Breaking News from Pod Save America - Lake America: Trump’s Trade War With Canada Gets Even Dumber

Episode Date: August 25, 2026

Alex Wagner and Erin Ryan break down Trump's escalating tariff war with Canada. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Congratulations, America. We have finally pissed off the night. people in North America and possibly the world. I am, of course, speaking of the Canadians. Donald Trump's idiotic trade war with our neighbors to the north has now reached insane new heights or lows, depending on your perspective. After Trump on Saturday announced new tariffs on Canadian products, including 36 different kinds of plywood as well as anorex and dog muzzles. Canada today announced new retaliatory tariffs, some as high as 50 percent on 700 American products, and that includes a doubling of tariffs on American steel

and aluminum, and it is all supposed to kick in on September 8th, the day after Labor Day. In response to this, Trump is threatening to rename Lake Ontario, Lake America. I wish I was kidding. Joining me to unpack the monstrosity of policy that this represents is the great Aaron Ryan of hysteria fame. It's great to see you. It's great to see you, too. I wish we were talking about something a little less annoying. I mean, there's so much here to unpack.

There always is with Trump, but this is like, I do feel like we've reached a new frontier in terms of both American idiocy and also global pushback. And I want, I mean, I will say, I remember when this was all just a tit for tat over Canadian wildfires. And I'm nostalgic for that. time, aren't you, Aaron? I'm absolutely nostalgic for that time. Yeah, I wish, I miss when, like, there were elected officials commenting on how Canada's smoke coming into America was somehow Canada's fault. Like, there should be giant fans on the border. When it was just a weather debate,

when we were just talking about wind. And now we're talking about what could actually be like a very serious, significant blow in terms of cost, affordability, price of goods, price of home construction. We'll get to that in a second. I am very enamored of the position that Mark Carney has taken with regards to Trump in the last several months, beginning at the NATO conference in January and leading up to today. He is very clearly learning the lesson you learn on the playground, which is if you want to stop a bully from stealing your lunch money, punch him in the face. This is Mark Carney talking about the new retaliatory tariffs that are targeting industries that will hurt the U.S. steel, dairy, appliances, agriculture equipment. Here he is today. We recognized from the start that America has changed.

Early last year in this room, I observed that the decades-long process of steadily increasing integration between our economies was over. We cannot accept what they've offered, and we will not give what they've asked. The TLDR there, Aaron, is fuck you, Donald Trump, also fuck you again. Good idea, bad idea. I think it's a good idea. I mean, the punch of bully in the face thing absolutely makes sense. Also, Mark Carney has like a banking background.

He worked in Canadian banking. Like, he understands macroeconomics in a way that Donald Trump doesn't seem to, despite the Wharton degree, which I think the University of Pennsylvania should retroactively revoke. Yes. They should be like, actually, we don't want, keep our name out of your mouth entirely. But, you know, Carney is confident in the economic moves that he's making. And I think that he also understands the role that he needs to have as a leader. Canada is a small country.

It is, I mean, population-wise, it is not as big as it's a little bit bigger than California, I think. Maybe around the same size as California. Population-wise. Yes, yes. And so I think that if I think Canadians now in the face of these American tariffs might feel like David facing down a Goliath. And so I think Carney's bravery and refusal to show any sort of flinch, any sort of blink is important for Canadian morale, in addition to being important in just asserting that Canada can't be pushed around. Like, we can't do this. And, you know, it is, September 8th is, you know, a ways off, a little over a week and a half off.

