Alec Salloum
Regina Leader-Post
Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe says Danielle Smith is “one of the strongest advocates we have in Canada right now.”
He made the comment to reporters Thursday morning, ahead of the Alberta premier attending a PragerU fundraiser in Florida Thursday evening with right-wing U.S. influencer Ben Shapiro, who has called Canada a “silly country” and has spoken about annexing it as the 51st state.
Smith’s appearance and Moe’s comments come amid the ongoing Canada-U.S. trade war, heightened by the threat of even more tariffs as of April 2.
Smith was under fire earlier this week for comments she made on a Breitbart podcast. She said in her trade missions south, she urged Trump officials to put tariffs on pause, as the levies were helping the Liberal party to the detriment of the Conservatives.
“It’s actually caused an increase in the support for the Liberals,” Smith told Breitbart of the tariffs.
“What I fear is that the longer this dispute goes on, politicians posture, and it seems to be benefiting the Liberals … I’ve told (Trump) administration officials: ‘Let’s just put things on pause so we can get through an election.’”
Moe said on Thursday morning that Smith has likely “taken a similar approach” to what he has done, “using the contacts that you have, whoever they might be, to advocate and to educate on just how integrated our economy is.
“I commend not only Premier Smith, but all premiers that are doing their level best to engage with the contacts that we have,” said Moe.
Calls to cancel
It’s been a hot topic on the floor of Alberta’s legislative assembly, with Smith taking to her feet to decry the notion that what she did amounted to treason.
“Why won’t the Premier admit that it was wrong to call for foreign interference in Canada’s election?” asked NDP MLA Christina Gray on Tuesday from the floor of the Alberta legislative assembly.
Smith said in response that asking for officials not to interfere “is the very opposite of interference.”
On Wednesday, speaking from the floor of the Alberta legislative assembly, she said premiers were previously encouraged to reach out to people south of the border to try and remove tariffs. She claims that changed after Mark Carney became Prime Minister.
“Now all of a sudden it’s apparently treason to talk to American media personalities that we disagree with. It is disloyal to try and persuade high-profile Republicans holding influence with the President to abandon his tariff policies on Canada,” she said.
Alberta’s Opposition NDP has for weeks called on the United Conservative premier to cancel her appearance in Florida, saying Smith is using taxpayer money to fundraise for an extremist, Islamophobic organization that denies the history of American slavery.
–with files from The Canadian Press
alsalloum@postmedia.com
