Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew unloaded on President Donald Trump on Thursday, branding the U.S. leader a bad person and warning his fellow Canadians that any bargain struck with him could be torn up on a whim.
The broadside from the leader of a single Canadian province landed at a delicate moment, with negotiators from both countries scrambling to finish a trade agreement that would head off tariffs Trump has threatened at levels as high as 50%.
“Everybody knows the American president by now, he’s erratic, he’s irresponsible, and he’s not to be trusted,” Kinew said.
He went further, arguing that Canada was being asked to hand over additional concessions to a partner who could simply undo whatever he signs. The relationship between the two neighbors has deteriorated sharply under Trump’s administration, with the 80-year-old’s threat of tariffs on an array of Canadian goods pushing both governments into fresh talks.
A Whiskey Truce With a Catch
The immediate flashpoint was alcohol. Prime Minister Mark Carney has leaned on provincial leaders to lift their boycott of U.S. liquor, treating shelf space in provincial liquor stores as a goodwill gesture that could help close the deal.
Kinew indicated Manitoba would fall in behind Carney and let stores stock American products again, framing the decision as part of a united national approach rather than a change of heart. But he attached a pointed condition: he told Canadians to leave the bottles exactly where liquor mart employees put them and to reach for Canadian brands instead.
The premier said Canadians have done a remarkable job holding together against Trump’s tariff threats and should keep it up. The distinction captures the awkward position of Canada’s premiers, who have been asked to soften the most visible symbols of retaliation while the harder economic questions remain unsettled in Washington.
Ottawa Says an Agreement Is Near
Also on Thursday, Dominic LeBlanc, the federal minister responsible for Canada-U.S. trade, returned from Washington after meeting U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and said the two countries were very close and still making progress, with Canadian officials staying in the U.S. capital to keep hammering out details.
Trump, for his part, has described the emerging agreement as very fair to both sides. Neither government has released the full terms of what has been negotiated so far, leaving businesses on both sides of the border to guess at what the final package will contain.
As of August 21, 2026, tariffs covering about $20 billion worth of Canadian goods — originally set to take effect on Wednesday — had been postponed until 12:01 a.m. Saturday, buying negotiators a narrow window to land the deal. The reprieve covered a fraction of the trade Trump has threatened to hit.
Premiers Split on Tone, Not Direction
Kinew is not the only provincial leader weighing in, but he has been among the most combative. In Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia, the premiers have voiced open support for the course Carney is charting at the negotiating table, handing the prime minister political cover as he pushes for a settlement.
Kinew’s message was blunter: fight. He argued that Trump is weak, that the United States carries less weight around the world than it did a year ago, and that the president is badly out of step with Americans on the cost of living, which Kinew called the top issue there. He also predicted Trump would be slaughtered in the midterms.
His read on the balance of power in the talks was equally confident. “We’ve got the upper hand,” he said, describing American negotiators as back on their heels and coming to Canada for a deal.
That assessment sits uneasily beside the concessions Ottawa has been making, including the alcohol climbdown Kinew himself signed off on while urging shoppers to render it meaningless. The same tension runs through Canada’s entire approach: a federal government trying to lower the temperature enough to sign something, and provincial leaders unwilling to soften their view of a year of pressure from a longtime ally.