens, Trump has made no such “jokes” against authoritarian countries like Russia. In fact, he’s cozied up to America’s former geopolitical adversaries while threatening some of this country’s best friends.

Trump is a threat to the safety and security of not just Americans but every country of free people around the world. Canada knows it, and they’re going to