Trending Now
We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
{{ subpage.title }}
The $Trump meme coin together with Bitcoin and crypto coins, seen in this photo illustration.
HARD NUMBERS: Trumpcoin takes flight, Canada’s deficits are here to stay, Snowbirds flee Florida, US slashes red tape for energy and mining
50: The value of $TRUMP surged by more than 50% on Wednesday after the cryptocurrency’s issuer said President Donald Trump would have dinner with the top 220 holders of the meme coin next month. The top 25 holders of $TRUMP would get a special pre-dinner reception and VIP tour of the White House.
62.3 and 31.4: No matter which of Canada’s largest parties wins the upcoming election, you can be sure of one thing: Deficits are here to stay. The Liberals’ spending plans foresee a deficit of $62.3 billion this year, falling to about $48 billion by the end of the decade. The Conservatives see a deficit of $31.4 billion this year, falling to $14 billion over the same time frame.
25: The number of people locking in mortgage rates to buy second homes in the Tampa area of Florida fell 25% in the first quarter of this year. Experts say the drop is due largely to evaporating interest from Canadian “snowbirds” put off by the Trump administration’s attacks on Canada and its tighter security restrictions on foreigners.
28: It’s about to get easier to drill, baby, drill. The US Department of the Interior has implemented an emergency measure that caps approval times for energy and mining projects on federal lands at 28 days. Permitting for projects of this kind can normally take months or even years. Solar and wind projects are, notably, excluded from the new rules.
Trump's tariffs & the end of globalization
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: It is the day after 'Liberation Day,' April 2nd. I'm not sure that day is going to stick. It was good not to do on April 1st. Not only because it's April Fools, but also because you had a couple of key elections in the US, in Florida and in Wisconsin. And Trump clearly wanted to go after that because he knew that these weren't going to be super popular. And yet, this is exactly what he was promising.
He has been promising tariffs. He's been promising securing American borders, securing borders from people coming into the US illegally, also securing US borders from unfair trade practices. And that is precisely what we're seeing right now. Overnight, the United States is moving to having the highest tariffs against countries of any major economy in the world by a very long margin, and also the largest average trade tariff in over a hundred years.
This is a new era. It's a post globalization era. It's a post post-war era. It's kind of the equivalent of what the Brits did with Brexit just on a global scale. Now, why these tariffs and what's behind the percentages? Because Trump's been talking about reciprocal tariffs for a very long time, and yet these aren't reciprocal. There are no countries that have the percentage tariffs on the US that the US is now putting on them in terms of goods. So how did they do that? That's the extraordinary thing, is the calculation wasn't based on the tariffs that are imposed on US goods. Rather, it was a look at the trade deficit that the US runs against those countries and taking the percentage of what the trade deficit is and applying a tariff that would get you to parity. In other words, what reciprocal from Trump's perspective is whatever would actually bring that trade deficit into trade neutrality and then just impose half of that, which makes no sense economically whatsoever.
Why not? Well, first of all, because there are a lot of poor countries around the world that have trade deficits with the US because they can't afford American goods, and the US wants to buy commodities, for example, from those countries or low tech manufacturer like from Bangladesh. And are you angry because the Bengalis aren't capable of buying Teslas from the US or buying smartphones? And the answer is, of course not. And all that's going to be is a tax. The US government will pick up revenue and the Americans will have to pay more for inexpensive goods that the US isn't going to produce. Some cases, these are goods that the Americans not only wouldn't want to produce because the labor quality and cost is really, really low and no one's going to do that work, especially when you're closing borders and taking illegals out of the population. But also, because the US economy couldn't produce them.
I mean, your tropical fruits, I mean some of them can be in the United States, but most of them need to come from other places. Coffee beans, I mean all sorts of things that the Americans are just not going to be substitution effect producing that now are just going to be higher costs for the United States, for average Americans. And then in places where the US was not in deficit, then you're just throwing a 10% tariff against. Why? Is that about fair trade? No, that's just about the Americans wanting to ensure that there are tariffs on absolutely everyone. It reminds me of the January 6th conversation where originally Trump was talking about, "Well, maybe we've got to look more carefully at all the really violent types and we're not going to want to give them amnesty. But there are a lot of people that were treated very badly, very unfairly, and so they should have amnesty and they should be pardoned."
