{"id":181963,"date":"2026-08-25T07:41:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T07:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/181963\/"},"modified":"2026-08-25T07:41:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T07:41:10","slug":"how-the-french-language-contributed-to-the-us-canada-trade-war-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/181963\/","title":{"rendered":"How the French language contributed to the US-Canada trade war"},"content":{"rendered":"

The trade war between the United States and Canada<\/a> has taken on the flavor of a culture war after the collapse of negotiations<\/a> last week.<\/p>\n

According to Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney<\/a>, the dispute with the nation’s largest trading partner was not just about tariff demands but what he called unacceptable “threats” to the French language<\/a> and “Quebec<\/a> culture.”<\/p>\n

Those are not typical sticking points in trade negotiations, but emotive ones in Canada<\/a>, particularly in the French-speaking eastern province of Quebec, which has long sought to preserve its distinct identity.<\/p>\n

Read more\u2018We don\u2019t need Canada\u2019: Trump threatens to double auto tariffs after trade talks collapse<\/a><\/p>\n

Carney said Canadian subsidies for Francophone culture<\/a>, the role of Francophone online media and bilingual labeling of products sold in Canada were among the issues at stake.<\/p>\n

He described these as “fundamental rights” and said there was “a huge gap between Canadian and American perspectives.”<\/p>\n

The prime minister also contended that the US wanted to destroy Canada’s automotive, steel and aluminum industries, and restrict Canadian trade deals with other countries.<\/p>\n

After the breakdown of talks, Canada now faces additional tariffs on some $20 billion worth of its US exports and double tariffs on Canadian vehicles, while Carney has vowed to match the US tariffs “dollar for dollar.”<\/p>\n

In Quebec, Carney’s decision to break off negotiations was widely supported.<\/p>\n

A poll published Sunday by the Angus Reid Institute found that 85 percent of Quebecers supported the move \u2013 the highest approval rate among the 10 Canadian provinces.<\/p>\n

Read moreCanada: Meeting the people determined to keep the French language alive<\/a><\/p>\n

“Our identity is not negotiable,” Quebec Premier Christine Fr\u00e9chette wrote Sunday in a social media post.<\/p>\n

She faces a reelection battle in October and is currently trailing in polls to the leader of a Quebec separatist party.<\/p>\n

According to Canadian media, Frechette said Washington wanted concessions on Quebec’s rules for appliances and instruction manuals, as well as its law promoting French-language cultural content<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Recent legislation by Quebec allows it to regulate how much French-language content digital platforms offer and how prominently it appears, which can add to the cost of doing business for US companies, the Montreal<\/a> Gazette reported.<\/p>\n

In an interview on Monday, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer played down the language issue in the trade talks as a “funny fake story”.<\/p>\n

“What we don’t like is a situation where Canada, the federal government, forces American tech companies to take their earnings and give a percentage to their competitors in Canada,” Greer told CNBC.<\/p>\n

“But I understand why the Quebecois want to have French language content and all of that. And we think that’s a really valuable thing.”<\/p>\n

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The trade war between the United States and Canada has taken on the flavor of a culture war…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":181964,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[364,17,162,18674,111,241,400,437,6133],"class_list":["post-181963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mark-carney","tag-americas","tag-canada","tag-donald-trump","tag-french-language","tag-mark-carney","tag-quebec","tag-tariffs","tag-trade-war","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181963"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181963\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/181964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}