New Brunswick’s premier is pausing retaliatory measures to U.S. tariffs but says her government remains ready with a response plan.
Susan Holt made the comments after U.S. President Donald Trump agreed to a 30-day pause on planned tariffs against Canadian imports.
“I’m glad our countries could work together as we have for decades and hope we can continue [to] make progress together over the coming weeks,” Holt said in a statement early Monday evening.
“We look forward to going to Washington next week to advocate on behalf of New Brunswick workers and businesses for a permanent removal of the tariffs.”
Earlier in the day, Holt unveiled what measures the New Brunswick government would take in response to tariffs from the United States.
She had directed NB Liquor to stop buying American alcohol and to remove their products from the shelves, noting they sell around $40 million worth of American alcohol products each year.
Holt said while American alcohol will now remain on the shelves, they will not be purchasing any new product for the time being.
She had also directed the public service to stop signing deals with United States companies, except for “critical services” that cannot be immediately replaced.
However, the premier said her government did not plan on cancelling existing deals like some other provinces had decided to do.
“One, there’s cancellation fees and costs to that. Two, there’s the disruption and the time to replace, and for certain critical services, we wouldn’t want to destabilize the economy more than these tariffs have already done,” she said.
“We’re going through the process of identifying which things that we would typically buy American or have in the past where we can transfer those purchases to Canadian companies or alternate companies and which things we can’t because those alternatives don’t exist.”
It was unclear how much of a financial impact that would have had on the United States, but Holt noted much of the government’s procurement is already from New Brunswick or Canadian companies.
The premier was also asked about withholding energy exports to the United States — something she said has been “a tool of last resort” for the federal government.
“It’s something that comes with a lot of negative impact for our province and our country, but obviously has a significant impact on the U.S. We’re not at that point yet and I do have some deep concerns about it,” she said.
Provincial departments were working with the federal government to finalize support programs for workers and entrepreneurs impacted by tariffs.
New Brunswick was also reviewing internal trade barriers to strengthen the Canadian economy in collaboration with federal, provincial and territorial governments.
“We would love to see New Brunswickers supporting New Brunswick and Canada at a time like this and that’s with their grocery dollars as well as with their tourism and their vacation purchases,” said Holt.