And as the details and the debates on who should and shouldn't get a pardon came out, Trump got sick of the debate, got sick of the nuance, and said, "I'm just giving it to everybody." And I think that's what happened with tariffs. There were debates going on with large numbers of advisors around Trump, right until the last minute and he just said, "Ah, I'm just putting tariffs on everybody." And that's what's happened. And now there will be individual deals that will be cut with a bunch of countries to try to get out of that. But the reality is that the biggest trade partners of the United States, there's no quick fix. Not with Europe, not with Mexico, not with Canada, not with China. And given that, we are clearly not only out of a US-driven globalization era... That's been gone for some time now. Globalization has been moving apace, but the US has not been driving it.
The US had been kind of standing on the sidelines and pushing their own industrial policy. But now you have the United States actively unwinding globalization. And the question will be how effective will other countries be in playing defense, in hedging, and in bringing some production, more production to the United States? Because in the near-term, you expect to see a lot of countries will try to limit the damage that's being done. And the US economy is, of course, stronger and more powerful. So that will mean that a lot of countries won't immediately do reciprocal tariffs, but will try to cut deals with the Americans. A lot of companies will try to find ways to manufacture more in the US. That's near-term.
In the medium and long-term, there will be hedging. There will be efforts to find ways to de-risk their economies from the United States, from the uncertainty, the volatility, the high costs. And sure, you'll want to produce things in the US for US consumers, but most things are not being consumed by Americans. And that is increasingly true around the world. And therefore you wouldn't want to produce most things in the US in that environment. So you'll see more hedging of the Europeans towards other countries, including in some non-AI fields towards China. And I think you'll see that in bigger ways in the Global South who already have their principal trade partners as China anyway.
And then final point is keep in mind that the Americans are not really good at being patient. And Trump has been talking the entire way, not one of the most patient people in the world that, "Look, I mean, yeah, they're going to be costing in the near-term, and I don't care if the cost of cars go up. But long-term, this is good for Americans." And certainly near-term there's going to be a significant economic hit, not just in the stock market, but also in US GDP and also in inflation. And Americans, I suspect are going to be pretty angry about that because Americans are very short-term in orientation. It's a nature of free market capitalism, kleptocratic or not in the US and it's also the nature of the political system.
So that's where we are. A lot to think about on the back of these unprecedented policy moves. And remember, it is a marathon, not a sprint. We are only a couple months in. Trump has four full years, and a lot is going to happen over the course of that administration. And I'll be here to talk to you about it. Thanks a lot, and I'll talk to you all real soon.
US travel warnings issued by its closest allies
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
Why are some countries issuing travel advisories for visiting the United States?
You'd call it an abundance of caution, but things are moving very quickly in the US. It's only been two months since Trump has been inaugurated. And many countries, allies of the US, feel that treatment of their citizens will not be aligned with rule of law in the United States. Certainly, worry given, for example, some green card holders facing deportation for what would be considered for an American citizen just exercise of freedom of speech, freedom of organization.
Also, they've seen what's happened with law firms and the chilling impact of Trump going after them if they are engaged in supporting lawsuits against the government. All of those things and a recognition that these are moving fast and getting more challenging quickly, quickly, quickly, is making a whole bunch of American allies issue travel advisories telling their citizens, "You shouldn't be traveling to the US right now." We've already seen a big economic impact of Canada tourism to the United States hurting the US economy. Haven't seen that as much from Europe yet, but I expect that you will. And of course, in terms of people that are applying for green cards and wanting to get jobs in top American corporations or apply to be students at top American universities, I think that's going to have a big impact going forward longer term.
How are the political tensions in Netanyahu's government impacting the war with Hamas?
Well, the fact that the far-right coalition is fully back together because the war has restarted. That's why the far-right party left, and that was because they didn't like the ceasefire and they certainly were opposed to phase two that would've led to the Israelis to do a full pullout of the military from Gaza. Well, now the war has restarted, the Israeli government is talking directly about annexation if the hostages are not all released. And they're doing that with full support of the United States. Big demonstrations in Israel, concerned that Israel is no longer going to be a democracy, especially because the prime minister has now sacked his Attorney General, has sacked the head of the Shin Bet, both unprecedented for Israel since independence. But Netanyahu has full support from his coalition and from the United States. So, he's in a strong position right now.
