The reactions to President Trump’s border security tariffs are not quite as funny from Canada, as they were Mexico, but they are still funny.

A subdued and despondent Justin Trudeau said he and President Trump spoke last night, and he stresses the importance of the bond and relationship; you know, the ‘feels’.  WATCH:

PM Trudeau tells reporters he had a phone call with US President-elect Trump after Trump threatened to impose 25% tariffs on all Canadian products.

Trudeau says he has also been in touch with premiers to address this issue. pic.twitter.com/06boFKsEuv

— True North (@TrueNorthCentre) November 26, 2024

.

Meanwhile, in a far more funny and less politically correct reaction, Ontario Premier Doug Ford says, ‘hey, wait a minute, we aren’t Mexicans’. WATCH:

(more…)

Other than Trump winning the election, this is the best news all year. Mexico is threatening to retaliate against Trump’s border security tariffs, with some form of economic punishment. Pinch me, this is too awesome.

Keep in mind that around 35% of Mexico’s GDP is contingent upon exports to the USA, meanwhile only around 1% of our stuff exports to them. Then add in the remittances of dollars to Mexico, and more than 50% of the Mexican economy is contingent upon us just being friendly to their needs.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has no clue or comprehension about the scale of Trump’s leverage over her. This is like a spoiled teenager threatening to cut up the credit card dad gave her if she can’t go to the concert. Beyond funny.

WASHINGTON DC – Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said her government would retaliate if President-elect Donald Trump moves forward with his threat to impose a 25 percent tariff on the country, warning of severe economic consequences for companies operating in both countries.

Sheinbaum unveiled the letter during her daily press conference in Mexico City, which responded to Trump’s plan to slap 25 percent tariffs on all goods from Mexico and Canada in an effort to crack down on the flow of migrants and illegal drugs into the United States. Trump also pledged an additional 10 percent tariff on China.

“For every tariff, there will be a response in kind,” Sheinbaum wrote in a letter sent to Trump. The text was released by the Mexican Embassy Tuesday morning, which said the economic fallout of a trade war would harm shared enterprises, particularly automotive companies that operate in both countries.

(more…)

Boy howdy, this article by The Associated Press is very telling.

First, it’s worth remembering that in the fine print of the USMCA deal, Mexico and Canada must comply with North American parts origination for anything they want to manufacture for sale into the United States.  Meaning, all trade manufacturers must either create their component parts domestically, or purchase them from the U.S, Mexico and Canada. It’s the core point of the USMCA trade agreement.

Secondly, in an aspect exclusive to the U.S. part of the deal that President Trump and USTR Lighthizer insisted upon, if either Canada or Mexico are deemed to be non-compliant with the agreement, the USA can cancel/override any trade agreement Mexico or Canada have with another nation.  It’s a heavy accountability hammer securing the gate into the massive USA market.

In an AP report today, Mexico is scrambling to find local or North American sources of parts and components, because President Trump is set to come into office and look at USMCA compliance.  Apparently, Mexico has been using excessive amounts of Chinese component parts for goods being sent into the USA and Canada.  Now they are quickly trying to source alternatives.

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico has been taking a bashing lately for allegedly serving as a conduit for Chinese parts and products into North America, and officials here are afraid a re-elected Donald Trump or politically struggling Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau could try to leave their country out of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement.

Mexico’s ruling Morena party is so afraid of losing the trade deal that President Claudia Sheinbaum said Friday the government has gone on a campaign to get companies to replace Chinese parts with locally made ones.

“We have a plan with the aim of substituting these imports that come from China, and producing the majority of them in Mexico, either with Mexican companies or primarily North American companies,” Sheinbaum said.

(more…)

Perhaps it’s just because the election is only a few months away, or perhaps it’s because President Trump’s trade and economic policies toward China were always the right approach for the USA.  Whatever the reasoning, the Biden administration is now proposing to use tariffs against China just like President Trump.

There’s a hidden dimension to the Chinese EV angle that makes this claim a little dubious, I will explain after the topline big story.

