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Trump Meeting With New Canadian PM Amid Historic Tensions; Trump Says U.S. Will Stop Bombing Houthi Rebels. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired May 06, 2025 - 12:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[12:30:00]

MARK CARNEY, CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER: -- elements that have come, and that's part of what we're going to discuss.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Right.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: During the campaign, Prime Minister Karajan talked about the American vitriol. How do you react if Canada decided not to shop in the American store as much as before, and decided to partner with other countries?

TRUMP: Well, we don't do much business with Canada from our standpoint. They do a lot of business with us. We're at like 4 percent, and usually those things don't last very long. You know, we have great things, great product. The kind of product we sell nobody else can sell, including military.

Look, we make the best military equipment in the world. And Canada buys our military equipment, which we appreciate. But we make the best military equipment in the world by far. The missiles, the submarines, everything. Everything we have is really top-notch.

I rebuilt our military during our last term. Stupidly, we gave some away to Afghanistan, which shouldn't have happened. But that was -- I think it was the most embarrassing moment in the history of our country. It was just very incompetent people.

But if you look, the man that's now the head of our Joint Chiefs, he led the attack on ISIS for me. That's why he's the head of the Joint Chiefs. And Razin Caine, he's the -- he was unbelievable. And as you know, we defeated ISIS in three weeks. It was supposed to take five years. We did it in three weeks.

And he ran the campaign. I said, I like him, but I knew him before. I went to Iraq, and we agreed to a plan, and that was the plan. And as you know, we did it in record time. So we have, you know, we have the best equipment in the world. We have the best a lot of things. But Canada does a lot more business with us than we do with Canada.

Yes?

(CROSSTALK) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can I ask about your investments, Mr. President? When do you think the investments that you've announced, the trillions, will finally hit economic data this year?

TRUMP: When you're saying about the tariffs at all?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, no, about the investments that you've announced.

TRUMP: Oh, it's hitting right now. Look, they're already starting AI plans. These are not people that look for financing. That's a good thing. You know, in real estate, you get a site. Then you have to look for financing. You have to get your zoning.

You know, five years later, you start building. You get a bank. Then the bank's no good. You know, these people have massive amounts of cash. The CHIPS Act was a ridiculous thing because that doesn't get them to build.

All we did is hand very wealthy companies money. The CHIPS Act, that was done by Biden. Billions, we give them billions of dollars. They don't even have to do anything with it. And then if you weren't -- if you didn't have -- and I don't want to be a wise guy, but if you didn't go with the DEI, if you didn't go with all of the different things, woke, if you weren't woke, you couldn't even use the money.

You had to have a certain percentage of this and that and that and that. It's impossible, impossible to have. The people, the companies actually complained to me. They said they gave me all this money, but nobody can get these people to do anything.

I mean, look, President Obama -- and if he wanted help, I'd give him help because I'm a really good builder and I build on time, on budget. He's building his library in Chicago. It's a disaster. And he said something to the effect, I only want DEI, I only want woke.

He wants woke people to build it. Well, he got woke -- and they have massive cost overruns. The job is stopped. I don't know, it's a disaster. And I don't like that happening because it's -- I think it's bad for the presidency that a thing like that should happen.

He's got a library that's a disaster. And he wanted to be very politically correct and he didn't use good, hard, tough, mean construction workers that I love, Marco. I love those construction workers. But he didn't want construction workers. He wanted people that never did it before.

He's got a disaster in his hands. Like millions of dollars, many, many -- I mean, really many millions of dollars over budget. And I would love to help him with it. Or somebody else, I could recommend professionals. But it was not built in a professional manner.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: By the way, nor was in California, a little train going from San Francisco to Los Angeles that's being run by Gavin Newsom, the governor of California. Did you ever hear of Gavin Newsom? He has got -- that train is the worst crossover run I've ever seen. It's like totally out of control.

So then they said, all right, we won't go into San Francisco. We'll stop 25 miles short. And we won't go into Los Angeles, we'll stop 25 miles short. It's hundreds of billions of dollars for this stupid project that should have never been built.

And then they realized that it would have been a lot less costly if we just gave limousine service back and forth and gave it free. They would have saved hundreds of billions of dollars.

