Carney with a mandate could spell trouble for Trump
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Welcome to The World in 10. In an increasingly uncertain world, this is The Times' daily podcast dedicated to global security. Today with me, Stuart Willey and Alex Dibble. Canadians are furious. Furious about Donald Trump's repeated threat that their country could soon become the 51st state of the US.

and now furious at the decision by their closest ally and southern neighbour to rip up long-standing trade agreements. And after April 28th, that fury looks set to give Donald Trump a series of problems. Problems he could have avoided too. Let's unpack the issues with our guest today. Xavier Delgado is a US-Canada relations specialist who's worked for think tanks in Washington as well as for Global Affairs Canada.

Zavi, you're somebody who straddles both countries. How much has this election become a referendum on Donald Trump's desire to take over Canada and his trade war?

Well, it's almost entirely about Donald Trump now. And to be clear, Stuart, there were, even before Donald Trump was in office, well before Donald Trump was elected president of the United States for a second time, Canadians were extremely anxious about the economy. Those anxieties about economic prosperity, housing affordability, grocery inflation actually drove Justin Trudeau out of office largely and

All of a sudden now it's shifted from being blame the liberal government and blame Justin Trudeau for Canada's economic prosperity or lack thereof. And now more so towards anxiety about how Donald Trump and his tariff plan might affect the Canadian economy. He started his presidency, lest we forget, with a proclamation that he would declare economic war on Canada and use economic force to make Canada the 51st state.

Canadians haven't forgotten about that. It's really resonated. It's driven up a lot of anti-American sentiment. And it's made the number one ballot question about who's better equipped to handle Donald Trump and the United States' new rhetoric towards Canada. How important will it be that Mark Carney or Pierre Poliev get a strong mandate to, as you say, handle Donald Trump?

Well, that's the really interesting thing. No matter who wins, they're going to have a new mandate. It's the first time in nearly a decade that Justin Trudeau is not on the ballot as a party leader. And so even if it is Mark Carney, he has a different platform than Justin Trudeau who came before him. Pierre Polyev obviously has a different platform that he's been pushing for well over the last five years as part of the Conservative Party and eventually its leader position.

They're going to need a strong mandate. And whoever does come out of this will have that mandate and be able to say, the people of Canada have put their trust in me to deal with this moment of crisis in Canada-U.S. relations.

Does that give Trump a problem that he didn't have before he started targeting Canada? Because when he started talking about making Canada the 51st state, a relatively weak Justin Trudeau was the person representing Canada. But next month, he's going to be up against a prime minister with a fresh mandate from the Canadian people to stand up to him. So does that change the dynamic?

I think there's two sides of the coin here. I think one is that, yes, the leader will have a strong mandate that puts them in a much more powerful position when dealing at the leader-to-leader level. But beyond that, Canadians have really rallied around this idea of protecting their sovereignty. They understand that they're paying a higher price because of U.S. tariffs, not because of poor government policy.

Whereas if you compare that with the United States, where I think the average American voter is going to be a lot more fickle in their support of the tariffs when they see prices going up, Canadians are ready to pay a higher price in exchange for protecting their sovereignty. That sort of anti-American driven sentiment and commitment to sticking by Canada makes the Canadian voter base a lot more resilient in the face of these price shocks and economic instability. It also gives the leader a lot more support. So both sides play into each other.

How that impacts the United States and the White House's thinking on this, I think they're going to have a harder time coming to the negotiating table for bigger issues like defense spending, like the USMCA review, which is mandated to take place next year. I mean, even, gosh, the two countries are going to co-host the World Cup in addition to the third North American partner, Mexico. All of these things are happening in the background while the bilateral relationship and sentiment on both sides of the border are just ramping up to a level we haven't seen before. Yeah.

I suppose Mark Carney, a man who's led central banks here in Britain as well as in Canada, he's someone with finance and economy running through his veins. He could be the worst person to be leading Canada from Trump's perspective.

That's certainly how the Liberal Party is going to try and push this. They've pointed to Carney's record as the former Bank of Canada governor, and not just, by the way, Stuart, as a central banker, but a central banker in times of crisis. The Bank of Canada governor during the 2008 recession, the Bank of England governor during Brexit. The Liberal Party's pitch is largely that Carney has this experience steering economies through difficult periods and

And Canada is about to enter a very difficult period as it breaks from the United States. It's worth noting that the Liberals have been very upfront about their perspective that U.S.-Canada relations have fundamentally changed. I think Polyev and the Conservatives are also in that boat, but it's across the political spectrum, a recognition that the U.S.-Canada relationship likely will not be proceeding forward as it's done in the past.

Back at the start of this year, the consensus was the Liberals would lose this election and the Conservatives would come to the fore. Xavier, how will Donald Trump be looking at the surge in support for the Liberals in the wake of his comments?

