Trump Says Canada ‘Voted in Favor of Doing Business With China’ | China in Focus

Welcome to China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. Our top story. President Trump says Canada is against the Golden Dome built over Greenland after revoking Canada's invitation to join the Board of Peace. So is closer alignment with China worth it for Canada? The U.S. officially leaving the World Health Organization. Why this matters and what it means for the U.S. and for the future of the WHO. The TikTok deal has been sealed. It is now majority owned by American companies. Is the app with its 200 million American users secure? And Danish troops have landed in Greenland for Arctic endurance training skills following a stern warning from President Trump to NATO allies to increase military presence in the region. A shift in a key three-way relations Canada has been improving its ties with China. That's as its tensions with the U.S. escalate. Are trade deals with China enough to offset a potential fallout with the U.S.? We'll get to that later in the story. Starting off on Friday, President Trump said Canada is against the Golden Dome being built over Greenland, even though it would also protect Canada. Instead, Carney voted in favor of doing business with China. This comes a day after Trump pulled his invitation for Canada to join the Board of Peace. It's a new organization Trump established to resolve global conflicts. He says it might replace the United Nations down the road. In a Truth Social post, Trump wrote, Dear Prime Minister Carney, please let this letter serve to represent that the Board of Peace is withdrawing its invitation to you regarding Canada joining. Last week, Carney said he planned to join the board. The rift comes after Carney saw closer ties with China by signing trade deals and taking a swipe at the U.S. Great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons. Tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited. You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration when integration becomes the source of your subordination. Here's Trump's response. Canada gets a lot of freebies from us, by the way. They should be grateful also, but they're not. Canada lives because of the United States. Remember that, Mark, the next time you make your statements. And Carney not backing down. Canada and the United States have built a remarkable partnership in the economy, in security, and in rich cultural exchange. But Canada doesn't live because of the United States. The U.S. Trade Representative says 75 percent of Canada's GDP is dependent on trade with the U.S. There's a bigger deal that could be at stake. On Thursday, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said that if Carney continues opening markets to China and importing Chinese electric cars, he might weaken Carney's negotiating position. This comes ahead of the upcoming review of the U.S. MCA. The trade agreement is critical for Canada since it protects most of Canada's exports from Trump's tariff hikes. Do you think the president of the United States is going to say you should keep having the second best deal in the world? I mean, you guys are such great friends. Lutnick says Carney's deal with China is, quote, the silliest thing I've ever seen. He stressed that China wouldn't open its economy to exports from Canada. Over 75 percent of Canada's exports goes to the U.S., while only 5 percent goes to China. Under the new trade deal, China would lower tariffs on Canadian canola and other agricultural products. And in return, Canada will allow China to export 49,000 EVs under very low tariffs. Any Chinese EVs imported beyond that threshold will face 100 percent tariffs. Ontario's premier criticized Carney's deal with China, warning it could affect Canada's access to American markets if the U.S. sees Canada as a backdoor for cheap Chinese imports. In addition, Carney announced a new strategic partnership with China, telling Chinese leader Xi Jinping that a new world order had come. Casey Fleming, CEO of Black Ops Partners, said Canada is playing with the devil by cutting those trade deals. If you're trying to do partnerships and strategic partnerships with the CCP, you have to understand that animal. You have to understand their history, how they think, and what their ultimate goal is. And it's complete control and taking all freedom away from everyone and controlling everyone's lives to the propaganda, to the state that controls you. Fleming noted Canada's way down the road is concerning. The U.S. has officially quit the World Health Organization on Thursday. President Trump began the year-long withdrawal process on his first day back in office. He criticized the agency's handling of COVID and what he calls excessive influence from China. President Trump signed an executive order on his first day in office, starting the year-long process of withdrawing from the WHO. In the order, he restated his reasons for withdrawing the first time back in 2020, saying that the WHO mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic and had too much influence from its members like the Chinese Communist Party. Chinese officials ignored their reporting obligations to the World Health Organization and pressured the World Health Organization to mislead the world when the virus was first discovered by Chinese authorities. At the start of the pandemic, the WHO took China for its word when it said