President Donald Trump’s Canada tariff threat handed Democrats a new political target, with Sen. Ruben Gallego calling the White House team “the dumbest” in U.S. history and Rep. Jamie Raskin accusing the president of killing American businesses.
Trump said Canadian cars, trucks, auto parts and steel would be hit with a 50 percent duty on Jan. 1, 2027, unless manufacturers build in the United States.
The president positioned the move as punishment for Canada’s treatment of American agriculture, but Democrats said the bill would land on families, farmers and small business owners at home.
Gallego used MS NOW’s “All In” to attack Trump’s handling of allies and the people advising him.
“Secretary Bessent is sometimes bright, but he could also be the dumbest man in the room at the same time,” the Arizona Democrat said.
We can't hold our allies at gunpoint and expect them to stay loyal. What Trump doesn't understand is that we need to foster our friendships during the good times so they're by our side during the bad ones.
So if he thinks a trade war with Canada is going to help us win the war… pic.twitter.com/oDFekSqSpk
— Ruben Gallego (@RubenGallego) August 25, 2026
Gallego said the administration was forgetting that Canada had stood with the United States before, including on D-Day, and that allies cannot be treated as expendable until they are needed.
“And he must at least remember, on D Day, Canada was our ally then, too,” Gallego said. “And the other thing that really matters about allies is that you need to have relationships with them before you actually need them.”
He warned that Americans would bear the cost of that approach.
🎓Support Defending Education’s mission to expose political agendas in America’s classrooms and restore quality education for all! 🎓 Help protect students and strengthen education nationwide ➡️➡️➡️ DONATE TODAY!!! 🇺🇸
“This is the dumbest administration this country has ever seen, and we’re all going to pay for it,” Gallego said.
Raskin, a Maryland Democrat, tied the tariffs directly to businesses and cross-border commerce on X.
“Stop Trump’s idiotic trade war killing American businesses,” Raskin wrote. “Let peaceful commerce among the nations prevail.”
He said Canada’s role as America’s top trading partner made Trump’s approach especially damaging.
“And hands off Canada, America’s #1 trading partner, whose people are now boycotting American products because of Trump’s imbecilic policies,” Raskin wrote.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro put the dispute in kitchen-table terms, saying the president was hurting families, farmers and smaller companies.
“Since Day One, Donald Trump has chosen chaos and cruelty — and by doubling down on his reckless trade war with Canada, he’s further harming our families, farmers, and small business owners,” Shapiro tweeted.
In his Truth Social announcement, Trump accused Canada of having “ridiculously high tariffs” on U.S. farmers and farm products.
“Canada has been ripping off the United States of America for years,” Trump wrote, saying the tariffs had “made life impossible for these great American Patriots.”
He blamed the trade relationship for a $60 billion deficit between the two countries and declared, “Not sustainable, and NOT ANYMORE!”
The tariff order he laid out covered “all Cars, Trucks, both large and small, Automotive Parts, and Steel,” with the rate climbing to 50 percent on Jan. 1, 2027.
“Build in the U.S. and there are ZERO TARIFFS. Canada will be treated like a State no longer!” Trump wrote.
Vice President JD Vance defended the White House position during a question-and-answer session in Brewer, Maine, by saying Canada had shown more favorable treatment to Chinese goods than to products from Maine.
“They treat Chinese goods more fairly than they do the goods that come from the people of Maine: It’s insanity,” Vance said. “And what we’ve said to Canada is stop it.”
Vance said he thought Washington and Ottawa were nearing an agreement before Canada brought “unreasonable last-minute demands” into the talks.
“I frankly thought we had a deal,” Vance said. “I think that we should have a deal, but I think that we need to send a message loud and clear to the prime minister of Canada: Stop taking advantage of the people of Maine. Stop taking advantage of America. It’s over.”
The trade fight also put Sen. Susan Collins at odds with Trump from inside his own party.
Collins, a Maine Republican, told News Center Maine that new tariffs on Canada would be a “mistake,” warning that the state’s blueberries, potatoes, lobster and lumber can cross the border for processing and return at higher prices.
“I really want us to go back to the very friendly, economically beneficial relationship that we have with our Canadian neighbors,” Collins said.
She said a tariff as high as 50 percent could increase the cost of eating, building homes and merchandising Maine’s best-known products.
Collins said she had recently pressed Canada’s ambassador to the United States over a dairy import barrier, but she still believed the Trump administration had been close to a deal.
That agreement had fallen apart after Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney took Canadian negotiators out of discussions with the United States on Friday.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said Canada had declined to finalize terms agreed earlier in the week, telling reporters that “new demands and walk backs of other commitments by Canada” had upset the balance reached in the prior days.
Carney said the United States made late changes that were “unfair, uneconomic, and called into question the reliability of any deal.”
Canada then prepared its own tariffs against the new U.S. 50 percent duties starting Sept. 8.
“We were attacked. You’re at war when you get attacked. We got attacked,” Carney said, according to the National Post.
At a press conference, Carney said Canada would match Washington’s new tariffs “dollar for dollar in order to protect Canadian workers, farmers, families and businesses.”
He accused the United States of using economic integration as a weapon and said American commitments no longer looked permanent.
“We recognize that sometimes its signature was written in pencil,” Carney said.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy predicted Carney would return to talks after feeling the pressure from the dispute with Washington.
“To think that they’re going to go to war with Donald Trump and actually win that war with the U.S., I think it’s foolish on their part,” Duffy said.
