Canadian official Dominic LeBlanc on Wednesday criticized President-elect Trump’s “51st state” remarks, saying they were no longer funny.
“The joke is over,” LeBlanc, Canada’s finance and intergovernmental affairs minister said. “It’s a way for him, I think, to sow confusion, to agitate people, to create chaos knowing this will never happen.”
“It’s becoming very counterproductive,” LeBlanc added.
Trump has recently suggested a U.S-Canada merger, saying it should “become the 51st state.” On Tuesday, the president-elect said he intended to use “economic force” against Canada to annex it.
“Because Canada and the United States, that would really be something. You get rid of that artificially drawn line, and you take a look at what that looks like, and it would also be much better for national security,” Trump said at a press conference.
The president-elect expressed his frustration at the press conference that the U.S. spent “hundreds of billions” in dollars to protect Canada amid a trade deficit.
Late last month, Canadian Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre said that his “message to incoming President Trump is that first and foremost, Canada will never be the 51st state of the U.S.”
Trump has also been recently targeting Greenland and the Panama Canal for possible U.S. expansion. His son, Donald Trump Jr., made a visit to Greenland earlier this week amid his father’s interest in acquiring the island.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
