Ontario has agreed to suspend its 25 per cent surcharge on electricity exports to the U.S. following a call between Premier Doug Ford and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick Tuesday afternoon as President Donald Trump threatened to double tariffs on all steel and aluminum coming from Canada.
“With any negotiation that we have, there’s a point that both parties are heated and the temperature needs to come down. And I thought this was the right decision. They understand how serious we are about the electricity and the tariffs, and rather than going back and forth and and having threats to each other, we have both agreed that cooler heads prevail, we need to sit down and move this forward,” Ford told reporters at Queen’s Park.
The premier shared that he and federal Finance Minister Dominic LeBlanc will be heading to Washington on Thursday and meet with U.S. trade representatives to discuss a “renewed” USMCA trade deal.
Ford described his conversation with Lutnick “constructive” and called the invitation to Washington an “olive branch.”
“When you’re negotiating with someone, they call you and they hand over an olive branch, the worst thing I think I could do as Premier of Ontario is ignore them and hang up the phone on them. I don’t operate that way. I believe when someone’s putting out an olive branch, we sit back, we accept it graciously,” Ford said.
When asked if the tariffs on aluminum and steel will be paused following the meeting, Ford said he was confident Trump “will pull back.”
The tariffs on steel and aluminum are set to go into effect on Wednesday.
The meeting between Ford and Lutnick came hours after Trump said Canada will pay a big “financial price” for Ontario’s electricity tariffs.
Trump made the comment in a post on Truth Social on Tuesday morning, less than an hour after he announced plans to raise planned tariffs on steel and aluminum to 50 per cent in response to an electricity surcharge announced by Ontario one day earlier.
In his post on Truth Social, the U.S. president asked why the U.S. “allows” another country to supply Americans with electricity.
“Who made these decisions, and why? And can you imagine Canada stooping so low as to use ELECTRICITY, that so affects the life of innocent people, as a bargaining chip and threat,” Trump wrote.
“They will pay a financial price for this so big that it will be read about in History Books for many years to come!”
The post was the latest in a series of online comments Trump has made in the last 12 hours in response to Premier Ford’s decision to add a 25 per cent surcharge to all electricity that Ontario sends to New York, Minnesota, and Michigan.
“Based on Ontario, Canada, placing a 25% Tariff on “Electricity” coming into the United States, I have instructed my Secretary of Commerce to add an ADDITIONAL 25% Tariff, to 50%, on all STEEL and ALUMINUM COMING INTO THE UNITED STATES FROM CANADA, ONE OF THE HIGHEST TARIFFING NATIONS ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“This will go into effect TOMORROW MORNING, March 12th.”
The U.S. president said he will be declaring a “national emergency on electricity” within the “threatened area,” a move which he says will allow the U.S. to “quickly do what has to be done to alleviate this abusive threat from Canada.”
“If other egregious, long time Tariffs are not likewise dropped by Canada, I will substantially increase, on April 2nd, the Tariffs on Cars coming into the U.S. which will, essentially, permanently shut down the automobile manufacturing business in Canada,” Trump wrote.
He reiterated his desire to see Canada become “our cherished Fifty First State.”
The surcharge announced by Premier Ford on Monday is among a number of countermeasures being taken by the provincial government in response to Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods.
In a news release issued on Monday morning, the province said the measure is likely to bring in $300,000 to $400,000 in revenue a day and add about CAD $100 a month to some utility bills being paid by the Americans who rely on the electricity from Ontario.
Ontario currently supplies electricity to about 1.5 million homes and businesses in the three states.