there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission of the coronavirus, thereby allowing outbound flights from China to continue while the CCP was locking down domestic travel at home. The entire time, China refused to allow outside investigators in. Trump also accused the WHO of helping China to mislead the world about the origins of the coronavirus pandemic, but the agency denies these allegations. I always said it came from Wuhan. It did come from Wuhan. President Trump also says that the agency demands disproportionately big payments from the U.S., compared to much larger countries like China. We were paying $500 million a year, and China was paying $37 million a year. Former President Joe Biden, upon taking office in 2021, immediately reversed the move and rejoined the WHO. First thing Biden did is go back into it. You know what he paid? More than $500 million. I made a deal at $37 million. I could have had $37 million. They were public about it. We'll give you the same deal that China has for $37 million. The exit could violate U.S. law, though, which requires the U.S. to pay about $260 million in outstanding fees before leaving. But a State Department spokesperson defended the decision on Thursday, saying the president paused all future U.S. funding to the WHO, and that Americans have already paid enough. The U.S. withdrawal from the WHO is forcing the agency to make major budget and workforce cuts, but the director general is seeing the bright side, saying it offers an opportunity. An opportunity for countries to transition away from aid dependency towards self-reliance. The WHO is just one of several United Nations-tied organizations that the U.S. has been withdrawing from over the past year. That includes the U.N. Human Rights Council, which allows notorious human rights abusers on it, like China and Cuba. Reporting from Washington, D.C., Jack Bradley, NTD News. To discuss the U.S. exit from the WHO, NTD's Dawn Ma spoke with Reggie Littlejohn, founder and president of Women's Rights Without Frontiers. Take a look. When the World Health Organization started following China's lead on COVID, I saw that they were installing a network of vaccine passports which would serve as the same platform as the China social credit system, which would put the entire world in a situation of mass surveillance and totalitarian control. They also mimicked China's lies, that there was no human-to-human transmission. They followed China's lead in terms of lockdowns, vaccine mandates, mask mandates. They basically botched the entire COVID response and arguably caused many, many lives all over the world. What they wanted for that is they were like, well, we didn't have enough power. They did these amendments to the international health regulations, this pandemic treaty to give themselves more power. It was time to get out. Trump cited the corruption of the Chinese Communist Party having an outsized influence on the World Health Organization. They botched COVID. Also, I would say this whole push towards digital IDs is something that is extremely dangerous. Then they have this new thing called the Pathogen Access and Benefit Sharing System, where they are encouraging countries instead of to quarantine off the deadly pathogens that they might find in their jungle or in their swamp, to send them to the World Health Organization. Then the World Health Organization will then farm them out to labs all over the world ostensibly to make vaccines. What this does is it greatly increases the chances of lab leaks and even bioterrorist attacks. There is no prohibition against gain of function in the pandemic treaty. I am absolutely jubilant that the United States now has officially withdrawn. I would encourage other countries to consider doing the same. You talk about China's influence in the WHO. Do you think public perception and world leaders' perception took a more critical view right after the pandemic and what you described about China's influence? I think that it became obvious to anyone who had eyes to see that China, for example, really restricted the way that the World Health Organization could even investigate whether this was a lab leak. China's line was, this is not a lab leak. It was the Wuhan wet market, pangolin or a bat. Then what the World Health Organization did is it shut, and also governments and social media, shut down people who disagreed with that, calling it misinformation and disinformation, when actually now it turns out that that is likely what happened. This is another problem with the World Health Organization that is similar to the Chinese Communist Party. The pandemic treaty requires governments to prevent misinformation and disinformation. It means you don't even censor it afterwards. You prevent it from coming out to begin with. This is very CCP-like and very dangerous for the world. So Reggie, the U.S. was the main funder of the WHO, contributing around 18% of its overall funding. What's going to happen for the organization without that money? Well, first of all, okay, so we withdrew our funding. That's a huge financial hit for them. Other organizations have stepped up. Some governments have stepped up, but they have not been able to replace the funding by the United States. What that would mean to me is that it signals to the World Health Organization that, in fact, the world does not value its services as much as they think it should. But the United States has said that we