U.S. President Donald Trump accused Canada of spreading smoke from wildfires into the United States and said he wants to add the costs associated with air pollution to existing tariffs on Canadian goods. Reuters reports, writes UNN.
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On Friday, Trump said he holds Canada responsible for improper forest management, causing thick smoke from hundreds of fires to blanket parts of U.S. states from the Midwest to the Northeast.
We hold Canada responsible for improperly managing their forests... The United States is suffering an unjustified invasion of dirty, polluted, and unhealthy air
The U.S. president also said that "the costs of this pollution must be added to the tariffs Canada is currently paying" and announced his intention to discuss the situation with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.
Canada responds to accusations
Canada's Minister of Emergency Preparedness and Community Resilience, Eleanor Olszewski, said that since 2020, the government has invested 12 billion Canadian dollars in increasing forest resilience and fire prevention. She also emphasized the long-standing cooperation between Canada and the U.S. in fighting wildfires on both sides of the border.
According to climatologists, large-scale fires in Canada are becoming more frequent due to hotter and drier weather conditions associated with climate change.
Reuters notes that this year, the most fires are raging in the northwest of the province of Ontario, where about 650,000 acres have already burned, and thousands of people have been forced to evacuate. At the same time, in the U.S., the area of land affected by fires in 2026 also exceeds the average for the last decade.