Mouran family who owns and collects monopoly tolls on the two existing Detroit Windsor links gets in Trump’s ear to try to block opening of a third link which was fully funded by the Canadian government. Probably paid Trump a million or so for the feigned outrage.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/trump-gordie-howe-bridge-9.7081924
I’ve been swearing about this since I first heard the news. Unbelievable, even by Trump’s standards. He totally supported the building of the bridge during his first term. Canada paid the full cost benefitting workers and suppliers from both countries and agreed to joint ownership despite paying for it. Inconceivable that he is now seeking compensation!
What makes Trump’s comments even stupider is Canada is paying for construction of the bridge and is already splitting ownership with Michigan.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/trump-gordie-howe-bridge-9.7081924
But a robber baron is being adversely impacted, so our Glorious Leader’s actions are perfectly reasonable and justified. /s
(IIRC, the story of the Moroun’s and the new bridge is complicated. They had an invitation to be involved early on, which would have had a lesser impact to their bottom line, and if they had invested more in the maintenance of their existing facility there would have been less of a demand for the new bridge. But they had a myopic view of maximizing their profit in the short term, so…)
Carney called Trump this morning and educated him on the facts. But we all know that Trump decides the “facts.”
This may be one more part of Trump’s efforts to weaken Canada economically. The sooner we reduce our economic relationship with the US the better.
Michigan politicians are strongly supporting the bridge but a few Republicans also need to speak up.
The Jakarta Method has never gone away. Seems like Trump is using a mild version of it on Canada.
I haven’t been watching closely, but the few quotes from MI politicians that made it into articles I saw were from Democrats. I’m not sure if that is media bias or if Republicans are willing to hurt their state to not go against the president.
Yeah. Gutless Republicans, although I thought Michigan might be important to them.
I enjoyed Blanchard’s interview on CBC this am.
Trump bridge threat 'foolish and ridiculous,' says former Michigan governor | CBC.ca
I’d have announced we’re shutting down all incoming traffic from the US over those bridges.
Carney’s response of course is more measured. You say he made a call? He probably said some kind things, gave trump something shiny over there as a distraction, and will simply wait until Trump’s moved on to something else. We’ll eventually have what should’ve happened anyway, just with a bunch of people like me getting triggered.
Carney doesn’t react to Trump’s threats and inconsistencies like trump expects. And Carney’s not runing business and real estate deals here, he’s PM of the country for 4 years and likely longer - he doesn’t have to make any specific deal. He can just wait out trump.
I used to live in Michigan and heard all about him.
I saw an article saying Canada was getting 14 more F-35s
Mouran got in Trump’s ear
The New York Times reported Tuesday evening that Matthew Moroun met with U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Monday in Washington. After that meeting, Lutnick spoke with Trump by phone about the matter, the Times reported, citing two officials speaking on the condition of anonymity. Trump’s threat came shortly afterward.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trump-carney-gordie-howe-bridge-9.7082658
At last, one prominent Republican speaks out to correct Trump’s lies about the Gordie Howe bridge. I don’t think Rick Snyder has anything to lose by doing so but, as the Michigan GOP Governor who negotiated the bridge deal, he has some credibility.
Trump’s advisor (Lutnick) failed him on this one. He just passed on the Mourant family lies to Trump without any attempt at verification. Anything that makes Lutnick look bad is ok with me. The guy is despicable.
OK. When I got interested in curling at the last Olympics, I found that women’s Canadian curling was pretty easy to find online, so adopted Team Homan as “my team”. And they are the Canadian representatives at the Olympics this year, which is great. I was looking forward to some awesome wins and maybe a gold medal. …and they promptly lose to the US!!! wtf. I feel bad for rooting against the US and for Team Homan losing.
And to make it worse, the US coverage, of course, has stressed that this is the first time the US team has EVER beaten Canada.
If I hadn’t been told this about 10,000 times, how would I know?