[12:35:05]

They have airplanes that go there for one hundredth the cost. And they have cars. They have a thing called a highway that goes back and forth that's not fully utilized. And they got involved with this project. And Gavin -- you know, I always liked Gavin. I had a good relationship with him.

I just got him a lot of water. You know, I sent in people to open up that water because he refused to do it. And we just got him a lot of water. If they would have had that water and -- if they would have done what I said to do, they wouldn't have had the fires in Los Angeles. Those fires would have been put out very quickly.

But if you think about it, and you got to take a look at this project, it's the worst cost overrun I've ever seen. I've watched a lot of stupid people build a lot of stupid things, but that's the worst cost overrun I've ever seen. What's happening between San Francisco and Los Angeles.

And you ought to ask about that because this government is not going to pay. I told our very great new Secretary of Transportation, he's doing a good job, Sean Duffy, I said, we're not going to pay for that thing. They are just -- it's out of control.

This is something that -- you don't have things like this. It's not even conceivable. Like 30 times over budget, 30 times. It's the craziest thing I've -- and now it's hundreds of -- it was supposed to be a simple train. And I think the media should take a look at it.

And I'd love him to run for president on the other side, you know? I'd love to see that. But I don't think he's going to be running because that one project alone -- well, that and the fires and a lot of other things pretty much put him out of the race.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, what changes would you like to see to the USMCA? What changes would you like to make?

TRUMP: We're going to work on some subtle changes. Maybe. I don't even know if we're going to be dealing with USMCA. We're just -- we're dealing more with concepts right now. Look, right now, we're doing trade. We have trade. They're paying a tariff on cars and steel and aluminum. And I think we have a baseline of 10 percent or something like that for the tariffs. But we're getting along very well.

Right now, going no further, but we have an agreement. We did something with even parts. You want to discuss that, Howard? With respect to Canada, which helps Canada out.

HOWARD LUTNICK, COMMERCE SECRETARY: Sure. So we've made an arrangement with the car companies that 15 percent of their, a, USMCA parts are included, and then 15 percent of foreign parts from the manufactured suggested retail price are not tariffed to help domestic manufacturing really thrive.

TRUMP: So it gave them a chance to be able to build their car parts, factories if they're going to -- a lot of these companies already have factories, and what they have to do is just fill them out. But they're able to build them in the United States, so we gave them a pretty substantial period of time.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just to clarify, Mr. President, is there anything the Prime Minister can say to you today to change your mind on tariffing Canada?

TRUMP: Tariffing cars?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tariffing Canada. Is there anything he can say to you in the course of your meetings with him today that would get you to lift tariffs on Canada?

TRUMP: No.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why not? Just the way it is.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE), if Canadians don't want it, would you respect that?

TRUMP: Sure, I would. But this is not necessarily a one-day deal. This is over a period of time they have to make that decision.

Yes, go ahead.

MARK CARNEY, CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER: Yes, if I may. Well, I -- respectfully, Canadians' view on this is not going to change on the 51st state. Secondly, we are the largest client of the United States in the totality of all the goods. So we are the largest client of the United States.

We have a tremendous auto sector between the two of us, and the changes made have been helpful. You know, 50 percent of a car that comes from Canada is American. That's not like anywhere else in the world. And to your question about is there one thing? No, this is a bigger discussion. There are much bigger forces involved. And this will take some time and some discussions, and that's why we're here, to have those discussions. And that's -- that is represented by who's sitting around the table.

TRUMP: See, the conflict is, and this is very friendly. We're not -- this is not going to be like we had another little blow-up with somebody else. That was a much different -- this is a very friendly conversation. But we want to make our own cars. We don't really want cars from Canada.

And we put tariffs on cars from Canada, and at a certain point, it won't make economic sense for Canada to build those cars. And we don't want steel from Canada because we're making our own steel and we're having massive steel plants being built right now as we speak.

We really don't want Canadian steel and we don't want Canadian aluminum and various other things because we want to be able to do it ourselves. And we -- because of, you know, past thinking of people, we have a tremendous deficit with Canada. In other words, they have a surplus with us.

[12:40:09]

And there's no reason for us to be subsidizing Canada. Canada's a place that will have to be able to take care of itself economically. I assume they can. I will tell you that Trudeau, when I spoke to him, I used to call him Governor Trudeau. I think that probably didn't help his election.

