World leaders have denounced United States President Donald Trump for unveiling a new tariff measure, this time aimed at the automobile industry.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney offered one of the most frank assessments, saying it signalled an end to the tight bonds his country and the US once enjoyed.
“The old relationship we had with the United States – based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military cooperation – is over,” Carney said.
“We will need to dramatically reduce our reliance on the United States. We will need to pivot our trade relationships elsewhere. And we will need to do things previously thought impossible, at speeds we haven’t seen in generations.”
Carney’s remarks arrived on the heels of a new executive proclamation from the Trump administration, placing a 25-percent tariff on all foreign-made automobiles imported into the US, starting on April 2.
Officials in both Canada and Mexico have decried Trump’s tariff campaign as a violation of the free-trade agreement the three countries signed in 2019, during the US president’s first term.
But the United Auto Workers (UAW) – one of the most influential labour unions in the US – praised Trump’s decision as a win for domestic workers.
“We applaud the Trump administration for stepping up to end the free trade disaster that has devastated working-class communities for decades,” UAW President Shawn Fain wrote in a statement.
He blamed free-trade accords for sending US manufacturing jobs to cheaper markets abroad.
“These tariffs are a major step in the right direction for autoworkers and blue-collar communities across the country, and it is now on the automakers, from the Big Three to Volkswagen and beyond, to bring back good union jobs to the US,” Fain said.
But critics warn that the tariffs will not have an immediate effect on job creation for Americans, as it will take time to build new production lines in the US.
“Donald Trump says that this will help regenerate the car-building process in the United States,” explained Al Jazeera correspondent Alan Fisher.
“But, of course, if anyone is going to build a plant, it is going to take two, three, maybe four years – beyond Trump’s time in office.”
Some industry experts even predicted that the burden of tariffs could grind car manufacturing to a halt.
Flavio Volpe, the president of Canada’s Automotive Parts Manufacturing Association, explained that nearly two million automobiles constructed in Canada are made for US car companies. Those Canadian factories, meanwhile, source half of their car parts and raw materials from the US.
Volpe said that serves as an illustration of how deeply intertwined the international car industry is.
“Anything that the White House is trying to do to Canadians is going to [be done] directly to the three biggest automotive enterprises that are based in the US,” Volpe told Al Jazeera.
“The industry is likely to shut down on both sides of the border within a week,” he added.
Since the 25-percent tariffs were announced, US automaker General Motors has seen a sharp drop in its shares. It is considered one of the “Big Three” car manufacturers in the US, alongside Ford and Stellantis.
Trump has been teasing tariffs on automobile imports since the start of his second term as president.
In February, for instance, he told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida that the tariffs would “be in the neighbourhood of 25 percent”, but he would unveil them at a later date, to give manufacturers “a little bit of a chance” to adjust.
Media reports indicated that US carmakers were worried such tariffs would disrupt their business.
At an investor conference in February, Ford CEO Jim Farley said cross-border tariffs threatened to “blow a hole in the US industry” over the long term.
Already, US trading partners have been preparing to retaliate against the tariffs, heightening a spiralling trade war.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, for instance, said, “The US has chosen a path at whose end lie only losers, since tariffs and isolation hurt prosperity for everyone.”
Carney likewise hinted at negative outcomes for the global economy – and a firm response from Canada.
“We will fight the US tariffs with retaliatory trade actions of our own that will have maximum impact in the United States and minimum impacts here in Canada,” Carney said.
Let’s be clear. We’re all on the same page. We won’t back down. We will respond forcefully. Nothing is off the table to defend our workers and our country.”
