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Our full discussion transcribed after the break:
by Rod D. Martin
August 25, 2026
I appeared on NTD Good Morning with Cary Dunst to discuss Ottawa’s last-minute rejection of an already agreed trade deal, the best trade deal the U.S. has ever offered anyone. Even Mark Carney admitted it was completely reasonable, but that he just doesn’t like Trump.
Okay, Mark. But pride goeth before a fall. And Canada’s free ride is coming to a crashing halt.
Cary and I discuss:
Why Trump is right that Canada wants, and has long received, a free ride
Why Ottawa walked away from an exceptionally favorable deal
The lopsided postwar trade calculus and why Trump is ending it
Canada’s freeloading on American defense spending
Why Ottawa needs access to the U.S. market more than Carney will admit
It’s a quick 7 minutes: watch the interview, and pass it along!
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Our Full Discussion:
Cary Dunst: Joining us now for analysis on the U.S.-Canada economic relationship is Rod D. Martin. He’s founder and CEO of Martin Capital. Good morning, Rod. Thanks for joining us so early.
Both sides are basically blaming each other. How do you see it?
Rod D. Martin: Donald Trump says a lot of things that make you go, “Hmm,” but this one was surprisingly accurate. This was just spot on: Canada wants the benefits of being a state without being a state.
One of the things Canada wants is for the United States taxpayer to pay for its entire military protection without any compensating factors whatsoever. They don’t pay into our Treasury. They don’t trade fairly.
I’ll give you an example. We face 280 percent tariffs on American dairy farmers. That’s absurd. That’s not an actual tax. That’s a blockade. That’s the Canadians saying, “You may not sell cheese here.”
You might say, “Well, that’s a small thing.” Well, it’s not small if you’re an American dairy farmer, and it’s certainly not small if you’re facing competition from Canadian dairy farmers. That’s true across a range of issues.
Canada was offered a deal, and agreed to that deal, that would actually have given them the most favored trade status of any foreign trade partner. No country has gotten a better deal. No country has gotten as good a deal as the one the U.S. and Canada agreed to earlier this past week.
And they walked away. Mark Carney said why. He said, “We actually agree with everything the Americans are saying. We just don’t like how they’re saying it.”
Well, okay. If that’s where you are, if you’re going to put pride between you and actually making a good deal for your citizens and ours, then I can’t help you. And Donald Trump won’t.
How Postwar Trade Policy Outlived the Cold War
Cary Dunst: I want to go a level deeper on that, because you used this example of the American dairy farmer. Is it political pressure internally on Carney? It seems as if Canada has this expectation of a nonreciprocal deal when it comes to some of these industries. How do you understand that?
Rod D. Martin: Well, Cary, that’s where our allies have been forever, because we taught them to be.
Coming out of World War II, we saw the world flattened. Germany was just rubble, but so was London, and so was much of France, and so was Japan, and so forth. We faced down a communist threat that could have, and almost did a couple of times, just conquer the whole world.
The United States took the decision that, look, we’re going to rebuild our allies. We’re going to do some of that with cash money and go over there and rebuild buildings. But we’re also going to help them by giving them favored trade status, such that they don’t have to compete with us as much as we have to compete with them.
We want market access to their markets, but we know that they have industries they need to rebuild. So for 35 years, 45 years, we did that. The problem is the Cold War ended 35 years ago, and nobody rethought it until Donald Trump.
You’ve got to actually get to some level of balance. You’ve got to actually make fair fair.
It’s absurd, for instance, that India, another American friend, was charging a 100 percent tariff on Harley-Davidson. That’s just basically a ban on Harleys in India, one of the world’s biggest markets. The Germans were charging us four times our auto tariff. That’s absurd. That’s ridiculous. And they wanted full access to the American market, and we pretty much gave it to them.
Those days are over. The EU trade deal is solid. The Indian trade deal is solid. The Canadian trade deal is a train wreck because Mark Carney is the only Western leader, or Eastern leader for that matter, who won’t just say, “You know what? You’re right. This is fair.”
Except, wait: Carney did say it was fair. He’s just mad about it.
Canada’s Defense Free Ride
Cary Dunst: And, of course, the internal politics of Canada potentially make people do things that seem slightly irrational when it looks like you face pressure from the other side. But I want you now, Rod, to explore the national security aspects of our relationship with Canada.
Rod D. Martin: Well, you’re right to do so. The Canadians contribute virtually nothing to the NATO alliance, which is just not sustainable.
It’s the exact same analysis as on trade. The United States knew it had to be the defender of the free world for half a century because these guys couldn’t really defend themselves.
Fortunately, Canada was one of the ones who could. Nobody bombed Canada. Canada fought heroically in World War II, as well as World War I, and they were a staunch, steadfast ally.
The truth is, we built continental defense around them. That’s why there’s a North American Air Defense Command based in Colorado at Cheyenne Mountain, or used to be at Cheyenne Mountain. These things are essential defenses that depend on both nations actually fully participating.
But Canada no longer does. Canada’s army is barely there. They couldn’t fight a Boy Scout troop. They’re not contributing anything. We are paying for their defense, which, again, factors into the trade picture.
If you’re blocking us from key markets in your country, you’re keeping us from being able to compete fairly. We don’t want any special advantages. We just want it to be a little bit more of a level playing field.
But then on top of that, they’re effectively raiding the U.S. Treasury to pay for the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines they won’t pay for themselves.
Then what good are they?
The truth is, Canadian industry sells to the United States market. If we cut them off from that, good luck. Europe is not going to build factories in Canada to supply Europe.
Cary Dunst: A lot to explore here. I wanted to ask you about Chinese autos undermining the auto industry for both countries. We’re going to have to pick that one up next time. Rod D. Martin, thanks for joining.
Rod D. Martin: Take care.
