Alberta Premier Danielle Smith sounded an upbeat note about the possible effects of nascent U.S. tariffs on Canadian industries that have drawn their ire. Smith was expecting an announcement from the Trump administration this Wednesday. She’s hopeful that industries such as food production and oil and gas won’t be subjected to any new tariffs. This feeling is largely a product of the last set of tariff actions that Trump unilaterally imposed. These were billed as a 25 percent tariff on Canada and Mexico and a 10 percent tariff on Canadian energy.
The Trump administration has been equally mum about what to expect from the first tariff rollout. This silence has led to much hand-wringing over what effect it will have. Trump and his allies have taken to referring the forthcoming announcement as “Liberation Day.” To cut exports, he plans to jack up special reciprocal tariffs that equal the duties that other countries impose on all U.S. exports.
In her remarks, Smith underscored the importance of her expectation that Alberta would be spared most if not all new tariffs. Now, again, I don’t want to get too much ahead of myself, because you don’t want to be too wrong. She said, looking at what she’s heard from different administration officials, that right now the expectation, the hope, is that we’ll see this really sectorally applied. This tendency informs her approach to the world as well.
Smith emphasized the foundational importance of pushing for an exemption. This exemption must be extended to any raw materials and goods exported to the U.S. used as feedstock in the manufacturing of other products. “That’s what I’m hoping to see tomorrow, but we really just won’t know until we see the result,” she added.
In view of all these advances, Smith is resolved to continue to work with American officials and influencers. Her goal is to draw attention to the possible protections mistakenly imposed through tariffs. As she said, “I think we had to make a full-court press all the way up to the buzzer.” Her work is helping to prevent any negative impact on Alberta’s economy from the new tariff laws.
That shift came after Smith faced the ire of the Opposition NDP last week for defending the trips. This backlash followed her joint appearance with conservative commentator Ben Shapiro at a PragerU fundraiser in Florida. She vigorously rebutted all allegations about her actions. In a podcast episode we recorded shortly after that event, Shapiro discussed how and why he had stood against those tariffs. Those are the influencers that will even influence the decision makers around the president,” she claimed.
Trump has the opportunity to fundamentally change the way the global economy operates. In the words of Karoline Leavitt, a press flack for the administration, his administration’s is making America the manufacturing superpower of the world again. Against this backdrop, Alberta’s leadership has stayed watchful and ahead of the curve in preparing for and addressing threats from U.S. trade policies.