want to collaborate bilaterally with other countries. If a country wants to coordinate with us, I'm sure that we will help them, not through the WHO, but directly. So I don't think that we're just leaving the world in a state of pandemic unpreparedness but we just want to be able to direct our actions and our funding as a sovereign nation. Reggie, really great to speak with you today. Thank you for your time. Thank you. The TikTok deal finally reached TikTok's Chinese parent company ByteDance as it has finalized a deal to create a joint venture. It's majority American-owned and aims to keep U.S. user data out of Beijing's hands. The move lets TikTok avoid a potential U.S. ban on the app, which is used by more than 200 million Americans. But is this deal really secure? TikTok's Chinese parent company ByteDance says it has finalized a move to avoid a ban in the U.S. The deal will create a new majority American-owned joint venture aimed at protecting U.S. user data. It's a major step after years of scrutiny by President Donald Trump, who in 2020 unsuccessfully tried to ban the app over national security concerns. In a post on Thursday, Trump said he is, quote, so happy to have helped in saving TikTok. He also lauded the deal, thanking Chinese President Xi Jinping for, quote, working with us and ultimately approving the deal. The TikTok-USDS joint venture will be responsible for securing U.S. data and apps, and TikTok's recommendation algorithm. Under the agreement American and global investors will own 80.1% of the venture, while ByteDance keeps the rest. Tech giant Oracle private equity group SilverLake and Abu Dhabi-based MGX will serve as managing investors, each holding 15%. A White House official says both the U.S. and Chinese governments have approved the deal. The venture will retain and secure TikTok's algorithm using only U.S. data, which will be secured on Oracle's cloud system. Reuters sources said last year that ByteDance would still own TikTok's U.S. operations, but that control of data, content and algorithms would shift to the new venture. Is TikTok now really secure? First, does ownership mean total control? Not always. TikTok's core technology and algorithms are still developed by ByteDance, a China-based company. Even though the joint venture will be responsible for securing TikTok's recommendation algorithm, the developer could still act maliciously. This risk remains unless the developer ByteDance, in this case, is trustworthy. Notably, data can be stored in the U.S., but engineers in China may still have indirect access through software updates or maintenance. On top of that, China's law requires Chinese-based companies to assist the government if requested. This policy does not change with a joint venture. NATO is strengthening its defenses. Danish troops are training near Greenland's capital after renewed global attention on the Arctic. It follows President Trump's comments about securing access to the territory to deter threats from China and Russia. Denmark says it has sent additional forces to Greenland as part of an exercise called Arctic Endurance, citing growing security concerns in the Arctic. Footage released by the Danish military shows troops in camouflage practicing live-fire drills outside the city of Nuuk. On Thursday, Trump said he secured permanent U.S. access to Greenland through a deal with NATO allies. The alliance's top military chief warned allies they must step up their Arctic presence to counter China and Russia. The announcement comes as Trump backed away from tariff threats against Europe and ruled out taking Greenland by force. The move eased tensions between the U.S. and its European allies. Coming up, Ukraine's president raised concerns that Taiwan's tech could be helping Russia's missile program. Taiwan is pushing back, but the island nation's president had to say. And is China preparing for a Taiwan contingency using fishing boats? Retired Marine Colonel Grant Newsham joins us to unpack China's recent deployment of thousands of fishing boats to the East China Sea and how that could complicate a U.S. response. More on that after the break here on China In Focus. Welcome back to China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. Taiwan's president is responding to allegations from Ukraine that Taiwanese-made components could be helping Russia's military. Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on Taiwanese companies to stop aiding Russia's missile production. Russia gets components from companies in Europe, the United States and Taiwan. Right now, many are investing instability around Taiwan to avoid war. But can Taiwanese companies stop contributing electronics to Russia's war? In a Friday interview, Taiwan's president reached out to Zelensky to provide evidence the island nation is aiding Russia against Ukraine. Lai Ching-de reiterated Taiwan's support for Ukraine, announcing plans to tighten controls on goods passing through other countries. Taiwan will also crack down on efforts to hide their final export destinations to prevent entry into Russia. Lai followed up in a social media post emphasizing Taiwan's commitment to humanitarian aid and sanctions against Russia. He also reiterated his wish for a peaceful end to the conflict soon. What message is China sending with its recent deployment of thousands of fishing boats to the East China Sea? How could that play into a Taiwan contingency and a U.S. response? Joining