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Trump raises tariffs on Canadian goods in response to Reagan advert
US President Donald Trump has said he is increasing tariffs on goods imported from Canada after the province of Ontario aired an anti-tariff advertisement featuring former President Ronald Reagan.
In a post on social media on Saturday, Trump called the advert a “fraud” and lashed out at Canadian officials for not removing it ahead of the World Series baseball championship.
“Because of their serious misrepresentation of the facts, and hostile act, I am increasing the Tariff on Canada by 10% over and above what they are paying now,” he wrote.
After Trump on Thursday withdrew from trade talks with Canada, the Ontario premier said he would take down the advert.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford said on Friday that he would pause his province’s anti-tariff advertisement campaign in the US, telling reporters that he made the decision after discussions with Prime Minister Mark Carney “so that trade talks can resume”.
He also said it would still run over the weekend, including during games for the World Series, which features the Toronto Blue Jays against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Canada is the only G7 country that has not reached a deal with the US since Trump began seeking to charge steep tariffs on goods from major trading partners.
The US has already imposed a 35% levy on all Canadian goods – though most are exempt under an existing free trade agreement. It has also slapped sector-specific levies on Canadian goods, including a 50% levy on metals and 25% on automobiles.
In his post, sent while he was traveling to Asia, Trump seemed to say he was adding 10 percentage points to those taxes.
Three-quarters of Canadian exports are sold to the US, and Ontario is home to the bulk of Canada’s automobile manufacturing.
The advert, which was sponsored by the Ontario government, quotes former US President Ronald Reagan, a Republican and icon of US conservatism, saying tariffs “hurt every American”.
The video takes excerpts from a 1987 national radio address that focused on foreign trade.
The Ronald Reagan Foundation, which is charged with preserving the former president’s legacy, had criticised the advert for using “selective” audio and video and said it misrepresented Reagan’s address. It also said the Ontario government had not sought permission to use it.
In his post on Truth Social on Saturday, Trump said that the advert should have been pulled down earlier.
“Their Advertisement was to be taken down, IMMEDIATELY, but they let it run last night during the World Series, knowing that it was a FRAUD,” he wrote, while flying to Malaysia.
Ford had previously pledged to run the Reagan advert in every Republican-led district in the US.
Both Trump and Carney will be attending the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Malaysia, but Trump told reporters accompanying him aboard Air Force One that he does not have any “intention” of meeting with his Canadian counterpart during the trip.
In his post, Trump also accused Canada of attempting to manipulate an upcoming US Supreme Court case which could end his entire tariff regime.
The case, to be heard by the highest US court next month, will determine whether the tariffs are constitutional.
On Thursday, Trump posted that the advert was designed to “interfere” with “THE MOST IMPORTANT CASE EVER”.
Responding to the Trump’s rate hike on Saturday, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce said it hoped “this threat of escalation can be resolved through diplomatic channels and further negotiation”.
“Tariffs at any level remain a tax on America first, then North American competitiveness as a whole,” the organisation’s CEO, Candace Laing, said in a statement to the BBC.
The Reagan ad is not the only way that Ontario – home of the Toronto Blue Jays – is using the World Series as a platform to criticise Trump’s tariffs.
In a video posted on Friday, Ford and California Governor Gavin Newsom jokingly made bets about which team would win the series.
Both men repeatedly joked about tariffs in the video, with Ford pledging to send Newsom a can of maple syrup if the LA Dodgers win.
“The tariff might cost me a few extra bucks at the border these days, but it’ll be worth it,” he wrote.
In response, Newsom asked Ford to resume allowing American-produced alcohol to be sold in province liquor stores, and pledged to send him “California’s championship-worthy wine” if the Blue Jays triumph.
They ended their exchange both declaring: “Here’s to a great World Series, and a tariff-free friendship between Ontario and California.”
(BBC)
Donald Trump said he hoped to reach phase two of the Gaza peace plan “very quickly”, as he warned Hamas would have “hell to pay” if it did not disarm quickly.
The US president, whose 20-point peace plan requires the militant group to disarm, made the comments as he met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Florida for talks on Monday.
During a press conference with Netanyahu after their meeting, Trump said Israel had “lived up to the plan 100%”, despite continuing attacks by its military in Gaza.
The US president also said his country could support another major strike on Iran were it to resume rebuilding its ballistic missile or nuclear weapons programmes.
Asked how quickly Hamas and Israel should move to phase two of the peace plan, Trump said: “As quickly as we can. But there has to be disarmament.”
Speaking about Hamas, he said: “If they don’t disarm as, as they agreed to do, they agreed to it, and then there will be hell to pay for them.
“They have to disarm in a fairly short period of time”.
Trump also said reconstruction in Gaza could “begin pretty soon”.
