U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order that he said would have the U.S. refer to Lake Ontario as “Lake America” “effective immediately,” his latest shot at Canada after trade talks fell apart last week.
Trump, speaking in the Oval Office after signing the order, took the opportunity to once again criticize Canada’s trade policies and leadership but insisted he loves the country and that renaming Lake Ontario was not about sending a message.
“No message,” he told reporters. “As you know, Canada has been ripping us off for a long time on trade, very sadly. Even the military — you know, we defend Canada for nothing, we don’t get anything.
“They’re not a state, but they want to be treated like they’re a state. And so we just can’t do that anymore,” he added. “We love the people of Canada. I don’t think their representatives do an appropriate job. Maybe they’ll change, I really don’t know. It doesn’t make much difference.”
The U.S. president equated the move to his order for the U.S. to call the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” last year — a move that has not been recognized by the rest of the world. Even U.S.-based Google has opted to put the “Gulf of America” name in parenthesis after the original name in Google Maps.
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Experts have told Global News that Canada and the rest of the world are under no obligation to recognize Trump’s order, noting the name Lake Ontario appeared on maps more than a century before the U.S. declared independence and long before there was a province called Ontario.
Trump said Tuesday the United States is giving “serious consideration” to changing the name of Lake Ontario as relations with Canada, and particularly Ontario, sour. He later posted a graphic depicting the Great Lake under the proposed “Lake America” name.
The move came after Ontario Premier Doug Ford lashed out at Trump over his new 50 per cent tariffs on Canadian goods and the collapse of trade talks, calling the U.S. president a “loser,” a “bully” and a “dictator.”
“The lake change, ‘Lake of America,’ is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time, actually,” Trump said Thursday. “As you know, we took something called the Gulf of Mexico, we changed it, and now it’s very routinely the Gulf of America.
“If you think about it, we have a gulf, we have a lake, now all we need is an ocean. So maybe we’ll have to change the name of the Atlantic and/or the Pacific. Maybe we’ll change them both.”
Asked why he was taking such actions against American allies rather than its adversaries, Trump replied: “Well they haven’t treated us very well,” referring to Canadian government officials.
“They’re nasty people,” he said, adding they’re “the worst to deal with on trade” and “feel entitled.”
Trump’s executive order says the U.S. lays claims to most of the volume of Lake Ontario and is mostly responsible for its security, economic activity and environmental stewardship.
“The United States has invested nearly $4 billion in protecting the Great Lakes freshwater ecosystem in the last decade, while Canada has invested far less in similar initiatives over the same period,” the document says.
“The Lake will continue to play a pivotal role in shaping America’s future and the global economy. In recognition of this flourishing economic resource and its critical importance to our Nation’s economy and its people, I am directing that the Lake officially be renamed as Lake America.”
The order directs U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to work with the Board on Geographic Names to ensure all U.S. federal government references to Lake Ontario, “including on executive department and agency maps, contracts, and other documents and communications,” reflect Trump’s name change.
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