‘I made sure that I brought him, Don, some clothing, because I wanted to remind him that the Trump family businesses were Yukon-built,’ Premier Ranj Pillai said
Although Canada faces a major trade war with the U.S. as soon as President-elect Donald Trump enters office in less than a month, Justin Trudeau has been distracted by a leadership crisis that could topple him as prime minister.
The situation has Canada’s regional leaders hopping on flights to influence the incoming Trump administration themselves.
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For Yukon Premier Ranj Pillai, that led to chewing the fat with the president-elect’s eldest son, Donald J. Trump Jr., over meals of black bear spring rolls, turkey, deer and oysters at a hunting lodge in North Carolina.
Don Jr., as he’s often called, has frequented the Yukon for hunting trips, a passion Pillai shares. And the Trumps have ties to the region. More than a century ago, Donald Trump Sr.’s grandfather Friedrich Trump capitalized on the Yukon gold rush with a restaurant, bar and brothel in a remote town close to the northern territory’s border.
“I made sure that I brought him, Don, some clothing, because I wanted to remind him that the Trump family businesses were Yukon-built,” Pillai said by phone. The two first met at a conference in Nevada a few months prior.
Pillai said the conversations were “incredibly positive” and an opportunity to “share some data points” and argue that the US-Canada trading deficit that stokes the president-elect’s ire “is only because we’re sending raw materials to them, and they’re creating jobs and value from that.”
They also discussed the Yukon’s efforts on Arctic security and “opportunities to secure supply chains inside of North America.”
Some of those projects are already happening. Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Defense and the Canadian government jointly announced they’d invest in a Yukon tungsten mining project.
Although Trump Jr. was quick to point out that he has no official role in the upcoming administration, people connected to the transition team were present over the weekend, Pillai said.
The premiers of Canada’s provinces and territories are trying to set up formal meetings with Trump’s transition team before Jan. 20, he added, sharing his worry that the federal government could be doing more.
“I’ve had some very, very brief dialog with Dominic LeBlanc, but other than that there does not seem to be a full-scale strategy coming from Ottawa, with a series of different ministers taking on certain responsibilities,” Pillai said, referring to new Finance Minister LeBlanc. He replaced Trudeau’s longtime deputy Chrystia Freeland after she dramatically resigned Dec. 16, destabilizing Trudeau’s government.
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