The Ben Mulroney Show - The High Stakes game of chicken between Doug Ford and Donald Trump

Episode Date: March 12, 2025

Guests and Topics: -The High Stakes game of chicken between Doug Ford and Donald Trump with Guest: Ian Lee, Associate Professor At Carleton University At The Sprott School Of Business -The High Stakes game of chicken between Doug Ford and Donald Trump with Guest: Chris Chapin, Political Commentator, Managing Principal of Upstream Strategy If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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And if you're like me and think a TFSA stands for total fund savings adventure, maybe reach out to TD Direct Investing. So the topic of the day, because this is new as of yesterday, is Ontario premier Doug Ford is going to Washington to sit down with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. In my estimation, it feels like the charm offensive, the constant presence of Doug Ford on American television, as well as the 25% exit tax that he had placed on Canadian electricity going to three border states

of Michigan, Minnesota, and New York caught the attention of the American administration. And it looks like they are finally put their swords down to a certain extent. And it looks like they will be talking. To what end and what we are going to get out of that, nobody knows.

But somebody who has had strong opinions on the Ontario tactic as it relates to these tariffs is Ian Lee, associate professor at Carleton University at the Sprott School of Business. And he joins us now. Ian, thank you so much for joining us on the Ben Mulroney show. My pleasure, Ben. Now I've I love talking to you. You say what you mean and you mean what you say. And at one point over the past couple of weeks, as this debate has gone on, you pointed out that Canada's ability to move the needle in the

States relatively insignificant, Ontario is even smaller than Canada's, and yet it does seem like this tactic by Ontario Premier Doug Ford has at least opened the door to dialogue. So what are your thoughts as he goes into this meeting tomorrow? OK, great. It's already being spun by people in why and i think it's rather that see the retaliatory terrace worked i think that what they showed was exactly the opposite

doug Ford blank yesterday i am ecstatic that he blanked this is not a criticism of doug ford doug ford and all our leaders not a walk right Doug Ford. Doug Ford and all our leaders in Ottawa, Kretchen, Trudeau, Carney, Freeland, have said over and over, nonstop for two or three months, look everybody, if we impose and we retaliate,

the Americans will back down. That's their thesis. That's what they're telling us, why to support it. That's their thesis. That's their what they're telling us why to support it So what is for a Trump been doing over the last two weeks? People announce we announced retaliatory terrorists. What does he do? Is he back down? God? No, he's come back and said, okay I'm gonna increase it from 25 to 50 percent. I'm gonna go after your auto sector I think what happened yesterday was a Doug Ford had an oh my god moment. It finally hit him.

He's going to, that guy in the White House is going to shut down the auto industry. He's going to annihilate us. And that recognition that went through Doug Ford's head yesterday, in my opinion, was what he said, oh god, we can't let that happen. This will destroy us. Ian, Ian, I hear everything you're saying and that's a fair assessment, especially because everything that we do is speculation, right? Because we do not, I do not believe there's an honest broker on the other side of the table, right? So we don't know what's actually motivating the president. And because we don't know, we don't know the motivations for the meeting, right?

However, let me offer this counterpoint that, yes, you're absolutely right. We are insignificant to them. However, the expectations of the American people as it relates to what Donald Trump has promised them versus what Doug Ford got elected on are completely different. Doug Ford got elected on a promise that Stuff was gonna get bad trust me to weather what is going to be an awful storm

Versus the president the United States who came in and said trust me these tariffs are going to lead to the greatest Economic boom you've ever seen meanwhile. He's watching the the Dow Jones economic boom you've ever seen. Meanwhile, he's watching the Dow Jones tumble day after day. The pressure is on him. And so we've sort of leaned into the chaos. I bet I don't get anything you said. It's just that that's completely beside what happened. That doesn't, isn't germane to what happened yesterday.

