‘Canada is very smooth’ on trade, but president says he’s wise to its tricks

WASHINGTON— U.S. President Donald Trump says he’s wise to Canada’s diplomatic trickery — even though “Canada is very smooth.”

At a meeting with governors at the White House on Monday morning, Trump again wrongly claimed that the U.S. loses money on trade with Canada. Then he claimed that Canada has been trying to deceive him, smoothly, about the true state of the trade relationship.

“We lose a lot with Canada. People don’t know it. Canada is very smooth,” he said in a tone of knowing mockery. “They have you believe that it’s wonderful. And it is. For them. Not wonderful for us. It’s wonderful for them. So we have to start showing that we know what we’re doing.”

In a report released last week, Trump’s own hand-picked Council of Economic Advisers confirmed the facts that Canadian officials, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, have long tried to convey to Trump: the U.S. has a trade surplus with Canada, not a deficit.

Trump has repeatedly insisted that the U.S. actually has a multi-billiondollar deficit with Canada. He refers only to trade in goods, in which there is indeed a U.S. deficit, and excludes services, in which there is a U.S. surplus bigger than the goods deficit.

According to the U.S. Trade Representative, the net U.S. surplus was $12 billion (U.S.) in 2016. Using a different method of calculation, Trump’s advisers wrote, “In 2016, the United States ran a trade surplus of $2.6 billion with Canada.”