Trump floats renaming Lake Ontario to Lake America amid Canada trade war

President Donald Trump has floated the idea of renaming Lake Ontario to Lake America as the trade dispute between the United States and Canada intensifies. Trump announced his consideration on his Truth Social platform Tuesday, linking the potential name change to the ongoing trade war.

"The United States is giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America in that we don’t expect to be doing much business with Ontario any longer," Trump wrote. This move echoes his previous suggestion to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.

“

The United States is giving serious consideration to changing the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America in that we don’t expect to be doing much business with Ontario any longer

Lake Ontario, one of North America's Great Lakes, borders both the Canadian province of Ontario and the U.S. state of New York. The trade war has seen the U.S. impose 50 percent tariffs on $20 billion of Canadian goods, affecting products like wine, furniture, and clothing.

Canada's Minister for U.S. Trade, Dominic LeBlanc, responded to the suggestion by stating that the Canadian government would not engage with social media posts from the U.S. administration. "We’ve decided as a federal government months ago not to respond to sort of the daily social media posts of either the president or his cabinet secretaries," LeBlanc said in an interview.

“

We’ve decided as a federal government months ago not to respond to sort of the daily social media posts of either the president or his cabinet secretaries