US-Canada relations, already tense, are likely to deteriorate further after the United States went ahead early Tuesday with a decision to ban nearly $1 billion worth of Canadian imports, including dairy products and motorcycles. The ban amounts to barely a ripple in $880 billion worth of a two-way annual trade between the two northern neighbors. But it marks another ratcheting up of President Donald Trump’s second-term trade war with America’s longtime ally and trading partner. The import ban “certainly won't do anything to help the trade tensions between the United States and Canada,'' said trade attorney Patrick Childress, a partner at Holland & Knight and a former US trade official. The latest sparring began over the summer when Trump reached back to a Great Depression law to impose 50% tariffs on about $20 billion worth of Canadian imports, charging that Canada discriminates against US dairy and auto producers. Canada promptly counterpunched with tariffs of 15% and 25%, matching US imports dollar for dollar. To punish Canada for retaliating against his tariffs, Trump decided to ban a list of Canadian products, effective 12:01 a.m. Eastern time Tuesday. The economic impact is likely to be minimal. Childress noted that the products on the banned list were already facing Trump’s tariffs. “For a lot of these goods, the 50% was already acting as a de facto ban by making importation from Canada into the United States uneconomical,″ he said. Jacob Jensen, director of trade policy at the center-right American Action Forum think tank, calculates that the ban would cover $967 million worth of Canadian imports, based on 2025 numbers. “This marks yet another escalation in the trade war that may result in further retaliation on the Canadian side,” Jensen said. He expects Canadian exporters and US importers “impacted by these bans will be highly motivated’’ to demand that trade officials on both sides find some way to reach a “resolution of this whole ordeal.’’
