President Trump in an interview published Friday was adamant that he was serious about his talk of adding Canada as the 51st state, something Canadian leaders have outright rejected.
The president sat down for an interview with Time Magazine, where a reporter suggested Trump may have been “trolling a little bit” with his repeated comments that Canada should be absorbed into the United States.
“Actually, no, I’m not,” Trump said in the interview, which was conducted Tuesday.
“I think Canada, what you said that, ‘Well, that one, I might be trolling.’ But I’m really not trolling,” Trump added. “Canada is an interesting case.”
The president repeated his frequent claims that the U.S. is losing money to Canada because of trade deficits and that there is no need for America to import Canadian products.
“We’re taking care of their military. We’re taking care of every aspect of their lives, and we don’t need them to make cars for us,” Trump told Time. “In fact, we don’t want them to make cars for us. We want to make our own cars. We don’t need their lumber. We don’t need their energy. We don’t need anything from Canada. And I say the only way this thing really works is for Canada to become a state.”
Trump has for months mused about Canada becoming a state, shrugging off the border between the two countries as arbitrary and mockingly referring to former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “governor.”
While some critics had suggested Trump was not serious about the idea, Trudeau and the Canadian politicians vying to replace him as prime minister have repeatedly shut down the concept of Canada becoming a state.
Trump has also spoken about acquiring Greenland, which is an autonomous territory under the Kingdom of Denmark. Danish leaders have rejected that idea.
The president told Time Magazine that Greenland “would be very well off if they I think it’s important for us for national security and even international security.”