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“That’s just the most recent rationale,” she adds. “Earlier in July, Canada’s cited crime was being ravaged by the dangerous fires in our own boreal forest. Before that, Canada was considered a national security threat, and therefore subject to tariffs on our steel, aluminum, car parts and cars.”

Freeland goes on to claim that “the economics of Mr. Trump’s tariff attacks on Canada are not really the point,” and concludes: “Trump’s tariff offensive has a clear purpose: to demonstrate who is dominant and who must submit.” She adds: “Canada must fight back. The only thing a bully understands is strength.”

Near the end of the piece she refers to Trump as “the current bully in chief.”

Freeland’s salvo is just the latest in a series of exchanges between her and Trump that go back to at least 2018.

That September, Trump said he had snubbed a request from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for a one-on-one meeting because, among other reasons, he didn’t like Canada’s negotiation tactics and “we don’t like their representative very much.” Freeland was Canada’s top trade representative at the time.

Later, when Freeland resigned as finance minister in 2024, Trump posted that her “behavior was totally toxic, and not at all conducive to making deals which are good for the very unhappy citizens of Canada,” adding: “She will not be missed!!!”

The next year, with Freeland vying for leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada, Trump called her “a whack” and claimed credit for her resignation as finance minister.

“Governor Trudeau understood that,” he told Britain’s Spectator magazine in an interview, using his nickname for the prime minister. “And he actually fired her because of a meeting he had with me. I said, ‘She is so bad. She’s bad for the country.'”

There’s a reason Trump called me a “whack.” There’s a reason he complained about my negotiating skills. There’s a reason Putin kicked me out of Russia, too.

I don’t back down—and Trump and Putin know it.

I’m ready to fight for Canada—and win.

— Chrystia Freeland (@cafreeland) February 28, 2025