Overall, the New York Times is reporting [SEE HERE] that Joe Biden and USTR Katherine Tai are likely to trigger massive tariffs against imported Electric Vehicles (EVs) from China, perhaps as much as 100% due to the low cost of Chinese production.  Additionally, the Biden administration is considering increasing the tariff regime against imports of Chinese steel and aluminum in a bid to protect the American industry.

On the EV issue, this tariff approach is politically duplicitous by Biden against the backdrop of massive investment in Mexico by the three largest Chinese EV automakers. Last December the three Chinese auto manufacturers, MG, BYD, and Chery, announced they were going to spend billions building new EV manufacturing plants in Mexico.  Each Chinese auto manufacturer was going to spend between $1.5 to $2.0 billion.

Those Mexican built Chinese EV’s would pass into the USA market under current USMCA trade rules and regulations, as long as they technically meet the material origination rules.  This can make tariffs against the Chinese imported EVs a moot point, because China will be making them in Mexico (North American trade agreement).

One of the reasons President Trump said the U.S. auto industry would suffer a “bloodbath,” is specifically because the current Chinese auto companies are targeting these EV’s in the $10,000 or less range.  If you want to see what it looks like when cheap Chinese EV’s start to flood a consumer market, visit Russia – the western sanctions have only increased this flow.  I can see it clear as day.

(more…)

This is somewhat of a predictably tragic outcome all things considered. I remember a previous conversation on these pages when GM moved massive investment into China to build their mid-size SUV brand, Encore.

Continuing the U.S. decline of the brand, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that approximately half of all Buick dealership in the U.S. have opted to take a buyout from GM, as opposed to spending millions in retooling, restructuring and retraining their staff to accommodate the EV influx.

Most of the EV’s shoved onto the dealer lots sit idle without customers to purchase them.

Wall Street Journal – General Motors (GM) has bought out about half of its 2,000 Buick dealers nationwide, based on their decision to not sell electric vehicles, according to a company spokesman Wednesday.

Dealers who are taking the buyout would give up the Buick franchise and no longer sell the brand, he said. The dealer can continue to sell other GM models, such as Chevrolet or GMC, that often account for a higher percentage of sales.

(more…)

The headline is the non-pretending reality.  Now that Joe Biden has designated EPA mandates for U.S. automobiles that include having at least 50% of all new vehicle sales be electric by 2030 {LINK}, three major Chinese EV manufacturers are reportedly building manufacturing facilities in Mexico.

Blackrock investments steer WH policy {Go Deep}. Blackrock investments are heavy in China and EV production.  Blackrock returns on their investments would be substantial with Chinese EV production in Mexico.  Quite a coincidence.

BUSINESS INSIDER – Three major Chinese EV companies are planning to build new factories in Mexico, sparking concern among US officials, according to a new report.

MG, BYD, and Chery are all looking at sites to build new factories in the country, according to unnamed sources cited by The Financial Times, and this investment is causing angst in Washington as it seeks to keep China out of the US electric car market.

US officials have reportedly raised concerns with their Mexican counterparts over Chinese investment, with the new sites potentially including a new $1.5 billion to $2 billion MG electric car factory and a factory investment worth hundreds of millions of dollars from Warren Buffett-backed Tesla rival BYD.

China’s electric vehicle market is booming, and local manufacturers are increasingly looking to expand overseas amid cutthroat competition for customers back home.

(more…)

The multilateral trade agreement known as the Transpacific Partnership (TPP), is a massive pacific rim trade agreement favored by Wall Street, the US Chamber of Commerce, Club for Growth, Ron DeSantis (voted to approve) and now candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.

President Trump famously took the U.S. out of the TPP agreement around the same time he took us out of the Paris Climate Agreement.  As noted by President Trump and his economic team at the time, Free Trade Agreements (FTA’s) are beneficial to the USA when they are bilateral between the U.S. and another singular nation.  Multinational trade agreements end up serving the interests of the least common denominator nation and are detrimental in their finished outcome to U.S. consumers.