It's really difficult to get into Donald Trump's mind. And I thought about this a lot when thinking about tariff policy, when thinking about the 51st state comments. I mean, there's an argument to be made that it won't matter to him who the prime minister is. He's going to treat Canada the same either way. But it's also possible that he looks at a leader with a strong mandate and sees that he has less room and leverage for negotiation, right?

From a U.S. perspective, Stuart, I think it's actually quite unfortunate. There was a squandered opportunity for them to push and apply pressure to Canada without stirring up negative sentiment towards the United States. Justin Trudeau's approval ratings were so low.

that if the U.S. had been more tactical in pushing for things like a USMCA renegotiation for certain parts of the agreement, on pushing Canada to spend more of its GDP on defense, I think they could have gotten those outcomes purely based on how low public polling was for leadership in Canada and how strong of a mandate the president had going into his second term.

You touched there, Xavi, on defence spending. Is there a risk that the divisions exposed between these two incredibly close allies could damage the defence cooperation between them, or even, in the worst case scenario, lead to some sort of conflict?

Certainly not right away. The North American continental defense is so closely integrated. We have the only binational command in the world, NORAD, based out of Colorado Springs. It was a Canadian commander who closed the North American airspace on 9-11. This is a defense relationship that goes back decades.

But relationships are also built on trust, and there is not a lot of trust in the Canada-U.S. relationship right now. We saw that Canada is going to invest in a new radar system in the high north, in the Arctic. It's going to be a system from the Australians, not the Americans. Over time, we could see a pivot away from buying American defense goods and American defense products to rely on other allies. But in the short term, I think it would be too damaging for both countries to breach that defense relationship.

We've heard fiery language from politicians in Canada, as you'd expect during a big election. Will that language continue after April the 28th, election day, or will things calm down? We only know so much as what the United States' policy is going to be. I think Canada would certainly welcome a calm down in the rhetoric and in the tone, but

We just don't know. It's possible that the White House starts going off again about the 51st state, about governor, whoever wins the election, whether it's Carney or Governor Polyev. We really don't know which direction they're going to want to go. And I think a lot of that is going to be driven by the man who's sitting in the Oval Office behind the Resolute Desk.

It's worth noting, though, Stuart, that after the first call between Carney and Trump, and as far as we are aware, the only call between the two, the president dropped the governor and 51st state public messaging. So there might be a reason for optimism. I'm not celebrating yet if I'm sitting in Ottawa or if I'm a Canada-U.S. watcher here in the States.

But there is a chance that the rhetoric can turn, especially as the White House's attention turns to other countries as targets for its tariff policy. In the long term, Zavi, is this a rift that is mendable? Or could the relationship between the U.S. and Canada be broken in a fundamental way?

I certainly think it's in both countries' best interest to mend the relationship. If you look back, the decades of prosperity we've had working together, and that's not to say, I'm not claiming that globalization...

And free trade has worked for everybody across the continent. If anything, we see that with the rise of the Donald Trump Republican movement, certainly some of the branding that we see from the Conservative Party and the People's Party of Canada today, there are a lot of people who are dissatisfied, a lot of communities that have been left behind. And the leaders in both countries need to work more closely together to ensure that the benefits of globalization are being well spread out.

But that being said, there's a lot of good that's come from Canada-U.S. cooperation. We're actually, in the coming years, about to hit two centuries of formal relations between Canada and the States. Look at how far both countries have come together. They fought in world wars together. They've launched multilateral and multinational institutions together. They're two of the leading trade partners in the world. There's a lot of good that's come from this relationship.

But like I said earlier, it's built on trust and there's a lot of distrust right now. It'll take a lot of good faith effort from both sides in the future to rebuild that. Okay, Xavier, thank you. That is Xavier Delgado, a US-Canada relations analyst, joining us from Washington. In an episode last week, we looked at what legal comeback nations might have against the escalating trade war. It was titled, Could the World Sue Trump Over Tariffs? It digged into the role of the WTO.

That's it from us. Thank you for taking 10 minutes to stay on top of the world with the help of The Times. See you tomorrow. You want work to be less hard work. You hear an ad for MHR, so you reach out. We connect your department systems, which leads to real-time data sharing that uncovers new insights, which empower your decision makers and triple monthly sales, which leads to high fives and awkward hugs. You say a big thank you. We say you're welcome.

M-H-R. The science behind HR, payroll and finance. The science behind a new world of work. Discover more at mhrglobal.com. This episode is sponsored by Womble Bond Dickinson, an international law firm of more than 1,300 lawyers across 37 offices in the United States and United Kingdom.

In today's complex world, new problems need new perspectives. Womble Bond Dickinson thrives on change, bringing together people with different skill sets and experiences

to give their clients a competitive edge. Across a range of markets, they support businesses and private clients on critical challenges, from energy transition, digital transformation, and cross-border investment, to corporate finance, dispute resolution, and personal wealth planning, all with a mix of minds you won't find anywhere else. Womble Bond Dickinson. A point of view like no other. Discover more at WombleBondDickinson.com.