On Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “The Story,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick responded to a question on if it’s possible to get to a place where the United States and Canada reciprocally end tariffs on each other by stating that “we want to bring back those jobs to America.”
Lutnick said, “Canada exists leaning on our economy. Let’s face it, cars used to be made in America. Why did Michigan’s cars move to Canada? To break out of the UAW. That’s just unfair to American workers and American union workers. It’s just — you finally have — Donald Trump’s got their back and is wondering why are cars made in Canada, why we are doing all this business in Canada if they’re not respectful, if they’re not thankful, and they don’t want to do it? Can you imagine a provincial leader…the equivalent of a governor deciding that they’re going to attack America and put a 25% increase on energy prices to teach Donald Trump a lesson, I guess? What happened? He learned a lesson. We’re going to come in and talk. But what should you expect? You should expect exactly what you heard President Trump [say] today, what are you doing for us? I know what we’re doing for you, but what are you doing for us? And I think that’s the right way to look at it, that’s our president’s way of looking at it, and that’s what you should expect.”
Host Martha MacCallum then asked, “So, why not just eliminate the tariffs between Canada and the United States? Is that a place that we can get to? Because it’s mind-boggling, like, 25%, no, it’s going to be 50%, no, we’re back to 25%.”
After MacCallum said the back-and-forth is “mind-boggling,” Lutnick cut in to respond, “No, no, no. … That would be true if you were Fox Canada. Fox Canada would like that.”
MacCallum then cut in to follow up, “I heard President Trump, moments ago, say, 200 million dollars we send in aid, essentially, to Canada. So, are we going to eliminate that? Tell me what the starting points are, I’m just — that’s what I want to know.”
Lutnik answered, “The starting point is, we care about America first, we care about American workers first, and we want to bring back those jobs to America. So, we’re going to bring back more and more jobs to America. We don’t want to buy 60% of our aluminum from Canada. We want to bring it to America. We want [to bring] the cars to America. We want to make America great first, then we can worry about Canada.”
Lutnick also argued tariffs will be a sizable revenue generator.
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