By President-elect Trump says he had a ‘very productive meeting’ with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at his Mar-a-Lago club in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Friday.
Trudeau jetted into Mar-a-Lago unannounced on Friday just days after Trump threatened to impose sweeping tariffs on Canadian products. Trump is threatening to impose 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico over failures by both nations to curb the flow of illegal immigrants and illicit drugs from those countries into the U.S.
‘We discussed many important topics that will require both countries to work together to address, like the fentanyl and drug crisis that has decimated so many lives as a result of illegal immigration, fair trade deals that do not jeopardize American workers and the massive trade deficit the U.S. has with Canada,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social Saturday.
‘I made it very clear that the United States will no longer sit idly by as our citizens become victims to the scourge of this drug epidemic, caused mainly by the drug cartels, and fentanyl pouring in from China. Too much death and hardship!’
Trump wrote that Trudeau, who has been serving as prime minister of Canada since 2015, made a commitment to work with the U.S. to ‘end this terrible devastation of U.S. families.’
U.S. customs agents seized 43 pounds of fentanyl at the Canadian border last fiscal year, compared with 21,100 pounds at the Mexican border. On immigration, Border Patrol made 56,530 arrests at the Mexican border in October alone and 23,721 arrests at the Canadian border between October 2023 and September 2024 — and Canadian officials say they are ready to make new investments in border security.
Trump said the pair also spoke about many other important topics, including energy, trade and the Arctic, although he did not go into further detail.
‘All are vital issues that I will be addressing on my first days back in office, and before,’ Trump concluded, without saying whether tariffs were still on or off the table.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, after speaking with Trump on the telephone, said Thursday she was confident a tariff war with Washington would be averted.
Sen.-elect Dave McCormick, R-Pa., posted a picture to X late Friday showing him at a Mar-a-Lago dinner table along with President-elect Trump, Trudeau, and Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick, among others. The ritzy club has been a hive of activity since President-elect Trump’s historic election win over Vice President Harris earlier this month as the 45th president co-ordinates his transition back to the Oval Office.
Tech billionaires Elon Musk and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg have also met Trump at the famous location, along with many of those nominated for top roles in the incoming administration. Trump selected Musk to lead an outside advisory panel known as the ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ to slash waste in the federal government.
As he was leaving his West Palm Beach hotel, Trudeau stopped briefly to answer a reporter’s question about the dinner meeting, saying it had been ‘an excellent conversation.’
An official who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said it had been a ‘positive, wide-ranging dinner that lasted three hours.’
The official said other topics included defense, Ukraine, NATO, China, the Middle East and pipelines, as well as the Group of Seven meeting in Canada next year.
Fox News’ Louis Casiano and The Associated Press contributed to this report.