(Bloomberg) — There may be sturdy nationwide help amongst Canadians for placing export taxes on oil shipments if wanted to retaliate towards US President Donald Trump’s tariffs, a brand new ballot suggests.
Export taxes on power have been thought-about politically divisive in Canada, however the sturdy backing reveals the extent of anger among the many Canadian public over Trump’s actions — and doubtlessly offers Justin Trudeau’s authorities larger license to threaten the levies if Trump revives the tariffs subsequent month.
General, 82% of Canadians help unilaterally elevating the value on oil exports to the US if Trump tariffs Canadian items however exempts oil, in line with a ballot by Nanos Analysis Group carried out for Bloomberg Information. The survey was carried out from Jan. 31 to Feb. 3 amongst 1,077 respondents, and is taken into account correct inside 3 proportion factors, 19 instances out of 20.
The ballot discovered 72% help amongst individuals dwelling within the western Prairie provinces, the place Canada’s oil assets are concentrated. The premiers of each Alberta and Saskatchewan have publicly opposed any use of export taxes, however the survey suggests the leaders are out of step with most of their residents.
Almost 90% of individuals within the Atlantic provinces — which have offshore oil initiatives — help utilizing export taxes if mandatory, which is the strongest regional degree of help discovered by the ballot.
Moreover, the ballot discovered 79% of individuals nationwide help retaliatory tariffs on US imports, even when it means Canadians will find yourself paying larger costs for items.
Oil is Canada’s single greatest level of leverage with the US, which imports about 4 million barrels a day from its northern neighbor. Many US refineries, significantly within the Midwest, depend on heavy crude oil sourced from Canada and don’t have simple replacements for it.
On Saturday, Trump signed an government order that might levy 25% duties on all Canadian exports to the US aside from the broad class of “power,” which might be tariffed at a decrease charge of 10%. Trump declared the tariffs have been essential to cease the stream of fentanyl from Canada into the US, although US-collected statistics present no proof it is a vital downside.
The tariffs have been delayed by 30 days on Monday after Trump spoke with Trudeau twice by cellphone, and stated he was happy by Canadian actions reminiscent of appointing a “fentanyl czar” and including extra border safety assets. Trudeau additionally agreed to pause retaliatory tariffs on C$155 billion ($108 billion) value of US items.
Nevertheless, Trump has explicitly saved the tariff risk on the desk, saying the approaching weeks can be used “to see whether or not or not a last financial take care of Canada might be structured.”
Bloomberg has beforehand reported the Canadian authorities has examined the usage of export taxes on key commodities reminiscent of oil, uranium and potash if Trump tried to place economy-wide tariffs on Canada however exempted these assets attributable to America’s reliance on them.
Trudeau has struck a cautious tone. When he introduced Canada’s retaliation package deal on Saturday, he stated it was necessary that “nobody area of the nation or one business carries a bigger burden than anybody else.”
“We is not going to be shifting ahead on points that additional divide the nation, which is why we’re working with all premiers to take a look at other ways we will encourage the People to step again from these commerce actions,” he stated.
To make sure, export levies on oil would probably be a final resort for Canada in a commerce warfare with the US, as they’d hurt a serious financial driver within the northern nation and doubtlessly increase the price of Canadian oil that runs by the US through Enbridge Inc.’s Line 5 pipeline en path to Ontario and Quebec.
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith — whose province is residence to the lion’s share of Canada’s oil deposits — has reacted furiously to the concept of export taxes, and refused to signal a joint assertion by Canadian political leaders final month as a result of it didn’t rule out measures to curb power exports to the US.
“Till these threats stop, Alberta won’t be able to completely help the federal authorities’s plan in coping with the threatened tariffs,” Smith stated when rejecting the assertion in January.
–With help from Erik Hertzberg.
©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
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