The Gaza peace plan came into effect in October. Under the second phase, a technocratic government would be established in the devastated territory, Hamas would disarm and Israeli troops would withdraw. The reconstruction of Gaza would then begin.
But critics have suggested Netanyahu could seek to delay the process of the plan and instead push for Hamas to disarm before Israeli troops withdraw.
The Israeli prime minister has been accused of not wanting to engage seriously with the issue of a political future for Palestinians.
Hamas officials have said a full disarmament should take place alongside progress towards an independent Palestinian state.
Asked if he was concerned Israel was not moving quickly enough to phase two of the plan, Trump said it had “lived up to the plan”.
“I’m not concerned about anything that Israel’s doing, I’m concerned about what other people are doing or maybe aren’t doing,” he added.
[BBC]
Bangladesh’s first female prime minister Khaleda Zia has died at the age of 80 after suffering from a prolonged illness.
“Our favourite leader is no longer with us. She left us at 6am this morning,” Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) announced on Facebook.
Physicians had said on Monday night that Zia’s condition was “extremely critical”. She was put on life support, but it was not possible to provide multiple treatments at the same time given her age and overall poor health, they said.
Zia became Bangladesh’s first female head of government in 1991 after leading the BNP to victory in the country’s first democratic election in 20 years.
Zia returned to the post of prime minister in 2001, stepping down in October 2006 ahead of a general election.
Her political career had been marred by corruption allegations and a long-standing political rivalry with Awami League leader Sheikh Hasina, who was ousted from premiership last year.
Zia, who was the wife of Bangladesh’s late president Ziaur Rahman, was jailed for five years in 2018 for corruption.
[BBC]
President Volodymyr Zelensky has denied allegations by Russia that Ukraine launched a drone attack on one of President Vladimir Putin’s residences, and accused Moscow of trying to derail peace talks.
Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov claimed Kyiv had launched an attack overnight using 91 long-range unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) on Putin’s state residence in Russia’s northwestern Novgorod region.
Russia said it would now review its position in peace negotiations. It is not yet clear where Putin was at the time of the alleged attack.
Zelensky dismissed the claim as “typical Russian lies”, intended to give the Kremlin an excuse to continue attacks on Ukraine.
He said that Russia had previously targeted government buildings in Kyiv.
Zelensky added on X: “It is critical that the world doesn’t stay silent now. We cannot allow Russia to undermine the work on achieving a lasting peace.”
In a statement shared on Telegram on Monday, Lavrov said all of the 91 drones he claimed were launched at Putin’s residence were intercepted and destroyed by Russian air defence systems.
He added that there were no reports of casualties or damage as a result of the attack.
“Given the final degeneration of the criminal Kyiv regime, which has switched to a policy of state terrorism, Russia’s negotiating position will be revised,” he said.
But he added that Russia did not intend to exit the negotiating process with the US, Russian news agency Tass reported.
The claim by Moscow comes after talks between the US and Ukraine in Florida on Sunday, where Presidents Trump and Zelensky discussed a revised peace plan to end the war.
Following the meeting, Zelensky told Fox News on Monday that there was a “possibility to finish this war” in 2026.
But he said Ukraine could not win the war without US support.
“My feelings of President Trump’s sanctions and economical steps, shows that he’s ready for very strong steps,” Zelensky said. “In this situation, the United States can move the situation to peace quicker.”
The Ukrainian president told Fox News there was no indication that Putin wanted peace and that he did not trust Putin.
“I don’t trust Putin and he doesn’t want success for Ukraine,” Zelensky added.
Zelensky said the US had offered Ukraine security guarantees for 15 years, and Trump said an agreement on this point was “close to 95%” done.
Ukraine’s leader described territorial issues and the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant as the last unresolved matters, and there was little sign of progress on the future of Ukraine’s contested Donbas region – which Russia wants to seize in full.
Moscow currently controls about 75% of the Donetsk region, and some 99% of the neighbouring Luhansk. The two regions are known collectively as Donbas.
Russia has previously rejected key parts of the plan under discussion.
The White House said on Monday that President Trump had “concluded a positive call” with Putin, following the US-Ukraine talks.
Yuri Ushakov, a Kremlin foreign policy aide, told reporters on Monday that during the call, Putin had pointed out the alleged attack on his residence happened “almost straight after what the US had considered to be a successful round of talks”.
Ushakov said: “The US president was shocked by this information, he was angry and said he couldn’t believe such mad actions. It was stated that this will no doubt affect the US approach to working with Zelensky”.
During a later press conference, Trump initially appeared to say he did not know about the alleged incident, but later told reporters that he was told about it by Putin and was “very angry” about it.
Asked if the US had seen any evidence supporting Russia’s claim, he responded: “Well we’ll find out. You’re saying maybe the attack didn’t take place – that’s possible too, I guess. But President Putin told me this morning it did”.
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