HOLD THE LINE

I Know Why You Must Never Surrender to TACO Trump: Politician

A one-time Canadian finance minister says shutting Trump down is as easy as one-two-three.

President Donald Trump will fold if you press the right buttons, says the one-time Canadian official he once dubbed “The Killer.”

Ex-Canadian Cabinet minister Chrystia Freeland tells The Daily Beast Podcast that she knows exactly how to make Trump throw in the towel when he gets too big for his britches.

“I think one of the reasons that Canada is united today in standing up to Donald Trump is, it’s not our first rodeo,” Freeland, 58, told the podcast. “We had a big confrontation in the first Trump administration, and it had a happy ending. And in that first Trump administration, it was a real team effort, and we developed a three-part playbook.”

The former minister of finance said the first part of the playbook was finding ways to collaborate, explaining that finding common ground with Trump helps gain his favor.

“Something that we knew mattered to the Trump administration was high-paying blue-collar jobs,” she told host Joanna Coles. “Matters to Canada, too. And we developed a novel clause—which is in the trade deal that we have that’s currently in force—to protect high-value jobs in North America.”

Next, she said, was to never back down to Trump—no matter what.

“We had a line that we repeated many, many times, which was. ‘We do not escalate, but we do not back down,’” Freeland said, referring to their dollar-for-dollar reciprocal tariffs on the U.S. in 2018. “I wish that that was a lesson that not only Canada had learned, but that all of America’s traditional partners had learned.”

She continued, “We don’t get to do history over, but I really believe that had we had a united allied response when the U.S. first imposed those illegal and unjustified tariffs in the spring of 2025, and had everyone retaliated together, I think you would have seen a very different Donald Trump after that.”

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“We see that when you meet him and respond, he backs down. Remember TACO: Trump Always Chickens Out,” she said. “But you have to stand up to him for that.”

The last element of the playbook was what Freeland called the “donut strategy.”

“It was a recognition that the president is one guy, but America is a vast country,” she said, adding that it was about having faith that the American people would be reasonable.

“They don’t actually want to have a fight with Canada,” Freeland said. “And we believed that if we explained to them what was happening, they would agree with us and they would pressure their president. That is what actually happened.”

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The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Freeland explained that a good sign the strategy is working is when the Trump administration signals it doesn’t like it—pointing to the U.S. Ambassador to Canada’s current attempt to keep Canadians from talking to Americans ahead of the midterms.

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She then cited an example of the donut strategy in action: Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s ad campaign last year, which used Ronald Reagan’s words to emphasize the pointlessness of protectionist tariffs.

“It drove President Trump absolutely nuts,” Freeland said, referring to the president’s subsequent meltdown. “To me, that shows it works, and the donut strategy really matters.”

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Vic VerbalaitisNight Breaking News Reporter

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