Canada election: Carney says ‘nothing is off the table’ to fight Trump’s tariffs

That’s all from the team on this page for today. We’ll have more coverage to come on CBCNews.ca, but here are some links if you’re looking for more on a specific topic from today’s news:

• Carney said he’ll speak to Trump soon – likely in the next day or two.
• Poilievre promised to raise the contribution limit for tax-free savings accounts, or TFSAs, for people who invest in Canadian companies.
• Singh said he had ideas to encourage investment in the Canadian auto industry to help offset any tariffs.
• For those wondering how the Canadian government can respond to a trade war during a federal election campaign, our colleague Peter Zimonjic explained how caretaker governments work at a time like this.
• Another colleague, Mark Gollom, asked experts whether Carney has done enough to avoid conflicts of interest with his finances.

And two questions from our colleagues at Cross Country Checkup: How is the trade war affecting your job security and how might that change your voting plans? Leave your comment here and we might read it on air or call you back for the show on Sunday.

I'm Aaron Wherry in CBC's parliamentary bureau. I've been covering Ottawa for the better part of 20 years.

I'm not sure whether today was exactly the first time he's said this, but it is certainly one of the most bracing and thought-provoking statements Carney made as prime minister: “The old relationship we had with the United States based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military co-operation is over.”

At the very least, that statement puts a certain onus on him to explain what it means for the country in practical terms and how his government would respond to it.

If you read only the policy announcements from the first few days of this federal campaign and you had no idea what was going on in the world, you might not have been able to guess that this campaign was happening at a time of historic disruption for Canada. The biggest proposals concerned tax cuts.

And however worthy or interesting those proposals were, the fact that the world has seemingly changed was not entirely obvious.

Yesterday felt like the day that the reality of Trump reasserted itself. And now we will see how that reframes or refocuses the rest of the campaign.

With that, here’s a quick recap of how the Liberal and Conservative leaders responded to the continuing fallout from Trump's auto tariffs.

Carney will be speaking with Trump over the phone in the coming days. The Liberal leader said Canada would retaliate with "maximum impacts on the U.S." and minimum impacts on Canada.

Carney said he wanted to build "strength here at home" by reducing bureaucracy and speeding up investment. He touted what seemed like a new slogan: "Canada strong, Canada free, Canada forever."

Poilievre also spoke about strength. He said he would "put Canada first for a change by axing taxes, greenlighting resource projects [and] bringing home our investment in jobs so that we're strong enough to stand up for ourselves against the American threats."

The Conservative leader said the Liberals had weakened the economy and that Carney wants "Canadians to blindly trust him" despite not revealing what is in the blind trust he moved his assets into to avoid conflicts of interest.

One sentence Carney said during his news conference flew under the radar for a moment as reporters listened for details on the tariff response plan, but it’s no small thing for a Canadian prime minister to say:

“The old relationship we had with the United States based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military co-operation is over.”

Talks are ongoing and Canadian officials are hoping to broaden that exemption by expanding other areas of co-operation, including on critical minerals.

"The fat lady hasn't sung until April 2," said the official involved in recent discussions, calling them positive.

"We hope we can take it further."

The conversations with Trump's team have featured Ford, federal Minister of International Trade and Intergovernmental Affairs Dominic LeBlanc, Canada's U.S. ambassador Kirsten Hillman, and Ontario's Washington representative, David Paterson.

It's unclear whether they'll reach an amiable conclusion. These talks could go either way, as Trump and his team have, in the past, insisted on a painfully strict method for determining the national origin of car parts.

Alex Panetta here, CBC's Washington correspondent.

There was an unusual murmur on the battlefield today, amid the most serious Canada-U.S. trade war in generations: the sound of optimism.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford told reporters in Toronto that he was hoping for an exemption for cars with a significant percentage of U.S.-made parts, based on his conversations with Trump's team.

One official privy to recent Canada-U.S. discussions said the sides have been talking for days about a potential reprieve — which is why, he said, Canadian officials were so crestfallen Wednesday when they heard Trump make his announcement in the Oval Office.

Then they saw the fine print of the executive order: It said cars built under rules of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico trade pact could have their U.S. content exempted from tariffs.

This means, for example, that a car assembled in Canada could, in theory, see its 25 per cent tariff reduced to 12.5 per cent, if half the car's parts are American.

That would be a painful, but not necessarily fatal blow to auto production in Canada, especially with a weak loonie.

Carney is back on the campaign trail after pausing his events to respond to a crisis — the latest blow in Trump’s trade war.

Journalists raced from Parliament Hill after Carney’s press conference to board the Liberals’ campaign bus after its departure was delayed by about two hours.

Media are now en route to Montreal for Carney’s rally tonight. It’s the Liberal leader’s first visit to Quebec this campaign — and his visit comes after some stumbles.

Carney has faced questions about why the Liberals didn’t agree to a French-language leaders’ debate on TVA after Carney initially suggested to reporters he was open to it.

He also apologized after making a gaffe about one of the darkest moments in Quebec history — the École Polytechnique massacre. Carney referred to one of his candidates as a survivor of the Concordia University massacre by mistake, instead of Polytechnique.

Now it’s up to people in Quebec to decide if they can look past these moments as Carney makes his debut in the province tonight. His party continues to lead in the polls in Quebec, according to CBC’s Poll Tracker.

Trump is targeting "five strategic areas" he wants to repatriate business and production to the U.S., Carney said.

He listed those as pharmaceuticals, lumber, steel and aluminum, the auto sector and semiconductors.

But Carney said he believes the auto tariffs could hurt the U.S. more than Trump intends.

"What's essential is that there are huge parts of the auto sector that will be necessary to change or the damage to the U.S. economy will be much greater," he said.

As Jenna mentioned, the prime minister is reluctant here to commit to specifics when it comes to the nation's response to tariffs.

He's been known to keep key policy plans close to his chest in the past.

As governor of the Bank of England, he made it clear ahead of the Brexit referendum that the bank was ready to respond to any financial disaster spurred by the U.K. leaving the European Union. But he didn't make any concrete promises so he could keep his options open.

It sounds like he's taking a similar strategy here, waiting to see exactly what the U.S. president does before he makes his promises public.

"You act when you act. You don't pre-commit,” Carney said just now.

At a rally in Kitchener, Ont., last night, Carney specifically asked for a majority Liberal government for the first time. He was just asked about that this afternoon.

He didn’t repeat his words, but said it’s important for the government to have a “strong and clear mandate” given the seriousness of the economic threat from the U.S.

“This is…the biggest crisis in our lifetimes,” he said. “The government is going to need to act. The stronger the mandate is, the more effective we are going to be [in] getting the best deal for Canada with respect to the Americans.”

CBC’s Poll Tracker now shows the probability of the Liberals winning a majority is 69 per cent, compared to one per cent for the Conservatives.