As insults fly around trade, negotiators for Canada and the U.S. avoid getting personal in public
This week, politicians from Canada and the United States have traded personal insults across the border, describing others as weak, nasty, foolish, ridiculous and a loser — the last paired with a curt invitation to “kiss my ass.”
The taunts have escalated the feud between the two countries, which has already led to crushing tariffs on tens of billions of dollars worth of cross-border goods. But the two governments’ trade negotiators have avoided getting personal, at least in public.
Political scientists and a public relations expert say the trade leads are striking a different tone because, like their predecessors in past negotiations, their bosses have given them a specific role to play in the trade dispute — one that would only be made harder by bad blood.
“What we’re seeing is a choreography, a play, if you like, where you’ve got different people playing different roles to have the overall effect that you want to achieve,” said Jaime Watt, founder of the public relations firm Navigator.
Negotiators don’t help themselves with ‘silly insults’: professor
Trade talks between the U.S. and Canada collapsed on Aug. 21, with each side later blaming the other for spoiling what seemed to be the closest chance at a deal in months.
Neither government has released the text of the scuttled agreement, and negotiators have mostly cited confidentiality when pressed for details, leaving the public to rely largely on politicians’ comments to gauge progress — or the lack of it.
On Thursday, U.S. President Donald Trump further antagonized Canadians when he directed his government to refer to Lake Ontario as Lake America, a move quickly dismissed up north as unnecessarily provocative and insulting. He had previously referred to Canadian officials as “clowns” and described Ontario’s premier as the “less charismatic, intelligent” version of his late brother.
In a Canadian exclusive interview with CBC News chief political correspondent Rosemary Barton, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer denied harsh language from the White House has hurt negotiations and called the Canadian ban on U.S. booze ‘extreme.’
In separate interviews with CBC News, the two countries’ respective cabinet members took a different tack. They criticized the other governments’ economic policies but didn’t make it personal.
Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc said he didn’t want spend time dwelling on “who said what about whom” and described his dealings with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer as “always personal and professional.”
Two days later, Greer sidestepped a question whether his boss’ rhetoric complicates his job.
“I would just say my job is quite narrow, and on trade relations, it’s quite narrow,” Greer told CBC News on Wednesday, describing his relationship with LeBlanc as “good.”
“It’s about economics.”
Experts said the trade leads are likely avoiding personal insults in public because poisoning the well won’t help them achieve their objective: securing the best deal possible for their respective countries.
“They’re not going to launch silly insults against one another because it’s not good for actually productive conversations,” said Aaron Ettinger, a political science professor at Carleton University. “If they can’t stand each other, then it’s going to be hard to be in the same room with one another.”
What would it take to get back to trade talks? Power & Politics asks the person leading Canada’s negotiations, Minister for Canada-U.S. Trade Dominic LeBlanc.
Away from the negotiating table, political leaders have their own goals.
“They’re the highest ranking politicians in either jurisdiction and they’re both using their space to try to convince people of something,” said Lori Turnbull, a political science professor at Dalhousie University.
In a departure from his typical conciliatory tone, Carney used the language of sovereignty and war on Saturday as he called for a generational shift away from an unreliable adversary.
Turnbull, Ettinger and Watt agreed the prime minister was looking to rally Canadians and project strength to global allies as the country enters a costly economic war with the U.S.
They said the prime minister didn’t need to mention Trump by name to make the show of defiance, which was later noted by international media.
In the days since, Trump has maintained the bombastic, unpredictable and personal approach he has taken toward world leaders throughout his time in the White House. Facing the lowest public approval of his second term, Turnbull said the president is also struggling to resolve the trade war with Canada and the war against Iran as they both drive up the cost of living for Americans.
Trade reps have been ‘firm, but friendly’ before
Canadian and American trade representatives have a history of tense but cordial relationships during free-trade negotiations.
Nearly a decade ago, while Trump insulted then-prime minister Justin Trudeau in public, Greer and LeBlanc’s predecessors were navigating a famously rocky relationship behind closed doors. Meetings between Canada’s then-foreign affairs minister Chrystia Freeland and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer were at points bitter, blunt and loud, but the dynamic evolved.
The relationship improved to the point that Freeland invited Lighthizer to a celebratory dinner at her home in Toronto after they reached a preliminary agreement on the deal that would become the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) in 2018.
Another set of negotiators had a “firm, but friendly” relationship as they negotiated the original North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). When Canadian international trade minister Michael Wilson stormed out on meetings at the Watergate Hotel, his American counterpart arranged tickets to a Friday night Baltimore Orioles baseball game to give the group a breather.
“I said, I’ve got to take these guys somewhere tonight…. Let’s get our mind off trade because it’s just getting a little fractious,” then-U.S. Trade Representative Carla Hills later recalled.
“We’ve all stayed close friends,” she said of the Canadian team who went to the game. “It really was wonderful. It was a good time.”
During the early NAFTA era, George H.W. Bush was in the White House and Brian Mulroney was prime minister. More diplomatic during negotiations, the two leaders continued speaking highly of one another long after leaving office.
“George Bush was fantastic and still is,” Mulroney said in 2018, six years before his death. “I tell you, if you want to see a contrast between a civilized, modest, thoughtful, generous leadership and what you’re seeing today, there you go.”