Carney's statement put the total at C$28 billion — against the U.S. Trade Representative's estimate of nearly US$20 billion. Canada "will match those tariffs dollar for dollar," the statement said. Speaking in Ottawa on Saturday, Carney said the countermeasures take effect Sept. 8 and will hit steel, dairy, appliances, agricultural equipment, pulp and paper and electronics.
The duty is paid by the American importer, not the Canadian exporter. It covers about 5% of what Canada ships south each year — close to 500 product lines spanning hockey sticks, honey, essential oils, cement, plywood and clothing.
Trump celebrated a 'DEAL!' with Canada — what happened?
At 10:15 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 18, less than two hours before the tariffs were first due to hit, President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that he was pausing them three days because Canada and the U.S. "have a DEAL!" U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer’s office posted that the deal would bring "comprehensive market access for all American goods," without specifics.
It did not survive the deadline. "Last-minute changes in the U.S. proposed terms were unfair, uneconomic, and called into question the reliability of any deal," Carney's statement said. On Saturday he added that Washington had tried to limit Canada's ability to strike trade deals elsewhere. "They asked too much, and they offered too little," he said, calling the tariffs "a miscalculation."
Canada had been prepared to drop its remaining retaliatory tariffs on steel, aluminum and autos if Washington substantially lowered its own, and to encourage the provinces to restore U.S. alcohol sales, Carney said Saturday.
Greer described the same 72 hours differently. Canada made "new demands and walk backs of other commitments," he said, while keeping "flat-out prohibitions on certain American goods and services" — Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec still bar U.S. wine and spirits from government-run stores. Carney asked premiers to restock on Aug. 19, but a Nanos Research poll found three in four Canadians won't buy American alcohol again either way. No further meetings are scheduled.
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Section 338 tariffs render USMCA protections useless
Most Canadian goods cross the border duty-free under USMCA, the trade pact Trump signed in his first term. Not these. A listed product pays the full 50% even when it qualifies as North American-made. The exemption that shielded earlier tariff rounds is worthless here.
"A 50% tariff is very significant" for importers who had relied on USMCA rates, Dave Townsend, an international trade partner at Toronto law firm Dorsey & Whitney LLP, told Moneywise in July.
There's no end date either. Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930, the Depression-era law behind these duties, sets no time limit, and no president had used it before. The administration invoked it after the Supreme Court threw out Trump's earlier tariff authority in February.
What do the 50% Canada tariffs cover?
Plenty is exempt — oil and gas, potash fertilizer, fish, some critical minerals and aircraft parts are all off the list. So is anything already taxed under one of Trump's other tariffs, including most steel, aluminum, autos and lumber.