What happened yesterday was as follows. And by the way, sure, we can't get inside Donald Trump's head or Ford or anybody's head, you're right. That's why I've always been evidence-based and all my research, I look at the actual decisions announced. And by the way, sure, we can't get inside Donald Trump's head or Ford or anybody's head. You're right. That's why I've always been evidence-based in all my research. I look at the actual decisions announced. There's no way around that. If a government announces a tariff decision, you can't say, well, they really didn't,

you know, because they've got bad motives or they've got good motives. I only deal with the actual decisions on the record, bills, laws, spending, and executive orders by the president. I have no idea why he did it, but we can actually decide and look and see whether he did or didn't. Yesterday, Doug Ford was told by the Americans, we are going to increase the tariff from 25 to 50, and we're going to go after your auto industry. But the auto industry is our auto industry. It's not just, it's not just Canadian. It's North American. Sure, sure, fine. And he's seen, but- Doug Ford is the Premier of Ontario, Ben.

And he said, I, Doug Ford, what's the impact gonna be on me and on the people of Ontario that I'm elected to represent? It's going to be catastrophically bad. He then backed down with that information available because he announced he's backing down. So you and I are gonna- You and I are going to- you and I are going to,

you and I on that, on this point are going to agree to disagree and let's shift our focus to tomorrow. Knowing what you know about the state of play, the what's at stake, what do you think could come out of a meeting between let's be honest, a sub national leader and the commerce secretary.

I am cautiously optimistic, and I'll explain why. The people in Ottawa, and I've watched the Sunday night every speech, including Mr. Kretchen, and I didn't see a flicker, a flicker of recognition of the failure of their approach, which is that we're going to stand up and defeat the United States with our retaliatory terror. So that's the operative belief in Ottawa.

I didn't see any recognition otherwise. With Ford, I believe there is a recognition we can't win in a terror war against the United States. That's what I believe happened yesterday. Now he's going to Washington because Lutnick said, come on down here and let's talk. I think he's the voice of reason i think what they've got the part his career since when he was the uh... c opcator firstgerald and turn around that company after that devastating terror

tactic killed eighty or ninety percent of all their people on the top floors of the world exchange i've been following his career he's a very smart guy and he said the magic word yesterday he's mentioned again a cause marina go she ish which as you know, I've been advocating is the only exit strategy from this trade war. But don't you think, Professor, don't you think it's so odd that we've got the Premier of Ontario who does not represent

and does not have a mandate of the entire country. He's the one going down there, possibly opening the door to a renegotiation of NAFTA 2.0. To me, that speaks to a vacuum of power in Ottawa. Yes. In fact, right now, de facto, sorry for these academic terms, but the de facto, that means in fact, not in reality, not legally speaking, the de facto leadership in Canada right now on this trade war is not the government in Ottawa. It is Doug Ford. Imperfect as he may be. He is at least showing growth and learning on the job. He realizes Lutnick is a key guy. He realizes that

Cosma is the X, I think, I think, I'm interpreting. I think Ford realizes, Premier Ford realizes, that the exit strategy is going to be uh... a kuzma agreement just if i can digress to kissinger and i can get my book if you're characters pointed out no war has ever ended by yet more bombs and yet more wars you always end up sooner or later may take five years in a war

but you end up at a negotiating table where you negotiate a treaty to end the war. The exit strategy of a trade war is not more trade wars. It's going to be a deal at some point. It may not be right now. It may not be in two weeks. It may not be in two months. But the only exit out of this is a negotiated settlement.

