Canada’s Not Ruling Out Energy, Minerals In Trump Trade War [Video]

Canada’s energy minister is angry. Speaking to me while in Houston for CERAWeek, Jonathan Wilkinson described the phases of Canada’s reaction to U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs and repeated taunting: shock, then hurt, and now anger. “We are resolute in our need to push back,” he says.

Wilkinson says that the anger shouldn’t influence his government’s decision making. But, at the same time, no option is off the table—including restrictions on energy and natural resources. Because of the highly-linked energy systems of the two countries, such a move could wreak significant havoc on the U.S. economy. “We would be foolish to take tools out of the toolbox,” he told me. “In the context where there’s no negotiation around trying to find a resolution here, certainly, export tariffs on energy remain in that toolbox.”  

There are many potential energy and climate change implications of the U.S.-initiated trade dispute. In the short term, Canada’s political conversation has been consumed by trade …