Trump Says Canada Will Become 51st State: ‘We Don’t Need Them, But They Need Us’

Donald Trump says Canada will become America’s 51st state, and that it’s headed the same way as Greenland.

At a campaign rally in Bullhead City, Arizona, on Wednesday, the U.S. president said Canada needs the United States far more than the other way around.

“We don’t need them, but they need us,” Trump told the crowd. “They’ll end up being the 51st state because it’s the only way it works.”

Then he added: “So they’ll be doing something just like Greenland.”

The comments came five days before Alberta’s Oct. 19 separation referendum. Trump didn’t mention Alberta.

What Trump said

He started with Lake Ontario, stumbling over the name before landing on “Lake America,” t

he name his administration now uses for it.

Then he turned to trade.

“Canada treats us very badly,” he said. “They always have. Not anymore.”

He accused Canada of quietly charging huge tariffs, especially on milk. He described a system where the first couple of bottles come in tariff-free and anything after that gets hit with 409%. “They are brutal and we don’t take that crap anymore,” he said.

He claimed car companies are “all moving into America,” then asked: “Why should we be losing 80, 90, 100 billion dollars a year to support a country that isn’t one of us?”

Why Greenland

Greenland is a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, sitting between North America and Europe in the Arctic.

Earlier this year, Trump pushed hard for the U.S. to take control of it. He threatened tariffs on European countries that opposed him and, for weeks, refused to rule out force. In January, he backed off and announced a “framework” for future talks with NATO.

On Wednesday, he waved off the backlash. “Remember, they thought I was going to send my military out to attack Greenland,” he said. “I wasn’t.”

He called the island a massive piece of land. “Our plate’s getting larger all the time,” he said, before moving on to Venezuela and Iran.

He never said what “doing something just like Greenland” would mean for Canada. There was no plan, no process, and nothing on how Canadians would ever agree to it.

Lake Ontario is already “Lake America,” in Washington

On Aug. 27, Trump signed an executive order telling U.S. federal agencies to call Lake Ontario “Lake America.” It changes American maps and government records. It doesn’t change anything in Canada.

Prime Minister Mark Carney pushed back, pointing out that “Ontario” comes from an Indigenous word that’s older than the province.

The name caused trouble fast. In September, a Michigan credit union CEO lost her job after sharing an AI-edited photo of a family in fake “Lake America” sweatshirts heading to Halifax.

The trade war behind it

After trade talks broke down, the U.S. put a 50% tariff on C$27.6 billion of Canadian goods starting Aug. 22. Canada hit back dollar for dollar on Sept. 8, with tariffs of 15, 25 and 50 per cent on American steel, dairy, appliances, farm equipment, paper and electronics.

Does the U.S. really lose $100 billion a year on Canada?

No. Here’s what the U.S. Trade Representative’s own figures show for 2025:

That’s about a fifth of Trump’s high-end number, and the deficit shrank in 2025.

A trade deficit also isn’t money “lost.” When an American refinery buys Alberta crude, it gets oil it turns into gasoline and diesel. The deficit is just the gap between what one side buys and what it sells.

What about the 409% milk tariff?

Trump is describing a real system with a number that doesn’t exist.

Canada uses quotas for dairy. Up to a set amount, U.S. dairy comes in tariff-free. Above it, tariffs apply:

Milk: 241%

Cheese: 245.5%

Butter: 298.5%

None of them are 409%. And American exporters haven’t come close to using the tariff-free amount. Recent figures put the fill rate at about one-quarter. U.S. dairy sales to Canada still topped $1.1 billion in 2024, up more than half since 2020.

The fight is decades old. U.S. farmers say Canada’s supply management system shuts them out. Ottawa says it keeps Canadian farms stable.

Are car companies leaving Canada?

Some work has moved. Stellantis shifted Jeep Compass production from Brampton, Ont., to Illinois last year.

But Canada still has major assembly plants and parts makers, and the industry is so tied together that some parts cross the border several times before a car is finished. That’s why auto tariffs hurt both sides.

Not every American agrees

Trump has kept the 51st-state line going all year. In June, after Canada slipped into a technical recession, he posted “51st State” on Truth Social. Carney called him “an exceptionally active user of social media” and said Ottawa won’t react to every post.

Many Americans don’t share his view. A September AP-NORC poll found just 26% now call Canada a close ally, down from 62% in 2023.

Some are going out of their way to say so. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told Canadians “we miss you” and said his city doesn’t see Canada as the 51st state. A Baltimore preschool went viral after taking its students on an imaginary trip to Canada.

Canadians are responding in their own ways. Visits to Las Vegas fell 17% last year, enough to become an issue in Nevada’s elections. And on Vancouver Island, one artist painted Trump with horse manure and sold the portrait for $1,800.

Five days before Alberta votes

On Monday, Oct. 19, Albertans vote on whether to stay in Canada or start a legal process toward a binding vote on separation. A vote to start that process wouldn’t make Alberta independent on its own.

The U.S. sits at the centre of the economic arguments on both sides. Alberta sells most of its oil to American buyers, and some separatist figures have faced questions about their contacts with American political figures.

An independent Alberta wouldn’t automatically become an American state. But while Albertans decide whether to start down a road that could lead out of Canada, the American president is telling rally crowds that Canada will end up part of the United States.

Advance voting runs until Saturday, Oct. 17.

Sources

Office of the United States Trade Representative: Canada
Department of Finance Canada: Counter-tariffs effective September 8, 2026
GovInfo: Executive order on Lake Ontario, August 2026
FactCheck.org: Trump’s misleading claim on Canadian dairy tariffs
Elections Alberta