But when I spoke to him, I said, so why are we taking your cars? Why are we taking your -- we want to make them ourselves. I mean, I said -- and if the price of your cars went up or if we put a tariff, if we put a tariff on your cars of 25 percent, what would that mean to you? He said that would mean the end of Canada. He actually said that to me.

And I said, that's a strange answer, but I understand his answer. But, no, I mean, it's hard to justify subsidizing Canada to the tune of maybe $200 billion a year. We protect Canada militarily, and we always will. You know, that's not a money thing, that's -- but we always will.

But, you know, it's not fair. But why are we subsidizing Canada $200 billion a year or whatever the number might be? It's a very substantial number. And it's hard for the American taxpayer to say, gee whiz, we love doing that.

Thank you very much. We're going to have a very (INAUDIBLE). Thank you. Thank you.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thanks, guys.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thanks, guys. Keep going.

DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: OK. Well, we have been watching a very lengthy Q&A session with the President of the United States and the new Prime Minister from Canada, Mark Carney, talking about a lot of issues.

But I do maybe want to start where that left off, because despite the fact that the two men, and frankly the two governments and countries, particularly Canada, have been very rhetorically aggressive towards one another, particularly with regard to this trade war that is going on, at the beginning, there -- it was extremely cordial. Really, almost throughout the entire thing.

Then at the end, you did see and hear President Trump start to get and give more jabs, talking about the fact that the United States doesn't need Canadian goods, doesn't need to have cars from Canada. And if you can see right there, the body language from and by the Canadian Prime Minister, he was not happy.

And then the president ended the session. And now they're going to go behind closed doors and we can only imagine how that conversation is going to go.

I want to bring in CNN's Kevin Liptak and Paula Newton. They are both at the White House today. And Paula, I do want to start with you because if I am in Canada watching my new Prime Minister, who got elected largely because he said President Trump back off, hear him say not once but twice, we're not going to be the 51st state.

I can tell you right now that the Canadians spoke in this election and it's not going to happen. I'm sure they will be pleased by that. Maybe less pleased by the lecture on economics that we just heard from President Trump at the end of that session.

PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Listen, Dana, you hit it right on the head there. The issue is here in terms of tone. Look, this was completely different. Not just from what President Trump had been saying really for months, but also from the election campaign of Mark Carney.

He had a very strident campaign and had harsh words for the president. They sat there in the Oval Office. Couldn't be more cordial, right? What's that issue now? Substance. And in terms of substance, these two countries remain very far apart.

Just fact-checking a couple of things in terms of the ripping off of Canada. It is true Canada gets a lot from the relationship with the United States. But the Prime Minister, Carney, tried to interject there and say, point blank, Canada is the largest purchaser of American goods, period. Full stop.

And that's why not too far from here on Capitol Hill, Dana, which you know all too well, there have been both Democratic and Republican politicians saying that to the White House loud and clear. Why? Because in severing that trade relationship with the United States, it will hurt both Democratic and Republican states. That's point number one.

[12:45:06]

I think it is a message loud and clear to any other nation trying to do negotiations here at this White House that this president is sticking to what he thinks about these trade deals. He said, OK, sure, we've got this trade deal with Canada and Mexico. We may renegotiate it. We may abandon the trade deal.

He is leaving everything on the table. And from that point of view, you see Mark Carney there, really trying to say what he could with the body language, right? Basically saying that Donald Trump owes him in terms of the election. He got him elected, and he turned apparently and said, oh yes, right.

Listen, that is what we've been hearing from the Prime Minister's office. Make no mistake, Dana, Prime Minister Carney does respect this president. And when he says he's transformational, he means it. That does not mean there will not be collateral damage in both Canada and the United States if that's the way this relationship goes forward.

Look, the expectations weren't very high in this meeting. I can tell you from Canadian officials so far so OK from the Oval Office. I'm sure behind closed doors things will get better. But, again, no one should be under illusions here. This is going to be a very long negotiations and both Americans themselves and American businesses should not be shocked about what happens next.

BASH: Yes, absolutely.

And Kevin, let me turn to you. And I just want to put a finer point on what Paula was saying when it comes to one of the basic fact checks about the economic and trade relationship between the U.S. and Canada. First and foremost, even this year alone, I'm told that the U.S. exports to Canada made up 17 percent of U.S. exports.