Plenty of time to taco. There's always time for tacos. I, you point out, you know. this is, if Canadians feel like they're David facing down Goliath, that's with reason, right? I mean, the Canadian auto industry, which exports 90% of what it makes, I mean, the U.S. is a huge buyer of that stuff. They face real economic consequences here. I mean, but in the same way that the tariffs that he's suggesting go into place in the eighth will really hurt American consumers as well. I mean, the stakes on this have gotten higher and higher and higher as a day has progressed. But I'm like,

this is the Jerome Powell School of Negotiation. You do not capitulate. You do not write love letters to Donald Trump. You do not take him to romantic dinners in Paris and give him, you know, long stem red roses at the end of that meal. I'm speaking to you, Emmanuel Macron. You call his bluff. I mean, the only way, the only thing he responds to, I mean, it's all psychology with Trump. The only thing he responds to is shows of strength. Anything else, if the, like the further you've been down to kiss the ring, the muddier you're going to get. And that is very euphemistic terminology. Pod Save America Breaking News is brought to you by ZipRecruiter with everyday interactions

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And some of these Canadian tariffs impact goods and services that just so happen to be used in a lot of states with important elections. There's a lot of tariffs on fish. I went through the document. Oh my God. So many different kinds of fish. I didn't know that there were that many kinds of herring. No. Did you?

No, I didn't know that. But you know what? I've got a ton of tinned fish at home, so I'm all set. Of course you do. Getting into sardines, getting into fish. Oh, my gosheries. Yes, yes. But the thing is like Maine, Senate race in Maine.

We just start, you know. Did you know that Maine is on the Canadian border, Erin? I don't think Donald Trump knows. I don't think he knows that either. So Maine is going to be impacted. People in the Midwest, there are important Senate races in Minnesota, in Michigan, places where... Iowa, big trading partner. Big one in, big one in Iowa.

Places where farm equipment and, like, fertilizer products and things that are used in the cultivation of agricultural byproducts, that they're going to be directly impacted. And I don't think, I know for sure that Iowans have had about had it up to here with Donald Trump. They're pretty tired of being hurt by the person that they voted for. And I think that Canada is sort of signaling, you know, it's matching Donald Trump's tariff's dollar for dollar, which is what Carney had promised when they first went into effect. But this is also kind of a warning shot. Like Canada can really turn the screws in strategic places that will be the most crucial to Democrats taking back the Congress and the Senate.

I mean, who knows about the Senate. But, you know, this is... Well, yeah, but you point out, I mean, Mike Rogers and Michigan and Susan Collins and Maine and Ashley Hinson and I are all looking at this war and they're like, are you fucking kidding me, dude? Yeah. Like, this is not what we need. First of all, the fact that the tariffs kick in, the day after Labor Day, to me is like

Carney's chef's kiss and all of this. Oh, yeah. Because the narrative in American politics, and I think it still holds true, is that the narrative is set around Labor Day. If people do not believe that Donald Trump cares about... them and their, you know, lived experience in America, that is going to be, I think, only that that world, that, that genuine belief that Donald Trump is completely self-absorbed. He is a malignant narcissist that doesn't give a shit about the American consumer and does not care about the

American economy. This is only going to serve to support that in a very, I think, meaningful and devastating way as people head to the polls in November, you know? Absolutely. And I think about another big weekend that happened in September in 2008. And that was when on Friday, Merrill Lynch was purchased by Bank of America. Lehman Brothers was allowed to collapse. And on Monday, I went to work at Merrill Lynch to a headline of the newspaper that said Merrill is bought by Bank of America. It was very surreal. But, you know, both candidates suspended their presidential campaigns in 2008.

And up until that point, it had been very next. neck. And I honestly think that round of headlines is what swung the election in favor of Barack Obama and not John McCain. So I think that the timing of this is definitely giving me fuck you vibes. Carney knows the game that he's playing and he knows that Canada may not have as much weight to throw around as the U.S. But it does have like access to like jujitsu pain points that it can just, you know, maybe just a little pinch right here can like bring a big man down. And I think that's what Canada is betting on in this. And, you know, whether somebody is going to get into Donald Trump's ear and talk sense into him and say, you know, maybe Natalie Harp. Maybe I was going to say,

does human printer have that kind of poll? Do you see what's happening here? I got to say, though, there's something about the degree to which Canadians are relative. It's like, I see this with my kids. It's like once they have the permission structure to start criticizing each other, like when mom and dad are like, okay, go for it. Not that we ever do that, but it's just the pile on is, it must be so cathartic to be Canadian for this brief moment. I mean, maybe it's cathartic to be a Canadian at all moments, but in this particular moment when they can really go after the United States and say the things that I think the rest of the globe wants to say, Doug Ford is the premier of Ontario, because that's how Canada's split up, for those of you who don't know. And he has been really like in it.

