Listeners, welcome to Canada Tariff News and Tracker, your focused update on how U.S. trade policy and Trump-era tariffs are reshaping Canada’s economy and trade strategy.

The big story is the mounting pressure ahead of the 2026 review of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, the deal originally negotiated by Donald Trump and now back under the microscope. According to Transport Topics, Prime Minister Mark Carney has confirmed that Canada will enter formal trade talks with the United States in mid-January, led by Dominic LeBlanc, his point person on U.S.-Canada trade. Carney’s office says these talks are the opening move toward that 2026 review, with the White House signaling it wants to “rebalance” the pact in America’s favor, a reminder that renewed tariff threats are never far from the table.

Those threats are not theoretical. Transport Topics reports that sectoral tariffs on Canadian steel, aluminum, autos, and lumber are already biting, and that a near-deal on targeted tariff relief collapsed in October after Trump abruptly cut off talks, in part over an anti-tariff ad campaign run by Ontario in U.S. media. Carney has acknowledged that tariffs are taking a toll on key Canadian industrial sectors, even as roughly three-quarters of Canada’s exports still head south under USMCA’s tariff exemptions.

At the same time, Canada is adjusting its own tariff toolkit. Trade law firm Cassidy Levy Kent reports that beginning December 26, 2025, Canada will impose a 25% surtax on certain steel-derivative products imported from any country. That surtax applies to the full value of the product, not just the steel content, and comes on top of existing measures that include a 25% retaliatory surtax on U.S.-origin steel, a 25% surtax on Chinese steel, and a 50% surtax on certain steel imports above tariff-rate quota limits. The government has clarified that these measures do not stack; any given product will face only one of these tariffs, but the new steel-derivative surtax will capture a wide range of downstream goods.

Politically, the tone from Washington has been cautious but firm. In a recent CBC News segment, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said President Trump wants to keep his “options open” through the CUSMA renewal process, signaling that tariffs remain a live bargaining chip as the U.S. presses Canada over longstanding “irritants,” from agricultural access to autos and digital trade.

For Canadian policymakers, commentators in Policy Magazine argue that the core challenge is Trump-style unpredictability: tariffs can be imposed quickly, lifted slowly, and reimposed at will. Their advice to Ottawa is to practice “strategic patience,” protect CUSMA’s core duty-free access for most Canadian goods, and quietly accelerate diversification away from overreliance on the U.S. market, all while cushioning sectors exposed to U.S. steel, aluminum, auto, and lumber duties.

For now, listeners should watch three pressure points: the January launch of formal US-Canada talks, the December 26 activation of Canada’s 25% surtax on steel-derivative imports, and the run-up to the 2026 CUSMA review, when Trump’s team will have maximum leverage to threaten new tariffs or quotas if Canada resists U.S. demands.

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