Trump’s rebranding of Lake Ontario was just the beginning of multi-day effort to provoke Canada
Donald Trump sought to escalate his trade war with Canada on Sunday afternoon and issued a demand on Truth Social that Canadian companies wanting to do business with the U.S. reshore their headquarters within its borders.
His latest remarks come as Canadian officials warned that the country was prepared for an extended dispute with the U.S. after trade talks collapsed and Trump announced tariffs as high as 50 percent on some Canadian goods including dairy products and lumber. Canada has levied reciprocal tariffs against U.S. steel, aluminum and other exports.
On Sunday afternoon, the president said Canadian companies should move their headquarters and production facilities to avoid newly imposed tariffs. The duties are set to begin in 2027.
But they are in America, North America to be precise. I assume what is referring to is the US.
This comes up a lot these days, but it’s pretty standard in Canada and the USA to call the USA “America”. It’s not just a Trump thing, or even just an American (from the USA) thing.
In Canada we would never say we are in America. We would say we’re in North America, and maybe “The Americas”. But saying we’re in America would sound to us like you’re saying we’re part of the USA. And absolutely, without a doubt, we would not call ourselves “American”. That is 100% reserved for people from the USA.
So I understand where the rest of the world hears the word “America” being thrown around by, well, Americans for lack of a better term (USAers?) and thinks it’s weird, but in this context, saying Canada is in America is actually kind of insulting to us Canadians.
It’s particularly weird when speaking Spanish, where saying someone is Americano is often used for anyone from the Americas. But at least they have “estadounidense” (basically “united statesian” which I’ve never heard anyone say in English). But they also use “norteamericano” (North American) specifically for people from the USA. Ugh.
It’s not the rest of the world, it’s mostly down to a cultural difference between English speakers and Spanish/Portuguese speakers in South America.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent#Number
As you note, they have “estadounidense”, but that should theoretically also apply to Mexico. So they can claim all they want that Canadians are American while ignoring the logic that Mexicans aren’t USians, but there’s no single “right” way to do things when talking about language and culture.
OP I responded to looked like they were Aussie, and I feel like I’ve seen similar comments from other non-Spanish-speaking people, so it just feels like “the rest of the world” in general.
My point is that they seem to be trying to call out the US president for using “America”, but in the process are maybe making it awkward for Canadians.