Will public outcry over the arrest of Istanbul's mayor lead to major political reforms or shifts within the Turkish government?
I don't expect so at all. They are allowing for large demonstrations to continue in Istanbul, even though President Erdogan has said that's illegal, in part because there's a lot of media there. There's a lot of focus there. They clearly want to limit that violence. But they've been cracking down really hard everywhere else in the country, including the capital, Ankara. They've dealt with this sort of thing in the past. The military is fully aligned with Erdogan, and the top is quite politicized. Media, dido, overwhelmingly aligned with the state. So is the judiciary after the failed coup attempt.
So for all of those reasons, I think this is going to be a move from Erdogan towards a more direct autocracy as opposed to a hybrid system. Unfortunate and yet one more place where the Europeans are in trouble. But nonetheless he's been quite useful to a number of other countries around the world in terms of dealing with refugees from Syria. If you're the Europeans, dealing with Turkey on the ground, dealing with Syria on the ground, and stability if you're the United States. And the Gulf States have found him useful as an interlocutor as well on Russia-Ukraine too. So for all of those reasons, very important internationally, very repressive domestically. Two things I expect to continue.
Trade war may push Canada closer to its threatening ally
When Canadian defense expert Philippe Lagassé met with American counterparts in Washington this week, he quickly sensed they had not registered that the mood had shifted in Canada.
“There’s still a lot of emphasis on partnership,” he said. “We should be working together. We should be doing some things together.”
But Lagassé, an associate professor at Ottawa’s Carleton University, had to tell them that things had changed. “That’s hard right now because, politically, that’s just become a lot more difficult.”
Canadians were so angered by Donald Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats that they yanked American bourbon from liquor stores and turned up their noses at American produce. The typically staid hockey fans of Ottawa even booed the US national anthem.
Canadians, who are used to thinking of the Americans as friendly neighbors, are suddenly seeing them as a threat to their sovereignty. A poll this week shows 80% of Canadians support using oil as a weapon in the trade dispute, which would be a dramatic escalation. On Monday, Trump called off the planned 25% tariffs after Justin Trudeau agreed to take measures on the border, but the pause is for just 30 days.
Rattled Canadians are suddenly more committed to enhancing their sovereignty by reducing internal trade barriers, diversifying international trade so the country is less dependent on the United States, and beefing up the military.
Long a NATO laggard
It will need a lot of beef. For decades, Canada has sheltered under the coattails of Uncle Sam.
With oceans on both sides, an impassable ice cap to the north and friendly Americans to the south, there was little public support for military spending and lots of support for spending money on social programs. Even tough-talking Conservative Stephen Harper did little to boost defense spending. Canada is a NATO laggard, spending only 1.37% of GDP on defense — the average across NATO members is 2.71% of GDP — something Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and Trump have all complained about. Last year, leaked documents showed that Trudeau told NATO that Canada had no plan to get to 2%, the level all NATO countries have agreed on.
When political circumstances changed, Trudeau laid out a plan to get to 2%, but years of neglect will take time to turn around. Due to recruiting problems, there are only 63,000 people in the Canadian Armed Forces — well below the 71,500 it is supposed to have. Even at full strength, it is tiny compared with the 2 million troops south of the border. To make matters worse, three-quarters of Canadian soldiers are either overweight or obese.
Canada has summoned the will, finally, to spend on defense. Trudeau has promised to reach 2% by 2032. His likely successor, Mark Carney, said Wednesday he would aim for 2030. The defense minister has said we could get there within two years, although quickly rearming would pose logistical challenges.
But it is not clear if Canada's big push will be in partnership with its newly hostile neighbors. After all, if the United States decides to put tariffs on all Canadian exports, driving the country into a deep recession, would Canada want to proceed with the CA$70-billion purchase of 88 F-35A US fighter jets? Or would Ottawa cancel the order and buy fighters from Sweden, which has never threatened annexation? And if Canada’s economy is in free fall, could it afford to buy either?