And so he, I have glimmer, I see glimmers of opportunity and hope here because Lutnick is a rational guy, he's a smart guy. And Doug Ford, I think, is starting to understand the trade war is a, a retaliatory terrorist, is a dead end strategy. We got to start talking about a comprehensive deal. And that is why I'm cautiously optimistic. John Oakley on his show yesterday said something that resonated tremendously with me. You're winning if you're talking and Doug Ford is talking and therefore there's the

possibility that we can move this thing along. Ian Lee from Carleton University, thank you so much for your insights today. Hope to talk to you again soon. Thanks very much, Ben. Thank you. Welcome to the Ben Mulry Show. Thank you so much for taking time out of your Wednesday to join us on the Chorus Radio Network or on the iHeartRadio app or across podcast platforms

to which we say thank you. We really appreciate you. We can't do the show without you. And it means a lot that we're building this show and this community one listener at a time. The biggest story in Canadian politics today is the imminent meeting between Ontario Premier Doug Ford and Howard Lutnick, the Commerce Secretary under

Donald Trump after days of aggressive trade behavior by the Ontario Premier in the form of a 25% exit tax on applied to all electricity going to three neighboring states in Minnesota, Michigan, and New York. It looks like that finally got the attention of the Trump administration. And these two politicians will be sitting behind closed doors to hash something out.

We don't know what's going to come from that. But here to talk about it with me, because I've done a lot of talking on my own, is Chris Chapin, political commentator and managing principal of upstream strategy. Chris, welcome to the show. Always a pleasure, Brad. So Chris, there is there is a lot of debate going on. It's pretty clear to me. My assessment of the facts on the ground is that this is a home run by by Doug Ford as somebody who sat on this radio station yesterday. You're winning if you're talking and he's talking. So what's your assessment?

I couldn't agree more than and I think that the best way to sum it up is actually the the comment because I think there's been some back and forth about well, you know, did Donald win or did Doug win? And I think Doug summed it up pretty well today when he was asked by a reporter, he said, you know, Howard Lutnick called me, I didn't call him. Yeah, exactly. And I don't think you can take that for granted. They had a strategy that, you know, to get notice and have a conversation, we had to push back. And that's exactly what the province did in the absence of really anything else across the country. And it worked. Nobody been able to meet with Howard Lotnick as the Secretary of Commerce to date so far. I think there've been some conversations behind the scenes, is my understanding between him and

Premier Ford. But you know, there wasn't a sit down face to face in Washington at the White House. And now we have that tomorrow. And so I remember enough time in the schoolyard that you know, you got to stand up to the bully and I think that's what Ontario did. I think that's what Doug Ford did. And now he's got a meeting at the White House to try to hash this out and come to some kind of an agreement because it certainly is felt for some time now that there's been a lot of talk about terrorists, but no talk about a resolution.

Yeah. And look, I'm giving a lot of credit to Doug Ford for getting to this point and moving into a new phase of this trade war. Hopefully it'll turn into trade diplomacy, which will then in turn lead to trade peace. But there shouldn't be any talk of winners or losers at this point because it is an ongoing, ever-changing situation.

And so for people to be saying, Doug Ford blinked, or the Trump administration has capitulated. None of that is true right now. Yeah, no, I completely agree. I think what is happening is that for the first time in months, we are seeing some sort of a progress towards a discussion taking place. And that, you know, unfortunately, you know, this should be these should be discussions that are taking place between the federal government and the white house and we all know that you know federal politics has been disarrayed for some time hopefully that you know might find some

steady ground in the coming month or so depending on whether the feds go to the polls or not but we're having a discussion and Dominic LeBlanc and the premier are heading down to Washington to meet for the first time face to face with who we should be meeting with. And instead of, you know, negotiating this trade war on Twitter, it sounds like we're finally going to be doing it in the boardroom where we're frankly these diplomatic conversations belong. I'm talking with Chris Chapin, political commentator and managing principal of upstream strategy. And we're talking about this meeting that could mean so very much to the future of our country. I don't think I'm overstating it.

But one thing that has changed, at least as it relates to Donald Trump and the words he's using, we are so used to him denigrating and demeaning our prime minister by calling him Governor Trudeau, that all of a sudden yesterday, in response to this new happening,

this is how he referred to Doug Ford. Now I will say this, that already Canada, and I respect very much, as you know, there's a very strong man in Canada who said he was gonna charge a surcharge or a tariff on electricity coming into our country. He's already he has called and he said he's not going to do that.

