Relations souring even further with Canada:
Donald’s Trump’s chief economic adviser said the US pulled out of a G7 communique because the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, “stabbed us in the back” and accused the leader of one America’s most important allies of playing a “sophomoric political stunt for domestic consumption”.
In an extraordinary interview with CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, Larry Kudlow, who was present for negotiations at the G7 summit in Quebec over the weekend, said Trudeau had instigated “a betrayal” and was “essentially double-crossing President Trump”.
Trudeau used a media conference on Saturday to reject a US demand for a sunset clause in the North American trade agreement, Nafta, that Trump has at different times pressed to abolish or renegotiate. The prime minister also said Canada would “move forward with retaliatory measures” in response to the Trump administration’s move to impose tariffs on aluminium and steel imports from the European Union, Mexico and Canada.
The move enraged Trump, who branded his Canadian counterpart “dishonest and weak” in a furious tweet, announcing the US would pull out of an agreed communique.
The G7 communique said the leaders of seven of the most powerful countries in the world agreed on the need for “free, fair, and mutually beneficial trade” and the importance of fighting protectionism.
Kudlow added that Trump had made the decision to pull out of the agreement in an attempt to save face ahead of his historic summit with North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, in Singapore.
“Potus [the president of the United States] is not going to let a Canadian prime minister push him around – push him, Potus around, on the eve of this,” Kudlow said. “He is not going to permit any show of weakness on the trip to negotiate with North Korea. Nor should he.”
The onslaught continued as Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro appeared on Fox News Sunday and said Trudeau deserved “a special place in hell”.
“There’s a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad faith diplomacy with President Donald J Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door and that’s what Bad Faith Justin Trudeau did with that stunt press conference,” Navarro said, adding that his comments had come “right from Air Force One”.
“There’s a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad faith diplomacy with President”
Kudlow, a staunch conservative who regularly pounded his fists on the desk throughout his interview on CNN, argued that Trudeau’s comments were “a great disservice to the whole G7”.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... rea-summit
