‘Canada Strong will make America great again,’ Carney says in NYC

Prime Minister Mark Carney on Thursday pitched stronger economic ties with Canada to American investors in New York.

Carney was in New York on Thursday, meeting business leaders, CEOs and money managers with an aim to attract foreign investors to Canada.

“Let’s be absolutely clear. Canada Strong will help make America great again,” Carney said while speaking at the Economic Club of New York.

Carney’s speech came as the review of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico trade deal, or CUSMA, is drawing closer.

“Canada is America’s largest customer. We buy more goods from America than China, Japan, and Germany combined. Those common interests run through our supply chains,” Carney said, adding that Ottawa had made “specific, practical proposals” to the Trump administration.

Carney called for greater integration between the two nations, particularly in the automobile, critical minerals, agriculture and energy sectors.

“Canadian exports to the United States are the energy equivalent of 10 Hoover Dams. With America’s growing energy needs because of the incredible transformation there, does it really make sense to build the gigawatts here needed to replace Canada?” he said.

Carney pitched Canada as a “reliable, predictable partner” for investors “in a world where transactions are replacing relationships.”

Speaking earlier in the day, Industry Minister Melanie Joly said Carney and Trump were “constantly” in touch as the CUSMA negotiations draw nearer.

The trade deal, which was signed in 2018 and touches virtually all trade between Canada, the U.S. and Mexico, is scheduled for a review by July 1 this year.

“Prime Minister Carney is in contact with President Trump constantly, and also they have met each other around the world and they will be meeting each other very soon, as the G7 will be hosted in France in June, so very shortly,” Joly said.

In the coming weeks, as the CUSMA review draws closer, other Canadian ministers will also be deployed to the U.S. to meet with business leaders and stakeholders in the private sector, Joly said.

“We need to be able to talk to many allies across the U.S. Many of us ministers will be deployed across the U.S. as well to be talking to the private sector and different communities across the country,” Joly said.

Canada is more proactive now, rather being reactive, in managing the trade war with U.S., Joly said.

“In 2025, we were much more in reaction mode when it came to the trade war and the tariffs. In 2026, we have a plan and we’re putting it into place,” she said.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said Tuesday there are significant trade issues with Canada but he has been in regular contact with his Canadian counterparts.

Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc has been having “key conversations this week and even meetings” with Greer, Joly said, while she has been meeting with private sector representatives from both sides of the border in tariff-hit sectors like automobiles, forestry, steel and aluminum.

The CUSMA review sets up a three-way choice for each country to make in July. They can renew the deal for another 16 years, withdraw from it or signal both non-renewal and non-withdrawal — which would trigger an annual review that could keep negotiations going for up to a decade.

Greer has suggested that the Trump administration is unlikely to rubber-stamp a renewal and the three countries are preparing for lengthy trade talks.

Trump froze negotiations with Canada last year because he was angered by an Ontario-sponsored ad quoting former president Ronald Reagan criticizing tariffs.

— with files from The Canadian Press