TORONTO (AP) \u2014 The leader of Canada\u2019s most populous province called for economic retaliation on the U.S. after auto company Stellantis said it was moving planned production of its Jeep Compass from Canada to the U.S.<\/p>\n
Ontario Premier Doug Ford blamed U.S. President Donald Trump for the company\u2019s decision this week<\/a> to shift production of the SUV from Brampton, Ontario, to Illinois as part of plan to invest $13 billion to expand its manufacturing capacity in the United States.<\/p>\n The comments come as Canada is negotiating to reduce tariffs. Trump has been urging the Big 3 American automakers to move production to the U.S. <\/p>\n \u201cThat guy, President Trump, he\u2019s a real piece of work,\u201d Ford said. \u201cI\u2019m sick and tired of rolling over. We need to fight back.\u201d<\/p>\n Ford said Canada needs to hit back with tariffs if Prime Minister Mark Carney can\u2019t reach a trade deal with Trump. <\/p>\n Dominic LeBlanc, the minister responsible for Canada-U.S. trade, is in Washington this week for talks to reduce tariffs on certain sectors. Carney left Washington<\/a> last week without a deal. <\/p>\n Carney said the move by the world\u2019s fourth-largest carmaker<\/a> was a direct consequence of tariffs and his government would work with Stellantis to create new opportunities in the Brampton area. Carney added that Ottawa expects Stellantis to fulfill its commitment to Brampton workers. The federal government threatened legal action against the company. <\/p>\n Federal Industry Minister M\u00e9lanie Joly said the production shift is \u201cunacceptable\u201d and warned Stellantis made commitments to Canadian production in exchange for substantial financial support.<\/p>\n \u201cAnything short of fulfilling that commitment will be considered as default under our agreements,\u201d Joly wrote in a letter to the company chief executive.<\/p>\n Fear has spread in Ontario<\/a> over what will happen to Canada\u2019s auto sector. Autos are Canada\u2019s second-largest export and Carney has noted the sector employs 125,000 Canadians directly and almost another 500,000 in related industries.<\/p>\n \u201cStellantis is bowing at the Trump administration with this pledge of massive investments in the U.S.,\u201d Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.<\/p>\n \u201cIf this bullying tactic works with Stellantis I expect it to be replicated to every other automaker that has a presence in Canada and frankly other sectors that the U.S. has an interest in.\u201d<\/p>\n Workers at the Stellantis assembly plant in Brampton were greeted Wednesday with a robocall from their employer that said work they\u2019d been waiting for wouldn\u2019t be coming back. The company closed the factory in 2023 and laid off its roughly 3,000 workers as it retooled the facility. <\/p>\n Stellantis said it would reopen its Belvidere Assembly Plant in Illinois to expand U.S. Jeep production, creating thousands of new jobs there.<\/p>\n Vito Beato, president of Unifor Local 1285, which represents the Brampton plant workers, said the news came as a surprise because Stellantis had said previously it was committed to producing its Jeep Compass in Brampton.<\/p>\n Stellantis said it continues to invest in Canada, including adding a third shift to the Windsor, Ontario assembly plant, and that it is in talks with the government on the future of the Brampton facility.<\/p>\n Carney<\/a> won the country\u2019s election earlier this year fueled by Trump\u2019s annexation threats and trade war, but has tried to improve relations ahead of a review of the free trade deal next year. More than 75% of Canada\u2019s exports go to the U.S. and Canada recently dropped many of its retaliatory tariffs to match U.S. tariff exemptions for goods covered under the United States-Mexico-Canada trade pact<\/a>.<\/p>\n Ford said Canada should start responding to Trump\u2019s tariffs with its own harsh measures. <\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s the only thing that this person understands,\u201d Ford said of Trump. Ford is scheduled to meet with Carney this week. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO (AP) \u2014 The leader of Canada\u2019s most populous province called for economic retaliation on the U.S. after…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":307048,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[29553,64,2147,18810,155437,69,35939,57,1819,1818,13790,18809,155440,2150,155438,80,9230,16618,67,370,132,68,155439,93,107],"class_list":{"0":"post-307047","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-auto-industry","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-canada-government","12":"tag-dominic-leblanc","13":"tag-donald-trump","14":"tag-doug-ford","15":"tag-general-news","16":"tag-il-state-wire","17":"tag-illinois","18":"tag-international-trade","19":"tag-mark-carney","20":"tag-mlanie-joly","21":"tag-ontario","22":"tag-patrick-brown","23":"tag-politics","24":"tag-stellantis-nv","25":"tag-tariffs-and-global-trade","26":"tag-united-states","27":"tag-united-states-government","28":"tag-unitedstates","29":"tag-us","30":"tag-vito-beato","31":"tag-washington-news","32":"tag-world-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115381764334332470","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307047\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}