President Donald Trump intends to move forward with his plans to place separate 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico but told reporters Thursday he might include an exemption for oil.
Even before entering office, the president had signaled he would use tariffs as leverage in debates with America’s northern and southern neighbors about border security.
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Following his inauguration, Trump imposed a Feb. 1 deadline for both countries to begin complying with his border and immigration policies or risk the imposition of blanket 25% tariffs on all imports.
“I’ll be putting the tariff of 25 percent on Canada and separately, 25% on Mexico,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “We really have to do that.”
Trump added that imported oil will have “nothing to do with” the tariffs, prompting reporters to ask for clarification on his comments.
“We may or may not. We’re going to make that determination probably tonight on oil,” the president continued. “They send us oil. We’ll see. It depends on what the price is. If the oil is properly priced, if they treat us properly, we say ‘No.’”
“Mexico and Canada have never been good to us on trade. They’ve treated us very unfairly on trade and we’ll be able to make that up very quickly because we don’t need the products they have,” he concluded.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford harshly criticized Trump’s Thursday statement.
“President Trump is hellbent on undermining Canada. The federal government needs to be ready to immediately implement a strong and forceful response. Dollar for dollar,” he wrote on X. “Tariff for tariff. Canada won’t start this fight, but we have to be ready to win it.”
Trump has also suggested that he plans to place new tariffs on China if they don’t do more to stem the flow of fentanyl and fentanyl components to the West, a theme he revisited Thursday.
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“With China, I’m also thinking about something because they’re sending fentanyl into this country, and because of that, they’re causing hundreds of thousands of deaths. So China’s going to end up paying a tariff also for that. And we’re in the process of doing that,” he stated. “China has to stop sending fentanyl into our country and killing our people.”
Trade experts have previously suggested to the Washington Examiner that both Canada and Mexico, like Colombia before it, will “cave” to Trump’s tariff threats and ramp up efforts to counter illegal immigration and drug trafficking.