He has been very much marinating in telling America to fuck off. Let's just listen to one or two clips from the great Doug Ford. Hear that? It's your money calling. It wants a promotion. Elevate your savings with the Scotia high-interest savings account. Always earn high regular interest rates that grow the more you save and invest. Conditions apply.

Visit scotiabank.com slash h-I-SA to learn more. Scotia Bank. You're richer than you think. President Trump is a type of person that would steal your lunch money. the first day. He'd steal the toke off your head the second day, and the third day, he'd steal your running shoes. You sound a little more subdued than you did this morning on the radio when you said Donald Trump could kiss your ass. Did the prime minister tell you to ask you to tone it down a bit? I have a lot of real estate on my ass, so he has a lot of room to kiss my ass. President

Trump underestimates us, and that's the biggest mistake, underestimating your opponent. That was basically, you can kiss my big ass. Not just kiss my ass, but my ass is big. And you can kiss all of it. Yeah. That's the meanest thing I've seen a Canadian say outside of a hockey arena. Normally all of their aggression is contained to like a hockey match. But I think what's interesting about Ford is that he's a little bit of a Trumpy figure as well. Like he tells it like it is.

Straight joker. Yeah, he's unvarnished. And I think the people that are fans, I'm not an expert on Canadian politics. So please. I'm like, that's awesome that you knew that. Yeah. No, I was at Gawker when his, I was at. Gawker Media when his brother was busted for smoking crack.

You know. So, yeah, down crash course in the Ford family. But he is like a pugnacious guy. He is, his appeal is that he is unvarnished and not practiced. And so it's this, it's a sort of evenly matched situation. He's kind of a Canadian Donald Trump type. Okay, okay, let's not insult our neighbors to the North. Yeah, well, he's not afraid to step up and like, say, like, kiss my, my big ass.

Like that's- Well, and I look, as pure as juvenile as that may all seem, I do genuinely think that's the way you get Donald Trump to rethink his position. I mean, look at his truth social account since this all started happening. On Monday, he posted Canada's unemployment rate is now at 10% and rapidly rising. Just for clarification, it's at a two-year low of 6.4%. Canadians feel entitled. And yet we don't need Canada. They need us. They do 95% of their business with America, with us. Yes, it's the exact opposite. It's actually 70%. But also, as we just discussed, we do need Canada. They're a major trading partner and some of the key Senate races that are going to determine the balance of power in November revolve around some of Canada's largest trading partners in the United States. You know, I will say there is the immediate lesson and the immediate sort of psychology and sort of power struggle that we're seeing play out right now, Aaron. But I do think the tension and then sort of like pugnacious attitude Canada is taking towards the United States will have effects that last longer than the Trump administration. And I was reading JBL, Jonathan B. Las, Bullwork, who true to form was very pessimistic about this moment and makes the case that like this isn't just about Trump.

This is about America seating its role as the leader of the free world, that it is not just about Trump, but it is about the country that elected him twice. And that it's not just that we don't have a leadership position. It's that there are figures that now recognize that the world needs to be protected from America. I'll read a little excerpt. Not only does the free world no longer include America, the free world is organizing to defend itself from us. Mark Carney understood that the rules-based order which America had organized after World War II was over and that the United States was now a post-liberal predator, not because of a single bad orange man, but because tens of millions of Americans wanted this change. I'm inclined to not be alarmist, but I actually genuinely think that we might not recover from the Trump years because who's to say another Trump won't be elected in four years or eight or 12? And how do you sort of account for that?

If you're the rest of the free democracy-loving world, you forsake America. I mean, and if past is prologue, and I don't want to, you know, break whatever the internet rule is about comparing things to Hitler. But, you know, before Germany had the rise of an extremist far right that resulted in a genocidal disaster, they had a sort of Donald Trump-like figure who was in charge, you know, during World War I. And he set them on a path for economic ruin that rolled into the conditions that were necessary for Nazism to rise. And my fear of what right now is that we're not in the 19, we're not in Germany in the 1930s. We're in Germany in like 1920s.

