During a news conference Tuesday, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump didn’t hold back in his message to Canada.
“Why are we supporting a country $200-billion-plus a year?” said Trump. “Our military is at their disposal. They should be a state.”
In recent weeks Trump has posted on social media his desire to make Canada the 51st U.S. state, and also expressed plans to impose a 25-per-cent tariff on Canadian exports into the United States.
With Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20, B.C. industry leaders are bracing for impact.
“There’s currently an average of 14-per-cent softwood lumber tariffs going on our products right now, so does that mean it now becomes 39 per cent as of Jan. 20? We don’t know that answer,” said Jeff Bromley, chair of the United Steelworkers Wood Council.
Bromley represents approximately 14,000 forestry workers across Canada, and around 9,000 workers in B.C.
“I’ve told them to prepare, because we could be suffering incremental layoffs throughout this year, and into …