But what you're looking at there, that's 2024. These are U.S. exports to Canada. So it's the Canadians buying American goods and services. $349.4 billion. It is the highest except for the E.U., which is not on this. So it is a fact that the United States benefits greatly from Canada buying the U.S. goods. Kevin?

KEVIN LIPTAK, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Right. And that's part of why it's so striking to hear the language that the president uses when he's talking about Canada. You mentioned before this meeting started relatively cordially. And, in fact, when someone asked the president whether they would discuss this idea of Canada becoming the 51st American state, he tried to downplay it, saying that it wouldn't be a part of the conversation.

And then he proceeded to talk at length about why he thinks it would be advantageous for Canada to become a part of the United States. And it was in a lot of ways hard for Carney to get a word in edgewise there. And you did note his body language.

I was noting particularly when the president was going after -- he didn't name her, but Chrystia Freeland, the foreign finance minister, saying that she was a terrible negotiator talking about this experience, negotiating the USMCA. He kind of had a pained look on his face.

If I can do this, I would like to pull out one more, I think, important piece of news out of this meeting, which is what the president said at the very, very beginning when it comes to the Houthi rebels in Yemen. He says that they, in his words, have capitulated. He says that they don't want to fight anymore. He says that they've agreed to stop blowing up ships.

And in the president's words, he's accepting the Houthis at their words and that the U.S. will end this bombing campaign that had been ongoing since March 15th. So I guess 52 days that this bombing has been ongoing, trying to decimate that Iran-backed rebel group. Now the president's saying that there is some sort of agreement to end the tensions.

And we are getting some reporting in about exactly what's happening here. We understand that Steve Witkoff, the president's foreign envoy, worked through the Omanis. Remember, that's the Gulf state nation that the U.S. is also working with to try and negotiate a new deal with Iran to come to this arrangement to end the strikes on the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

In a lot of ways, this campaign by the Americans has been tough going. You know, the Houthis have still been able to shoot down seven multimillion dollar drones. There was that incident last week when the Houthis fired on the USS Harry Truman in the Red Sea. It had to turn so hard that a fighter jet fell off the ship.

So this campaign had been tough going in a lot of ways, and now the president announcing that there could be an agreement to bring it to an end. I think two big questions here is, one, does this create momentum for a broader deal with Iran that the president has been pushing for?

And two, does this agreement include a ceasefire with Israel, which just today had been targeting, you know, the main airport in Yemen that had been in retaliation for the Houthis striking the main airport in Israel? So a lot of questions there, but I think a significant announcement --

BASH: Yes.

LIPTAK: -- from the president at the start of this meeting.

BASH: Yes, I'm glad you brought that up, Kevin. It is true. It is a big announcement, and he in his inimitable way teased the fact that there could be a different announcement on a different deal in the coming days. Not about trade. He made that very clear.

[12:50:11]

So, the other potential areas in which there could be a deal point to the Middle East, so that kind of speaks to what you were just wondering, whether what he announced on the Houthis could maybe pave the way for something else.

Thank you both for that. We have a lot more to discuss on what we heard. A lot to unpack. Don't go anywhere. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:55:14]

BASH: Welcome back. My panel is here to talk about what we saw and heard in the Oval Office. David, what was your takeaway?

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, I mean, there was a lot in there that you covered already with Kevin and Paula, but I do think one of the things to pay attention to and you referenced this when you were talking to Kevin, Dana, when the president could not have been clearer that this announcement he's teasing is not necessarily a trade deal. He wanted to make sure that was clear.

On the same week, or after weeks of his administration, kind of suggesting trade deals are on the precipice, right? He wanted to calm the markets.

BASH: And he said it was us.

CHALIAN: Right. But he also said, I don't know if this is being communicated --

BASH: Yes.

CHALIAN: -- but he clearly wanted to reframe expectations of trade deals being imminent, which is something I think the administration has sort of been hanging out there as a way to calm the markets. And he just reframed that, and I thought that was really interesting.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: But not even just hanging out there for the markets. I mean, I -- reading back in after coming off of maternity leave, every single administration official that I talked to was really pointing to this idea that there were going to be trade deals, that was going to offset everything, that that was going to really move the needle, and then the economy was going to come back.