Pentagon control
And should Canada buy kit from a hostile power? Canada’s military technology is integrated with America’s, so any operations without US approval would be complicated. The F-35 can’t function without its autonomic logistics information system, which is controlled by the Pentagon, which could limit its effectiveness in a showdown with America.
There may be pressure, therefore, to work more closely with other countries — to buy equipment from the Europeans, for example — although the natural inclination of the defense community in Ottawa is to stick with the Americans, whom they see as their friendly big brothers.
“I think there’s going to be a pretty heavy emphasis on the fact that you take Trump at his word, so you buy more American equipment, and you invest more in the US,” says Lagassé. “You try to integrate yourself more deeply into those supply chains, and that’s how you protect yourself. The other side is going to argue, well, now this is too vulnerable. We should try to become less dependent, take a step back.”
Not a lot of choices
But Canadians are limited in their options, says Graeme Thompson, an analyst with Eurasia Group, because at the forefront of military innovation with AI and advanced computing, there are only two real options: China and the US.
“There’s the Chinese ecosystem and there’s the American ecosystem, and basically Canada doesn’t have a choice there. It’s not going to be able to develop its own autonomous tech ecosystem or supply chains. It has to be plugged into the US side of things. There’s a great line, I don’t know who said it, but ‘the US is our best friend, whether we like it or not.’”
Canadians may want their government to do more to assert national sovereignty, but Lagassé doubts that sentiment is strong enough to disrupt the close military cooperation between Canada and the United States.
“The public may want us to do something differently, but … is the public willing to sustain the cost? Is the public’s attention going to be sufficiently focused so that political leaders see gain in pursuing that? Or does it just kind of evaporate once the tariff threat is no longer present?”
Once tempers cool, Canadian politicians will continue to use procurement deals as a way of currying favor with the Americans rather than a way of asserting independence. After all, they are Canada’s best friends, whether they like it or not.
Conservative Party of Canada leader Pierre Poilievre speaks in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, on Dec. 3, 2024.
Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre goes after fentanyl
Poilievre, who often blames Trudeau for soft-on-crime policies, said he would introduce mandatory life sentences for fentanyl traffickers. “I will lock up fentanyl kingpins and throw away the key. It's like spraying bullets into a crowd — even if you don’t aim, you will kill people. The penalty should be the same as murder.”
Canadian courts have often ruled that mandatory life sentences for any crime violate the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, but Poilievre has said he would override the courts if necessary to get tough on crime.
The proposal comes as the Conservatives search for new messages to use against the governing Liberals. The party has been connecting with voters for two years by launching attacks against Trudeau and the unpopular consumer carbon tax. But Trudeau has announced that he is resigning and his likely successor, former central banker Mark Carney, has promised to get rid of that tax.
The polls have tightened slightly after many months of downward motion for the Liberals, and they are still moving. A poll of Quebecers shows many have suddenly decided to shift their support to the Liberals, and more would do so if Carney is leader.
Expect Poilievre to talk about crime and find new ways to talk about the cost of living, and keep an eye on volatile public opinion.
Why is Trump starting a trade war with Canada?
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: A Quick Take on the US-Canada relationship, which, right now, is on ice. And I don't mean the hockey kind. Trump, the tariff-man, cometh. Some 25% across the board on Canada, on Mexico too, except on Canadian oil, that's only 10%. Why? Why 10% on oil? Because that's actually what makes up Canada's surplus with the United States. So, wouldn't you actually hit that sector harder if you were trying to balance the budget? And the answer is, of course, no. That's like saying Canada's a friend and China's an enemy, and so wouldn't you hit the Chinese harder than the Canadians instead of the Chinese only 10%, the Canadians 25%, Mexico 25%, but that's also not the case. Why? Because China can cause a lot more damage to the United States. And so therefore, President Trump has to be more careful. Canada, Mexico, a lot smaller, much easier to punch down against the Canadians, even if it's technically punching up, given where they sit geographically. And except for oil, where the United States gets 4 million barrels a day, which is much more than the US gets from the rest of the world combined. And that quality of crude, only replaceable in terms of the kind of crude it is from Venezuela with massive sanctions and run by a dictator, and they've destroyed much of their own oil sector, so that's not a capability, which means that the Canadians can't send it anywhere else, the Americans can't buy it anywhere else, but the US is more powerful, so Trump thinks he can get away with it.