Okay, not going to do that. And it would have been a very bad thing if he did. And he's not going to do that. So I respect that. But we were just informed that he's not going to do that. Kevin O'Leary often says when it comes to Donald Trump, you have to know how to separate the signal from the noise. The noise was everything that he said,

with the exception of Doug Ford is a strong man. And we know that President Trump responds to strong men, whether they be autocratic or democratic. And so this to me is a positive sign that he's going to be, he's got at least the beginnings of respect from this administration. I think it's the first time I've ever heard Donald Trump refer to anybody in a positive tone. I'm trying to think of, you

know, who in, you know, the years he's been president that he's spoken of like that. And I think there's something to be said about we all know Donald Trump fancies himself as the ultimate deal maker. He wrote the book, The Art of the Deal. He really does believe that when it comes to negotiations, you do negotiate, you're trying to always win the deal, but you respect the person on the other side of the boardroom table. And I think clearly the province's actions, Doug Ford's actions on standing firm and saying, hey, we can do things too.

We are going to negotiate this, but don't think we're just going to roll over, has clearly garnered the president's respect. And you know, for Canada's sake, I think that's a very, very, very good thing because it seems for too long. He, he looked at us as a bit of a joke. Chris, you've seen Doug Ford behind closed doors and most of us thus far have been appreciating the work he's doing on television, on radio,

in scrums, with the press. But what's he like behind closed doors when he is negotiating, when he is talking and the cameras aren't on? Because I think a lot of us wanna know, well, like what's his style? What's his angle? How does he how does he communicate in private? I think people need to remember Doug Ford at his core is a businessman and so well before he got into politics he was running the family business in offices here in Toronto and down in Chicago. And, you know, he's straight to the point. He wants everybody to walk away happy,

but he's always gonna protect his side of, you know, his interest in the deal first and foremost. And so I think he's a straight shooter. And I think that's probably where the respect comes from south of the border is that, you know, and I think there's just probably a reason there's that line of dialogue, that open line of dialogue between him and Howard Lutnick is that he's not trying to pull any punches here.

He just, you know, let's get past this. Let's do what's in the best interest of both countries and get on with it because what we're doing right now is hurting both of us and nobody's winning. And so I think behind the scenes, it's not that much, honestly, not much dissimilar to what you see when you see him on press clippings or when he's talking, especially when he's talking to the American press and the American people is like, we're not trying to take advantage of you here.

We want to deal just as much as you want to deal. So let's get to making a deal. Yeah, and I gotta say, it really has been a tale of sort of two leaders. On one hand, you've had Donald Trump, who has changed the reason behind these tariffs, and he has gone back and forth on these policies, causing a lot of instability and a lot of worry

and a lot of concern amongst investors and people who are looking to build their businesses. But on this side of the border, in the province of Ontario, you've had a very consistent message coming out of Doug Ford. Every time he opens his mouth, I love Americans. We love Americans. We didn't want this.

We don't want to do this. We want to build your economy alongside our economy. He has been beating that drum consistently. And I think that will, I personally think that'll help him when he sits down because he hasn't derogated from that message once. No, he really hasn't. There's something to be said about

the Premier's message discipline, whether it's in public or private. But it really has, I think, helped his cause. And I think it goes back to kind of what I was saying. He is a straight shooter, and it's just like, we don't want this, let's reach a deal. But recognizing, I think, that anybody in business that's ever sat down and negotiated a deal,

is you can't negotiate something if you're not sitting down at the table. And so, you know, Premier Ford was pretty adamant that we needed to get to the table. I think, you know, there were some criticisms of him during the snap election of why was he going down to Washington? It's well, you can't make a deal with the White House if you're not at the White House. So I think that was really what was, you know, I never had a couple of things on my bingo sheet, the president of the United States calling Doug Ford a strong man. Yeah, Chris. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, we're gonna we're gonna leave it there, my friend, but

more to discuss after that meeting. And so thank you so much.