And that the disaster of seating our place as leader of the free world and the disaster of putting. us on a path for domestic strife en masse for tens and tens of millions of people as like only very rich people have any money. So getting us getting us in a position for like hyperinflation. You know, they're all of these these pieces being moved into positions where it feels like that is the direction we're going. And what I'm really afraid of is what happens when the irresponsible behavior and reckless behavior of the Trump administration ends up really reverberating for long after he's gone. And I know that, you know, there's a lot of, like, joking around about like, oh, yeah,

he can't live forever. And that's true. But the echoes of this are going to be things that people are picking up for a generation, at least. And it's very frightening. I mean, I think that if I were a Canadian watching all this happen, I would have the same attitude about Americans. And I would think, man, there's a lot of real shitty people there.

But I think the bigger danger is what happens when those shitty people lose even more than they've already lost and become even more desperate and angry and willing to look for scapegoats anywhere. Like we are on a path to something that is so, so dark. And I don't think that it's unfixable. I don't think that there's no hope. There's absolutely hope. There has to be. You have to operate as though there's hope. But I think that Canada could end up swooping in here and become like the hero, like the Deus X maple syrup.

Can they take over the United States? That's my question. You know, that would be kind of cool. They subsidize artists in Canada, you know. How many territories are there in Canada? Can we become one? How many provinces? There are, I'm not sure exactly how many provinces are in Canada.

No, we don't even know. But wouldn't that be interesting? Wouldn't that be interesting? I don't want Canada to take us over, but I'm saying like, I do. Canadian. Canadian. Oh, yeah, but like Quebec Cuanian. No.

Because, okay, yeah, no, I'm not, I'm not going to be able to learn how to do that. Oh, that was French. I think that when I say Canada could emerge the hero here. I don't mean that they like, you know, Mark Carney rides in a white horse and like saves us all from ourselves. But if elections in November swing really, really wildly in the Democrats way, and it's clear that the finger was put on the scale, then I think Canada can kind of like... They can take credit for ousting Susan Collins.

Wouldn't that be rich? Pretty much. Like, they can do what a generation of Democratic candidates hasn't been able to do to this point, which is get Susan Collins out of the Senate. Listen. So I think that there is, you know, I have Canadian friends. I love them.

They're great. I feel like I need to be the one saying sorry now this week because... Sorry. Sorry. Also, I love that Doug Ford's... called it a touque. Like that's a Canadian is um it's like a little little beanie it's like what we call a beanie. We call it we call it a beanie. Yeah. All right. Well, I mean, we've learned some things. One is Mark Carney could actually decide the balance of power in November of 26. A took is a

beanie. And nobody knows how many provinces there are in Canada, but someone somewhere will find out on our behalf. I say, uh, Mark Carney ain't no Neville Chamberlain. Keep. punching Mark. That's what I say. Absolutely. We are on team Mark Carney here at Crooked Media. Doug Ford's got a big ass and he wants Donald Trump to kiss it. I just got to say, you know, a broken clock when it comes to Doug Ford, a broken clock. And him's telling Donald Trump to kick his ass or kiss his ass is I'm for it. It's right. It's right twice a day. Yeah. Aaron, it is great to see you. Thank you for helping me get like slightly hysterical over this. Because it's worth it. You should watch hysteria and subscribe to it on YouTube as I do because it is worth every second. Oh. And you should also subscribe to this channel or Runaway Country because you get stuff like this.

Yeah. Bantir. Aaron, you're the best. Let's go have some pancakes with Canadian maple syrup. I would love that. I'll bring the putine. Perfect. I'll be in the tok.

We have an addendum to the important discussion that you just heard. And that is Aaron. many provinces Canada has. What is the magic number? A big one-oh. They got 10 provinces. And that is an embarrassing fact to not know as your neighbors to the South. So I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We're sorry. Please make us the 11th. Bye. Bye.