So, why? If it's not about oil and it's not really about the trade surplus, then why is it that Trump is doing this? What he says, is it's about fentanyl and illegal migrants, that the Canadians are not policing their border. Again, doesn't make a lot of sense. It makes more sense for Mexico, and again, there's a big question about whether the smartest thing to do is, you know, shoot first and ask questions later, or negotiate credibly first and not undermine the economies, the much weaker economies of your friends. But when it comes to Canada, the argument doesn't make sense at all. Fentanyl, we're talking about on average every year about 10 kilos of fentanyl that is interdicted at the border, which is, by the way, that's every year from Canada. That's less than what you see in Mexico every day. So, it's way under 1% of the total.
Illegal migrants, it's a larger problem from Canada. Here you're talking about roughly 5% of the interdiction on the northern border of illegals coming into the United States compared to 80% from Mexico, and the remainder mostly by sea and occasional air transit. And yes, I'm talking about what is being stopped, not what's getting through, which you can't measure as easily, but it's not like Homeland Security isn't tracking where illegal migrants are actually coming from. And this is not anywhere close to the issue from Canada than it is from Mexico. But that's not really the issue here either because national security issues are more likely to hold up as legal reasons for the US president to invoke IEEPA, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. And so, if you're worried that the court's going to strike down your tariffs because you don't actually have the law behind you, this is the way you couch it.
And also, Trump doesn't really care what arguments he's using. It's to show that he can't and to get his supporters to go with him to make better deals for the US no matter what. But the timing here is strategically horrible for Trump. Canada is at the beginning of an election, and this from Trump is remarkably unifying for the Canadians. Using fake news to justify a trade war and then leaning in to say that Canada can join as a 51st state if they want. Now, there are plenty of Canadians that over the last eight years have supported Trump. Remember the trucker strike, for example. I mean, I certainly see it and I hear it on my trips there, but these are not America First, Canadians. These are Canada First, Canadians, and they don't want the Canadians to fold to Trump. In fact, the only people that I hear saying quietly that they wish the Canadians would fold are the globalists.
They're the corporate and financial elites in Canada that just really want this to go away because it's hurting their profits. And they're trying to find a way to say, "Well, just give him a win. It'll be okay." But I mean, in terms of the average Canadian, no, no, no, no, no, they want their political leaders, whether it's the Conservative Party or the Liberal Party, to stand up to Trump. And that's why you've seen in the last 24 hours, Liberal leaders, whether it's Trudeau, or it's Chrystia Freeland, or Mark Carney, who are the two that are contesting for the premiership, or it's Pierre Poilievre leading the conservative party, or Doug Ford, head of Ontario, who's also a major conservative leader in Canada, and they're all saying the same thing, which is they've got to stand up for Canada, to hit Trump back hard, that they can't take this laying down. And these are also the people that are booing the US National Anthem at hockey games across the country in Canada right now, which I have not seen happen in Canada, frankly, since the US war in Iraq.
I am not someone who opposes tariffs as a matter of course. I think that tariffs can be a useful tool of economic and national security influence. They can help to deal with national security concerns. They can help nudge rebalancing of economies for domestic reasons that matter politically. And we saw some of that during Trump's first term. We saw some of that during Biden's term. But for Trump's first term, he then had strong economic voices internally that were also moderating his behavior, that stopped fights from becoming long-term destructive. People like Robert Lighthizer, who was the US trade rep. Jared Kushner, who was a senior advisor, had a lot of access and influence of course to his father-in-law. Steve Mnuchin, the Secretary of Treasury. That's not remotely the case this time around. That's not what you're seeing from Treasury Secretary Bessent or from Commerce Secretary Lutnick. Much, much weaker, much more divided forces internally.
So instead, you are taking on America's closest friend, most trusted ally, not to mention critically integrated economy with the United States, and you are hitting them in the teeth harder than you are hitting anyone else. And I would argue that this is a big mistake, long-term, for the United States and frankly for everyone but America's adversaries, who will take advantage of weakness of US allies that have been historically very strong, and that have been harder for adversaries to deal with.
