WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau returned home Saturday after his meeting with Donald Trump without assurances the president-elect will back away from threatened tariffs on all products from the major American trading partner.
Trump called the talks “productive” but signaled no retreat from a pledge that Canada says unfairly lumps it in with Mexico over the flow of drugs and migrants into the United States.
Meanwhile, Trump threatened 100% tariffs against a bloc of nine nations if they act to undermine the U.S. dollar.
His threat Saturday was directed at countries in the so-called BRICS alliance, which consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates. Turkey, Azerbaijan and Malaysia applied to become members and several other countries expressed interest in joining.
That latest tariff threat came after Trump threatened to slap 25% tariffs on everything imported from Mexico and Canada, and an additional 10% tax on goods from China, as a way to force the countries to do more to halt the flow of illegal immigration and drugs into the U.S.
Trump also held a call this past week with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, who said Thursday she is confident that a tariff war with the United States can be averted.
Mexican immigration authorities broke up two small migrant caravans headed to the U.S. border, activists said Saturday.
Some migrants were bused to cities in southern Mexico, and others were offered transit papers.
The action came a week after Trump threatened to slap 25% tariffs on Mexican products unless the country does more to stem the flow of migrants to the U.S. border.
On Wednesday, Trump wrote that Sheinbaum agreed to stop unauthorized migration across the border into the U.S. Sheinbaum wrote on her social media accounts the same day that “migrants and caravans are taken care of before they reach the border.”
Migrant rights activist Luis García Villagrán said the breaking-up of the two caravans appeared to be part of “an agreement between the president of Mexico and the president of the United States.”
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While the U.S. dollar is by far the most-used currency in global business and has survived past challenges to its preeminence, members of the alliance and other developing nations say they are fed up with America’s dominance of the global financial system.
The dollar represents roughly 58% of the world’s foreign exchange reserves, according to the IMF and major commodities like oil are still primarily bought and sold using dollars. The dollar’s dominance is threatened, however, with BRICS’ growing share of GDP and the alliance’s intent to trade in nondollar currencies – a process known as de-dollarization.
Trump, in a Truth Social post, said: “We require a commitment from these Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency, nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs, and should expect to say goodbye to selling into the wonderful U.S. Economy.”
At a summit of BRICS nations in October, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the U.S. of “weaponizing” the dollar and described it as a “big mistake.” Russia pushed for the creation of a new payment system that would offer an alternative to the global bank messaging network, SWIFT, and allow Moscow to dodge Western sanctions and trade with partners.
Research shows the U.S. dollar’s role as the primary global reserve currency is not threatened in the near future.
After the hastily arranged dinner Friday night at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, Trudeau spoke of “an excellent conversation” and said in a post later Saturday on X, accompanied by a photo of the two men smiling, that he looked forward to “the work we can do together, again.”
Trump said earlier on Truth Social that they discussed “many important topics that will require both Countries to work together to address.” He cited fentanyl and the “Drug Crisis that has decimated so many lives as a result of Illegal Immigration,” fair trade deals “that do not jeopardize American Workers” and the U.S. trade deficit with its ally to the north.
Trump asserted that the prime minister made “a commitment to work with us to end this terrible devastation” of American families from fentanyl from China reaching the United States through its neighbors.
U.S. customs agents seized 43 pounds of fentanyl at the Canadian border last fiscal year, compared with 21,100 pounds at the Mexican border.
On immigration, the U.S. Border Patrol made 56,530 arrests at the Mexican border in October alone and 23,721 arrests at the Canadian border between October 2023 and September 2024 – and Canadian officials say they are ready to make new investments in border security.
Trudeau called Trump after the Republican’s social media posts about the tariffs last Monday and they agreed to meet, according to a official familiar with the matter who was not authorized to publicly discuss detail of the private talks. The official said other countries are calling Canadian officials to hear how about how the meeting was arranged and to ask for advice.
At the dinner that was said to last three hours, Trump said he and Trudeau also discussed energy, trade and the Arctic. A second official cited defense, Ukraine, NATO, China, the Mideast, pipelines and the Group of Seven meeting in Canada next year as other issues that arose.
The prime minister was the first G7 leader to visit Trump since the Nov. 5 election.
The threatened tariffs could essentially blow up the North American trade pact Trump’s team negotiated during his first term.
Here are the people Trump has picked for key positions so far President-elect Donald Trump Susie Wiles, White House Chief of Staff Marco Rubio, Secretary of State Pete Hegseth, Secretary of Defense Pam Bondi, Attorney General Kristi Noem, Secretary of Homeland Security Doug Burgum, Secretary of the Interior Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Secretary of Health and Human Services Scott Bessent, Treasury Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer, Labor Secretary Scott Turner, Housing and Urban Development Sean Duffy, Secretary of Transportation Chris Wright, Secretary of Energy Linda McMahon, Secretary of Education Brooke Rollins, Secretary of Agriculture Howard Lutnick, Secretary of Commerce Doug Collins, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Karoline Leavitt, White House press secretary Tulsi Gabbard, National Intelligence Director John Ratcliffe, Central Intelligence Agency Director Lee Zeldin, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Brendan Carr, Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission Elise Stefanik, Ambassador to the United Nations Matt Whitaker, Ambassador to NATO Mike Huckabee, Ambassador to Israel Steven Witkoff, Special Envoy to the Middle East Keith Kellogg, Special Envoy for Ukraine and Russia Mike Waltz, National Security Adviser Stephen Miller, Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Tom Homan, ‘Border Czar’ Dr. Mehmet Oz, Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services administrator Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to advise White House on government efficiency Russell Vought, Office of Management and Budget Additional selections to the incoming White House Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox!
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