President Donald Trump on Wednesday said Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau seeks to ink a trade deal with the United States, which has been negotiating a deal with Mexico to update the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
Speaking in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, Trump received a barrage of questions from reporters and chose to answer one about whether he had spoken to Trudeau.
"Yes, I spoke to him yesterday; we had a very good talk," Trumps said. "I spoke to him a couple of times."
The reporter also asked about what kind of deal they might have at the end of the week, the deadline Trump set for renegotiating NAFTA. Trump said "we’ll see" and indicated Trudeau had initiated the conversation.
"Hey, he called me; I didn’t call him," Trump said.
"He was very nice, couldn't have been nicer," Trump added. "We’ll see what happens."
Trump announced Monday a preliminary trade deal with Mexico to replace NAFTA, which he has called "one of the worst deals anybody in history has ever entered into." Trudeau said Wednesday he may be able to reach a deal for Canada, and Trump was quick to say he loves the northern neighbor.
"I love Canada, and you know what? I love Mexico too," Trump told reporters.
"Which one do you love better?" a reporter asked.
"I like them both the same," Trump said with a smile, and those in the room laughed.
With such a large portion of Canadian exports going to the U.S., it’s a top priority for Trudeau to have a trade deal in place. Trump has said he wants to establish a deal with Canada that is "fair" to American interests, and his criticism of NAFTA has annoyed Trudeau as well as free-trade supporters in the U.S.
"Right now we call it the U.S.-Mexico trade agreement, and we’ll see whether or not Canada gets into it," Trump also said Wednesday, in the Oval Office. "I think it’s probably not going to be good at all if they don’t."