So what is it that the United States stands for? And I go back, I think when I was a kid and when I was starting my studies, 1989, Wall comes down, and around the world, people saw that, and they weren't all pro-American, not by a long stretch, but they would still stay that the United States had values, that it was trying to stand for freedom and liberty and a free market economy. Not always consistently, but nonetheless, the general sense that that was something that the United States wanted to be seen as promoting. And today, you go to Canada, or you go to Denmark, or you go to Panama, or you go to Japan, or South Korea, the European Union, you name it, and you ask people what America stands for, and they say, "Power," and they say, "Money," and they specifically say, "Pay for play." And that is penny-wise and pound-foolish for the United States.
And I don't know how US Canada is going to ultimately resolve itself. I don't think it's going to be resolved quickly. I think there will be a lot of economic pain on both sides, a lot more for the Canadians than the Americans because they're in a weaker position, but sooner or later, I think economic interest on both sides will lead to a deal. And I think, I expect that this is not going to lead to a permanent trade war between the Americans and the Canadians, but you would have to go back to pre-war times to find a major country doing more than the US is doing right now, and President Trump is doing right now, to undermine America's closest alliances. That is what's happening here. And I think long-term, this is really not in the interest of the United States, in the interest the American people, and it's certainly not in the interest of having a sustainable and stable world.
So that's it for me. I'll talk to you all real soon and be good.
Putin makes a stunning accusation at Trump
Putin doesn’t like that Trump is copying his style. So he does what anyone would do ... invade Canada. #PUPPETREGIME
Watch more of GZERO's award-winning PUPPET REGIME series!
Canada's fight with India over Sikh assassination heats up again
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
What is the role of the United Nations in the Israel-Gaza war?
Well, it's actually quite a few roles. One, the General Assembly and the Security Council are principle places where you get to see how the various countries around the world respond to the war, what their political positioning is, so the comparative isolation of the United States on the Security Council, for example, what countries do, don't stand with Israel, the Palestinians of the 194 member states around the world? Secondly, the UN is the principal organization that delivers humanitarian aid on the ground in Gaza, staffed overwhelmingly by Palestinians, thousands of them. That's been controversial because a number, something like seven or eight, have been found to have been involved in the support for the attacks on October 7th, the terrorist attacks. And then, finally, you have UN peacekeepers, thousands of them, on the ground in southern Lebanon, with many countries around the world participating. That's the Security Council that's responsible for that but has not been particularly effective at ensuring that the Security Council resolutions, creating a buffer zone, pushing Hezbollah back, and not allowing them to strike Israel, have actually been implemented. So lots of places that they have a role, you learn a lot about the world as a consequence, but it's not like they have a lot of power or a lot of money.
Why did Canada expel Indian diplomats?
Well, it's a fight that's been going on for over a year now with the assassination of this Sikh terrorist that India was found to be behind on sovereign Canadian territory. There had been a conversation between Modi and Trudeau on the sidelines of recent G20 Summit. It looked like facilitated by the United States, that that relationship was improving. It has fallen apart again. One of the things, I mean, there's more information that's come out in Canada about what India's role has been interfering with Canadian politics and citizens, but also the fact that Trudeau is in really tough shape domestically. He's thinking that a fight with India right now may help him in terms of popularity. I don't think it's going to work, but that certainly is not irrelevant.
How important is Elon Musk in the US election?
I don't think he's very important to the outcome. Obviously, Twitter/X is significantly oriented towards the right in terms of both Elon and what's being algorithmically promoted, but it's a lot smaller for US citizens than TikTok, which is younger and is more focused to the extent there's a political slant on the left. So if you ask me, which is going to matter more? I suspect TikTok will bring out more voters than Twitter/X, will. I think you on, is important in the election because he has personally done so much to promote disinformation, and it's making it harder for the average American to know what they can trust, what's a trusted source of media, what's a trusted source of information, what they should believe around vaccines, around FEMA response to a hurricane, around whether or not the election is free and fair. And I'm worried deeply that there's much greater likelihood of violence in the United States on the back of his personal decision of how to run Twitter/X than there would've been otherwise. We'll be focused on this very closely.