WASHINGTON — Conservative MP Jamil Jivani’s mission to Washington met with some skepticism in Ottawa Wednesday after he said he wanted to help Prime Minister Mark Carney negotiate a trade deal with the United States.
When asked about the Bowmanville-Oshawa North MP’s trip to the U.S. capital to meet with political and business figures, Carney pointed out that Jivani is neither the minister for international trade nor the Conservative trade critic.
Carney said Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc did brief Jivani before his departure.
Jivani is a longtime friend of U.S. Vice-President JD Vance. In a video posted to social media Tuesday, the MP said he has “something to offer to help build bridges of communication between our two countries.”
Jivani said the Canada-U.S.-Mexico-Agreement on trade, known as CUSMA, is critical to the economy and “Conservatives and Liberals don’t need to fight over this at all.”
“The leader of the Conservative party Pierre Poilievre has said as much,” Jivani said in the video. “He has offered help from Conservatives to the Liberal government on this issue and I’m acting on that.”
The continental trade pact is up for review this year as Ottawa deals with a bilateral relationship upended by U.S. President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariff agenda and repeated annexation threats.
Canada-U.S. relations have swung wildly over the last year. Trump heaped praise on Carney and called him a “a world-class leader” when the prime minister visited the White House last fall.
More recently, in social media posts reacting to Carney’s trade outreach to China, Trump called the prime minister “governor” — an insult he used to direct at Carney’s predecessor Justin Trudeau — and threatened to impose massive new tariffs on Canada.
Trump increased tariffs on Canada to 35 per cent last August, but those duties don’t apply to goods compliant with CUSMA. The president’s sector-specific tariffs are slamming Canada’s automobile, steel, aluminum, lumber and cabinet industries, among others.
In the video, Jivani said he expects criticism from “frothing, elbow-waving anti-American activists” but he thinks Canadians want someone willing to “cut through all the posturing” to deliver results.
“That’s what a trade deal with the United States promises. It promises more stability so we can grow our economy and that our country can be strong and awesome and live up to its enormous potential,” he said.
“I think that’s all we all want. And that’s why I’m going to Washington.”
Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne told reporters in Ottawa that he has yet to see a Conservative act in a constructive manner, “despite what they say publicly.”
Industry Minister Mélanie Joly said she hopes Jivani speaks in the U.S. about the closure of an automobile plant in Ontario.
Trump has said he does not want vehicles made in Canada to be sold in the United States. Last week, General Motors cut the third shift at the Oshawa, Ont., plant that produces pickup trucks. It shut down production at its plant in Ingersoll, Ont., last year.
” (Jivani) represents people working at GM in his riding,” Joly said in Ottawa. She called on the MP to promote “the interest of the workers at GM that are facing … unjustifiable tariffs by the American administration.”
Jivani did mention General Motors employees in his video, saying their “lives have been turned upside down because of the economic uncertainty, the tariffs, and the lack of a good trade relationship with our biggest trading partner.”
A Team Canada approach is necessary, said Liberal MP Karina Gould. She said that as long as Jivani is not “going off on his own” and keeps in touch with the government, the government welcomes Conservatives’ “help with protecting Canada.”
“Freelancing — not the right thing to do right now,” she said. “But if we can all be working together, that’s absolutely the right thing to do.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 4, 2026.
Kelly Geraldine Malone, The Canadian Press