BASH: Yes.

HOLMES: They were going to change the language, the big beautiful bill, all of that. All of that was starting with the idea that there were these trade deals. He could not have said more times, the big announcement's probably not about trade, and then started to seemingly backpedal on the idea that there was a trade announcement coming, or that they were -- as far as they've been saying they are on these negotiations.

BASH: And to your point of your discussions privately with administration officials, that is what they have been doing publicly in a very aggressive way, and I totally agree with you.

CHALIAN: The Secretary of the Treasury this week, I think.

BASH: Yes.

CHALIAN: Yes.

BASH: Yes. And I totally agree with you that he was not just signaling, but saying out loud to his people like, we're not there yet, so let's communicate differently.

AKAYLA GARDNER, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, BLOOMBERG: I mean, President Trump just said this weekend that he said that there could be deals potentially this week. But one thing that really stuck out to me from that meeting is one of the first questions he was asked is, do you think Canada could be one of the first trade deals, and he said, I would love that.

That is not what the administration has been publicly signaling. They've been prioritizing places like the European Union, they've been prioritizing Japan, India, South Korea. And even Howard Lutnick was asked yesterday, he was not optimistic about this meeting with Canada.

And then at the very end of the meeting, Trump said, no, there's nothing that he could say that would make me lift tariffs. So it's really confusing, and frankly for foreign leaders, they're like, what is the point sometimes to negotiate with Trump if ultimately we're going to still have the same result?

BASH: And as we were watching, David, you remarked about the section where the president was talking about China, because that's the ballgame.

CHALIAN: That is the ballgame, and I think he is clearly looking for an off-ramp, right? I mean, that is clear. He has said repeatedly himself he doesn't envision a 145 percent tariff on China forever. It is a tool he is using to try to bring them to the table.

He says they're interested in talking, but you could -- in that whole section where he was talking about China, you get his entire philosophy that has been decades in the making about tariffs, but you also get a clear desire on his part to find some deal to get an off- ramp.

BASH: Yes. And can we just quickly go back to the Mark Carney of it all? And I think, I just want to put back on the screen how this -- what it was like 40 minutes, maybe 35-40 minutes of this meeting came to an end with the president really going off on what he claimed were the economics of the relationship between the U.S. and Canada.

And you could see Carney getting more and more agitated, and at one point President Trump said out loud, which I sort of took as a warning, this is not contentious, this isn't like another famous meeting that happened in the Oval Office, clearly referring to what happened with President Zelenskyy. And before Carney could even speak, and you see him looking down, getting agitated, the president ended the session.

HOLMES: He started lifting his hand as though he was trying to interject.

BASH: Yes. But he's going to want -- there's no question we're going to hear a lot from Carney after this.

HOLMES: Of course. Well, I think he has to. I mean, again, let's talk about what he campaigned on, talking -- telling Donald Trump to knock it off. Well, Donald Trump just, you know, ended the meeting, basically going after Canada. So he's going to have to respond, because again, that's part of why he was elected.

GARDNER: I think one thing too, he was really dangling some carrots, things that Canada's prepared to offer the United States. He talked about fentanyl, he talked about borders, he talked about upping security investments, all things that Trump has been saying he wants to see Canada do.

But we already saw Canada make some of these concessions, offer troops at the border, saying they're going to crack down on fentanyl. And the administration just continued with their 25 percent tariffs anyways.

BASH: Yes. And you heard Carney talking about that and really trying to praise.

I think we have like a few seconds left. The Obama and the whole library and his like sort of rant.

CHALIAN: I mean --

BASH: The wave is back, by the way.

CHALIAN: It would certainly.

BASH: The wave is back.

CHALIAN: I mean, I've not heard President Trump talk about the Obama Presidential Center like that before. But that Presidential Center is slated to open in the middle of next year in 2026. Usually, the sitting president is invited to participate --

BASH: Yes.

CHALIAN: -- in that process with the former president. We'll see how that goes, because he clearly had some thoughts about that not going so well at the moment.

BASH: Yes, he did.

CHALIAN: Yes.

BASH: Thank you all very much. Thank you for joining Inside Politics. CNN News Central starts right now.