Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Saturday morning called high U.S. tariffs on a wide swath of his country’s goods “a miscalculation” after trade talks with Canada collapsed Friday night. The 50% tariffs went into effect at the stroke of midnight. Carney blamed the breakdown of talks on what he said were “uneconomic” and “unfair” demands from the Trump administration. “In recent days, the United States proposed new terms that were uneconomic, unfair and undermined net benefits to Canada, and called into question the reliability of any agreement. In short, they asked for too much and offered too little,” Carney told reporters at a news conference. After weeks of talks, Carney announced Friday that while significant progress had been made, “that progress was not made.” was “a bad deal.” US imports from Canada worth $20 billion, according to the US trade representative’s office. The import taxes will hit everything from hockey sticks to some building materials, liquor and certain types of clothing. Carney said in Friday’s statement that Canada would immediately retaliate against the United States, matching “those tariffs dollar for dollar to protect our workers and businesses.” The White House did not immediately respond to NBC News’ request for comment. reaching a deal came after nearly two weeks of furious talks. It was also a dramatic turnaround from Tuesday, when President Donald Trump suspended tariffs for three days and wrote on social media that the two sides “have a DEAL!” Officials on both sides seemed optimistic about a deal until the last minute. On Thursday, the Canadian minister responsible for trade relations with the United States met with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer for several hours. Canadian, Mark Carney, in the Oval Office on October 7, 2025. Sarah L. Voisin / The Washington Post via Getty Images file “We are very close, we continue to make progress and we will stay here and do the necessary work until we get to that point,” Dominic LeBlanc told reporters as he left Greer’s office on Thursday night. They remained at the U.S. trade representative’s office after 10:30 p.m. ET on Friday. But in the end, the two sides were unable to reach a compromise. In his statement on Friday, Carney said that “the last-minute changes to the terms proposed by the United States were unfair, uneconomic and called into question the reliability of any agreement.” “We have recognized from the beginning that the United States has changed and that we will not return to our old relationship,” Carney said. And we will not allow any nation to determine our future.” At a news conference Saturday, Carney explained the “last-minute changes” the U.S. requested be made to the deal. One change, he said, was that the Americans wanted to limit tariffs “to cars only.” [and] …not including medium and heavy trucks, which is a big change.” Carney also said the United States introduced “in the last few hours efforts to restrict our ability to enter into other trade agreements,” noting that such proposals would have affected trade and security agreements Canada had signed with other countries. He added that American negotiators also sought to “restrict the protection of our language, our culture and, indeed, our sovereignty,” but did not provide details on the issue. The last-minute changes were not the only reason Carney said “We have said enough, so we have also taken countermeasures.” Canadian retaliation.” Greer said one point of contention was that Canada continued to maintain its retaliation against the United States “including, among other things, outright bans on certain U.S. goods and services.” Those bans, introduced by Canada’s provinces on the sale of U.S. alcohol, were introduced in 2025 in retaliation for earlier waves of Trump tariffs on Canada. As talks progressed this week, the Carney government faced some opposition from U.S. premiers. Canada’s provinces in his country. Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew said the Canadian federal government should “fight” Trump. One particular sticking point was a request by Carney to provincial premiers to lift their bans on American alcohol sales. Quebec Premier Christine Fréchette said Thursday she was still “looking at” the request, the CBC reported. country, did not make any public comments Thursday or early Friday. However, Ford wrote in Smith, at more critical supply chains and would put at risk the 13 million American jobs that depend on the North American trade pact. American competitiveness in this counterproductive trade saga.” “Americans will see their costs rise and Canadians will see customers, investments and small businesses disappear,” said Candace Laing, president and CEO of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce. The new tariffs were imposed under Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930, which had never been applied before. The law allows the White House to implement tariffs of up to 50% on any foreign trading partner that “discriminates” against the United States. However, the new Canadian tariffs will almost certainly be challenged in court. Canadian officials had hoped to convince the White House to eliminate Section 338 tariffs entirely. In addition to that goal, they had also been seeking a lower tariff rate for industrial products such as steel and aluminum that were imposed under Section 232 of the Trade Act, CBC News and Bloomberg reported. On Wednesday, Bloomberg reported that US negotiators had agreed to reduce current tariffs on cars and metals from 25% to 15%. In his statement early Saturday, Greer said the United States had offered “significant tariff reductions on steel, aluminum, automobiles and lumber,” without providing details. “This is a missed opportunity for Canada to partner with the United States,” he said. Spokespeople for Canadian officials involved in the talks have repeatedly declined to provide additional details about the negotiations to NBC News. But Greer previously said the new 50% tariffs on Canada were effectively revenge for Ottawa’s retaliation against earlier tranches of Trump tariffs. “The political basis for those tariffs is related to the actions that Canada took against the United States,” Greer said last week. “So I have two countries in the world that have retaliated against the United States over trade measures: the People’s Republic of China and Canada. That’s not the kind of company you really want to be in.” Last year, Trump briefly responded to China’s retaliation by raising tariffs to triple digits. Months of talks between Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and China’s vice premier finally calmed tensions and tariffs were reduced.
