Driving home this morning in my holier than thou hybrid, I heard a CBC radio news item that stunned me. The anchor was broadcasting President Trump’s latest tariff musings about punishing Canada, and how Trump thought it would be easier to deal with Canada as the 51st State, and how (PM Justin) “Trudeau said that without the US, Canada would be a failed nation.” Then the President added that he didn’t want to interfere in the federal election. This is what my wife would call an “Oh Really?” moment.

But worse than Trump’s comments about his plans for Canada, “as a State, it works great … As a nation…it doesn’t make sense,” was CBC’s silence about the comment alleged to have been uttered by our then Prime Minister, They did not dispute the “failed nation” statement that Trump claimed was made by Prime Minister Trudeau, and didn’t clarify that PM Trudeau did not utter those words. CBC just let it play right into the next newsbyte.

It left the impression that our Prime Minister, a Liberal, the defender of Canadian sovereignty, had said that without the USA, Canada would be a failed nation. Had it been true, that would have been quite a smear to leave on the Liberal Party legacy at a time when the upcoming federal election is only days away. So let me do what the CBC should have done.

Prime Minister Trudeau  NEVER made that statement. I know because I was privileged to have a one on one interview with Justin Trudeau after he returned from that infamous Mar a Lago Thanksgiving dinner. I took detailed notes. Here is the summary.

Concerned over the initial tariff threats, Prime Minister Trudeau had flown to Florida November 29, 2024, to immediately begin discussions with President Trump. He pointed out that massive tariffs would do great harm to the Canadian economy, and how it would ease Trump’s “border concerns” if he had a prosperous,stable, equivalent partner on the northern border, unlike the problem Trump was having on his southern border.

Trudeau basically told Trump that it would be bad for the US economy and security to apply massive tariffs which could collapse the Canadian economy. That was when President Trump proposed that Canada simply become the 51st State. Our Prime Minister replied “That is not going to happen.”

Keep in mind this was not a closed door hardball negotiations meeting. This was an informal  discussion, frequently jovial, at an American Thanksgiving dinner party including many other guests. At this point, Governor Doug Bergum of North Dakota said: Maybe we just want the oil producing, conservative provinces – Alberta and Saskatchewan. An unidentified guest jokingly added: We’d trade you California for them. Prime Minister Trudeau replied, also jokingly, that we’d take California and Vermont for them.

During this trade jokes exchange, President Trump was silent, did not engage in the banter, and quickly changed the subject.

That is the end of the notes from my interview with Justin Trudeau. However, in looking back at my journals from that time, I noted that on November 30, 2024 in some of his tweets on X (formerly known as Twitter) President Trump began to refer to Prime Minister Trudeau as Governor Trudeau, and continued his musings publicly about Canada becoming the 51st State.

Clearly President Trump didn’t get the message about respecting a prosperous, stable, equivalent partner. Just as clearly, Prime Minister Trudeau simply pointed out to the President, as every politician in Canada has done since, that massive tariffs could collapse the Canadian economy. No talk of a failed state, no talk of dependence on America, simply a discussion about the impact of massive tariffs on Canada.

Next time CBC, when someone talks dirt about our leaders, wash out their mouths with some media literacy soap, and set the story straight. The way I see it.