Trump’s 51st state talk ‘almost never’ comes up in D.C.: Canada’s envoy

Ambassador Kirsten Hillman says her private conversations in Washington remain focused on building Canada's relationship with the new Trump administration.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated calls for Canada to become the 51st state aren’t being echoed by other Republicans in Washington, Canada’s ambassador to the U.S. says, though Trump’s allies aren’t disavowing the president’s rhetoric either.

Ambassador Kirsten Hillman says her private conversations with members of the Trump administration and lawmakers on Capitol Hill remain focused on building the Canada-U.S. relationship under Trump and showing progress on border security in order to avoid looming tariffs.

“For me here in Washington, (Canada’s sovereignty) almost never comes up in the substantive conversations that I’m having with the White House,” Hillman told Mercedes Stephenson in an interview that aired Sunday on The West Block.

“People aren’t going to be contradicting their president, of course, but it isn’t part of our everyday work that we’re working on.”

Trump has said he wants to use “economic force” to make Canada join the U.S., citing what he says is a massive imbalance in trade and security spending, among other issues.

His allies like former advisor Steve Bannon have said such talk is actually about pursuing hemispheric control to protect the Arctic and other economic corridors from great powers like China and Russia.

When the issue does come up, Hillman says she makes clear that Trump’s rhetoric “is not at all appreciated by Canadians, and it’s not at all constructive or conducive to actually leading to hemispheric security, to leading to a relationship whereby we are willing and very enthusiastic partners.”

“Republicans on the Hill … but also in the administration, I think that they see that,” she said.