us to unpack all of this is retired Marine Colonel Grant Newsham. He's a senior fellow at the Center for Security Policy and author of When China Attacks. Grant Newsham, thank you so much for joining us. Great to have you back on the show. I'm always glad to be here. Now, China has deployed thousands of fishing boats recently, forming floating barriers that stretch about 200 miles long in the East China Sea. First, how are you reading this? What could China be practicing for here? Well, they're practicing using their sort of fishing fleet as a barrier, an obstacle for anyone who might try to get in and help Taiwan. They're also sending a message to the Japanese, as they've done before, actually, in 2014, 2016, saying that anytime we want, we can flood your territory with our fishing boats, say, the Senkaku Islands, parts of the Ryukyus, the Ogawasara Islands south of Japan, and there's nothing you can do about it. And they're sending a message. But what they have done is demonstrated an even higher degree of ability to weaponize their fishing fleet, to command and control it, put it where they want it. And this does cause a lot of problems for the United States Navy. You might think a fishing boat versus a U.S. Navy destroyer isn't much of a match, but when there's a couple thousand fishing boats out there, it makes life more challenging. Plus, there's a real usefulness for anti-submarine warfare. It makes it harder for submarines to operate in the region when you've got a lot of Chinese fishing boats out, and particularly when the Chinese put certain sensors and other hardware on them. I want to get to the U.S. part, but first, this scale this time seems kind of unprecedented. I know in the past, there's been hundreds, but maybe not thousands like we saw here. What do you see in terms of the timing of this? Why now? Well, it's just part of the larger intensification on the part of the Japanese, excuse me, of the Chinese, to use every resource they've got from their Navy to their Coast Guard, now to their maritime militia, the fishing fleet, put it all together, make it so that you can operate it in a coherent fashion and apply pressure. In this case, it's largely Taiwan that is the main target, but the Chinese are obviously looking farther afield. We've seen them operating similarly against the Philippines in recent years, and the Japanese, as I mentioned, are very much in the Chinese crosshairs. But the Chinese are indeed thinking very closely about how you prevent, say, an outside military, and they use the word external force, but they mean the Americans. How do you keep the Americans from getting in close to Taiwan? Having your fishing fleet weaponized like this is sort of one aspect of the strategy that the Chinese will employ. I want to dig into that potential gray zone warfare area that we're seeing there, because in terms of, say, a Taiwan contingency, if the U.S. is trying to come in, you're talking about how this is already going to embroil that. But there are some raising the concern that this would become a moral dilemma for the U.S., how do you see that aspect playing out? Well, it's as moral a dilemma as you want it to be. The Chinese are clearly not just skirting the edge of the law, they've gone well over it, and they are using this as a tool of their military that renders it a lawful target. And the Americans, however, and other Westerners, tend to tie themselves in knots when presented with this situation and say, oh, there's nothing we can do. Someday we need to wake up and say, we're not going to hold back. And that's always been one of the solutions to this, is to tell the Chinese, we look at this the same way we do the People's Liberation Army Navy, and we will defend ourselves. Now, it wasn't just these fishing boats, we also saw China flew a drone directly into Taiwan's airspace for the first time recently. What is China signaling with that move? Well, as I said, it's this intensification of move and pressure against Taiwan. And to see what the Taiwanese reaction is, see what the Western, the American reaction is to it all. Also, you're wearing down your opponent at the same time. And they're just getting so used to this gradually turning up the heat that you don't realize just how dangerous the situation is and how extreme the threat is. One thing I would like to go back, and when you talk about the fishing fleet, there's also a maritime militia, which has worked in with the fishing fleet. And these are parts of the People's Liberation Army Armed Forces. And they are sort of double-hulled, have stronger, more powerful engines, they're armed, often have surveillance equipment on them. And they function as sort of the muscle of the fishing fleet. So that's in there, mixed in there. And that makes it even more of a lawful target. But this is, once again, Chinese, very comprehensive strategy, that they've got to use every tool that their resources to overwhelm, just sort of overpower the opponents. Well, Grant Newsham, as always, thank you so much for joining us. Well, glad to be here. Thanks for having me. That's all for today's China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. If you have any feedback on the show, or have something you'd like to see us cover, send us an email at chinainfocusintd.com. We'd love to hear from you. For on-the-clock original news coverage, visit us at ntd.com or download our NTD app. Thanks for watching. See you soon.