SASKATOON - Premier Scott Moe is back in Canada from another mission to Washington D.C., but whether it can be considered a success or not remains to be seen.
Moe was in D.C. Feb. 24-27 alongside a continent from Saskatchewan industry, meeting with elected officials and industry partners. Moe told a news conference in Saskatoon that he met with senators and congressmen. Those meetings including with Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, who had been pushing for a carveout to prevent potash tariffs from being imposed, as well as with Trump cabinet members Secretary Chris Wright and Secretary Doug Burgum.
It was Moe’s second mission to D.C. this month alone, following a previous trip with the Council of the Federation, and he described their contingent's message as “well received.”
Yet those efforts haven’t yet resulted in any change of tune from President Donald Trump, who said this week he will indeed impose 25 per cent tariffs on Canada on March 4.
The indication from Premier Moe to reporters in Saskatoon is that he will keep up the province’s efforts, as he made it known no one wins in a trade war.
“When it comes to tariffs, what we are doing as a province and will continue to do for the foreseeable future is to make every effort to head off any imposition, whether it be of tariffs coming from President Trump in the United States, or whether it be even counter tariffs from Canada. Necessary, unfortunately, counter tariffs from Canada. No one wins with the imposition of tariffs.
“Certainly, if there is tariffs that are being charged on southern foreign products at the 49th parallel and on products coming to the north, no one wins in that environment. I would say in particular, no North American family wins in that environment. It makes our economy, our continental economy, much less competitive.”
Moe pointed to three key dates in particular. The first one was the broad-based March 4 tariffs. He noted that those are focused around fentanyl and the border, and he pointed to the efforts Saskatchewan has made.
“Saskatchewan has acted very quickly with our border security plan — been acting, I would say, for a number of months and years now, with increasing the number of enforcement officers in our communities,” Moe said. “Most recently, this past fall, with the addition of 100 municipal officers, as well as 185 provincially-funded municipal officers, and 185 provincially-funded RCMP officers.”
The second date is March 12 for steel and aluminum tariffs. Moe urged the federal government “to look at all options that they might have in that space to alleviate those tariffs that are proposed to potentially come into effect on March the 12th.”
“They need to ensure that there is not foreign steel that is flowing into a USMCA trade-free area. This was some of the steps that we took five years ago when there was steel and aluminum tariffs proposed, and we need to double down our efforts on ensuring that the USMCA trade area is for Canadian, Mexico, and U.S.-built products.”
On this point, Moe said there “is an opportunity for our federal government to engage to protect the free-trading continental opportunities that we have.
The third important date would be April 2 for the threat of reciprocal tariffs, which Moe said “would be much more global in nature.”
On this point Moe urged the federal government, to go into “more of a review of USMCA at that point in time. “
“What we would urge and encourage the federal government, as we find our way towards April 2nd… we would hope that if every effort is made between now and then, that we might be able to find our way to a review of our USMCA agreement.”
Moe said Saskatchewan is going to “continue to engage and engage alongside our industry partners, and engage alongside any allies in the effort to have a tariff-free environment.” He pointed to the efforts to eradicate fentanyl from their communities and to support food and energy security.
“Our focus from Saskatchewan's perspective is very much one of the long view. We want to find our way back to that stable trading environment, where Saskatchewan can be part of building the continental food and energy security that we know we need as North Americans, as fellow North Americans. And if we are not focused on that as someone that lives on this continent, you can trust and rest assured that others around the world may be, and they may be interested in it and not with our best interest in mind.
“So energy security, food security, manufacturing security all have to be goals not only of us in the province and the nation, but they have to be our continental goals. And over the course of the next number of months, I hope we all keep that at the forefront and keep that as the goalpost on where we want to find ourselves. And that's the message we took to Washington, D.C. this week, and I'd say it was very well received.”