Wall Street loves multinational trade agreements because they provide greater flexibility for the profit opportunities of global corporations, multinational corporations and banks.  However, Main Street USA suffers from lost manufacturing jobs, lowered overall wages, and cheap imported durable goods that are an outcome of the lowest cost manufacturing priority.

During a Twitter spaces discussion yesterday presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy said he was in favor of reengaging the U.S. in the TPP trade agreement.  This is a non-starter for any America First economic platform.

“I think we should re-enter it,” Ramaswamy said to Musk about 94 minutes into the conversation on Twitter. “I think this is a little bit different than what, you know, the course of action taken by Trump in exiting the TPP [Trans-Pacific Partnership]. I think that was actually a poor decision.” (link)

This should be a disqualifying position for any consideration in the Trump administration.

(more…)

Earlier today President Trump kicked off a new coalition of Farmers for Trump in Council Bluffs, Iowa {Direct Rumble Link}.

While much of the first segment of the speech covers topics of significant importance to farming and agriculture, President Trump also expanded his remarks to cover current political events. WATCH:

(more…)

This is so critically important to the understanding of the core, central element where the globalism atom splits and the resulting destruction begins, that I must pause all personal recovery efforts -immediately- and explain.   This is an incredible example of where corporations and government merge.  This is the atom split. This is the root, the nub, the place where “trillions at stake” takes context.

Strong HatTip to Gateway Pundit for this exceptional video and example {Direct Rumble Link Here}.  The understanding comes via a Canadian dairy farmer, who, like thousands of other farmers around the world, is a private business under government control.  This example is about dairy, specifically milk, however, the underlying premise goes much further.

This is modern corporatism, the nexus of govt intervention, regulations and the multinational exploitation of industry.  This is also the globalist example that shows how the concepts of “capitalism” and “free markets” have been destroyed.  First, watch the video:

What you are witnessing in that video is something we have talked about at length for years.

Influential people, politicians (rules) and corporate leaders (profits), both with vested financial interests in the process, have sold a narrative that global manufacturing, global sourcing, and global production is the inherent way of the future. The same voices claimed the American economy was/is consigned to become a “service-driven economy.”

What was always missed in these discussions is that advocates selling this global-economy message have a vested financial and ideological interest in convincing the information consumer it is all just a natural outcome of economic progress.

It’s not.

It’s not natural at all. It is a process that is entirely controlled, promoted and utilized by large conglomerates, lobbyists, purchased politicians and massive multinational corporations.

(more…)

Given the fulsome context of the latest ideological alignment coming from the North American Summit, I am entirely certain the ordinary people in the U.S. and Canada do not have any idea just how badly things are likely to deteriorate in the near future.  However, for the ordinary people of Mexico, already living in a situation of day-to-day survival, they will not likely note any difference.

White House occupant Joe Biden, Mexican President Lopez-Obrador and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau delivered remarks yesterday at the conclusion of their trilateral discussions. You can watch the entire speech set HERE with the full transcript below.  What follows is a painful, albeit brutally honest, assessment of the remarks and the predictable future they contain.

AMLO is a soft socialist but has previously indicated his tendency toward economic nationalism.  Trudeau is a modern leftist and a true globalist at heart.   Biden is a puppet for the modern American political left and economically concerned only for his personal crime syndicate financial situation.  Behind Biden’s politics is a blend of Obama domestic ideology and a willingness to align with interventionist foreign policy that benefits his personal financial interests.

♦ IMMIGRATION – On the issue of mass illegal immigration, Trudeau can wax philosophically about the virtues of multiculturalism and diversity because the United States provides a 2,500-mile migration filtration and border protection zone.  For the United States, Joe Biden speaks about the endless ability of America to absorb millions of migrants in the sake of humanity. Biden’s position has little to do with the economic damage created by mass migration because he and his leftist allies are disconnected from the chaos, protected by walls and personal security.

On the issue of illegal migration, it is AMLO’s position that carries the most consequence because Mexico is the funnel control mechanism.  It is clear in his remarks that AMLO is a socialist on the issue of unlimited migration, and he has no compulsion to stop the flow of human trafficking from south and central America into the United States.

(more…)