Canada’s centre-left Prime Minister Mark Carney has said his country will not pursue a trade deal with China following a threat of huge retaliatory tariffs from US President Donald Trump.
Speaking to reporters today, Carney said: “We have commitments under CUSMA [the Canadian term for the North American free trade agreement USMCA] not to pursue free-trade agreements with non-market economies without prior notification.
“We have no intention of doing that with China or any other non-market country.”
Previously, Canada and China had concluded a “preliminary agreement” on January 16 with the aim of lowering tariffs on select goods, including a preferential tariff for Chinese electric vehicles as well as lower tariffs on Canadian agricultural products such as canola seed oil.
Trade analysts had seen the agreement as a significant shift in Canada’s policy on China, after the country had imposed high tariffs on Chinese cars in 2024 together with the US.
The new agreement has consequently sparked the ire of Trump. On January 24, he posted on his Truth Social platform: “If Canada makes a deal with China, it will immediately be hit with a 100% Tariff against all Canadian goods and products coming into the USA.”
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent echoed Trump’s remarks, telling ABC News yesterday that the US could not let Canada “become an opening through which the Chinese pour their cheap goods into the US”.
Trump was reportedly also angered by a speech Canada’s PM gave at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos. In a special address on January 20, Carney had warned against economic coercion by the world’s superpowers.
In his latest remarks, Carney downplayed the new agreement with China, saying the two countries had merely wanted to “rectify some issues that developed in the last couple of years”, adding the deal was “consistent with our obligations under CUSMA which we very much respect”.
He has in the past been accused of not being impartial regarding Chinese interests following reports that he implored the Mayor of Beijing to “deepen co-operation”.
In August 2025, Pierre Poilievre, leader of the Canadian Conservative Party, wrote: “Carney is compromised by the authoritarian regime in Beijing. His company owes the Chinese state-owned bank a quarter billion dollars.
“He protected a Liberal candidate & MP who said a Canadian citizen should be turned over to Beijing for a bounty … The Carney Liberals can’t be trusted to keep Canadians safe.”
