Main picture: Mark Carney, Dr Frank Gaeth
Washington’s Veto Against Europe — Trump’s War on Canada as an Associated Member of the E.U.
It was the sentence that sent Donald Trump into a rage. Yesterday in Strasbourg, in the European Parliament, side by side with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said this: „We want to bring the relationship with Canada to the highest possible level. We want to work toward Canada becoming the first associate member of the E.U.“
A historic step. An associate status has never existed before; it would have to be created from scratch. But the idea is logical. Like the European Union, Canada is suffering under the erratic trade and foreign policy of the United States, and both are increasingly looking to other alliances — a technology alliance, defense, the Arctic, energy, critical minerals, AI and quantum. As von der Leyen put it: The partnership is „not directed against anyone else“ but is meant to make Canada and the E.U. „stronger together.“
And that is precisely where Trump’s delusion begins.
Because in Trump’s worldview, no one is allowed to become stronger except America. And no one is allowed to form an alliance without asking his permission.
His answer came, as always, in the form of a threat. If the E.U. works with Canada „to do economic harm to the U.S.A.,“ both would be hit with tariffs „far larger than currently planned.“
Just last week he threatened Canada with 50 percent tariffs on cars, trucks and steel starting in January. If Canada continues to talk to China or moves closer to Europe, he warned, it will face 100 percent tariffs on everything.
This is no longer a trade war. This is the foreign policy of a sociopath who believes he holds veto power over the sovereignty of other continents. Canada may not talk to the E.U. The E.U. may not talk to Canada. And if they do, the bridge will be walled up, the commercial artery cut off. He even threatened not to open the Gordie Howe International Bridge — financed entirely by Canada — until the United States is „fully compensated.“
It must be said plainly: A man who forbids a country from choosing with whom it associates thinks like a dictator. Like someone who beats his former partner because she has found a new friend. The E.U. and Canada „share the same view of the world,“ as von der Leyen put it, they believe in democracy and not that power belongs to the strongest, richest or loudest. That very idea is intolerable to Trump.
And that brings us to the question every American voter must face. How can a country that sees itself as the cradle of democracy elect a second time a man who openly blackmails like a mob boss, who treats allies as property, who interprets any cooperation between democracies as an attack on himself? According to Reuters/Ipsos, 57 percent of Americans consider him too erratic, 70 percent expect his tariffs to make their own shopping more expensive. They feel the cost of his megalomania at the checkout counter.
Trump’s threat of a trade freeze against the E.U. and Canada — simply because Canada wants to become an associate member of the E.U. — is the final proof: He does not want partners, he wants subjects. Canada has decided it will no longer be a subject. Europe should now be equally clear and see this first associate seat in Brussels not as a provocation against Washington, but as an act of self-defense by democracies against a man who believes he can dictate whom they are allowed to love.
