A collective sigh of relief across Canada Monday afternoon, after Justin Trudeau and Donald Trump spoke and made a deal to delay trade tariffs.
It came after weeks of friendly lobbying from Alberta’s Premier Danielle Smith.
So, who gets credit for the delay?
“Obviously, I have some allegiance to the premier of this fine province. I think she’s done tremendous work there,” said Nathan Neudorf, Alberta Affordability & Utilities Minister.
Neudord even gave the Liberal Prime Minister some kudos for beefing up border security and committing to increase defence spending.
“A little bit of credit all the way around,” said Neudorf.
Debate over what convinced Trump to change his mind at the last minute — considering some of Trudeau’s promises were already announced — erupted on social media.
Tom Vernon with Crestview Strategy says, “The one main rule of politicians is when something goes right, they’re going to take credit and when something goes wrong, they’re going to heap blame somewhere else. So we’re seeing people taking credit across the board and people saying no it’s this side, not this side.”
Vernon says Alberta and its Premier have launched a lobbying effort in the states at a level he can’t recall seeing before, but whether it’s working or not is very hard to prove.
“I do think there is value in her having these conversations. Look, I don’t think she’s going to influence the president directly. I know she had that meeting and that conversation with him. I don’t think that conversation has anything to do with what happened when it comes to the delaying of the tactics,” said Vernon.
On the streets of Whyte Avenue, there is both relief that the tariffs are delayed and concern that the threat could become immediate again at any time.
“It’s uncertain. I don’t know what’s going to happen. So there’s a level of uncertainty in the air,” said one Edmontonian CityNews spoke to.
Another saying, “It is a worry and for sure we should be buying Canadian goods at this time.”
So what are Alberta’s next steps?
Well, three cabinet ministers, including Neudorf, will be in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday to lobby lawmakers at the national prayer breakfast.
“I’m in this position to serve Albertans and Alberta’s best interest is to make sure these trade tariffs never come into existence. Everything I can do to help Alberta’s position in that, I should do,” Neudorf explained.
Neudorf says he already had meetings scheduled about utilities, so he combined those with the prayer breakfast trip to save taxpayers some money.