In April 2026, several widely-shared social media posts claimed Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said, "The United States — our neighbour, our largest trading partner, the country whose economy has been braided into ours for the better part of two centuries — is no longer an ally we can count on."
For example, one popular Facebook post featured a graphic including a photo of Carney and text that read:
Seeing Canadian PM Mark Carney address Canada from his living room and say that "The United States, our neighbor, our largest trading partner, the country whose economy has been braided into ours for the better part of two centuries, is no longer an ally we can count on," is such a gut punch of reality. I truly hate what trump has done to all our allies, and I hope someday we can earn back the trust of our neighbors to the north.
(Facebook)
In short, Carney did not produce the exact quote in question. The remark stems from a Substack article by political commentator Dean Blundell, who summarized a real address Carney gave. Given social media users falsely credited the comment to Carney, we have rated this quote an incorrect attribution.
Blundell's Substack article (archived) begins:
On Sunday morning, Mark Carney sat down in an Ottawa living room, looked into a camera, and said the quiet part out loud - in the most Canadian way possible.
The United States — our neighbour, our largest trading partner, the country whose economy has been braided into ours for the better part of two centuries — is no longer an ally we can count on. They are compromised by a conman. America is breaking, and yes, that special relationship isn't just over; it's a liability.
At no point in the article does Blundell say this is a verbatim quote from Carney.
It is true that on April 19, 2026, Carney posted a video address (archived) in which he said that because of the steep tariffs U.S. President Donald Trump has implemented, Canada's ties to the United States have become a weakness. "Many of our former strengths, based on our close ties to America, have become our weaknesses," he said (minute 1:24). He continued, "The U.S. has changed, and we must respond."
Carney went on to praise Canadian war heroes, for example those who staved off U.S. invasion in the War of 1812, and said that Canada can't control the "disruption" coming from its neighbors.
A Google News search (archived) for "Mark Carney" and key words from the alleged quote produced no examples of reputable news media outlets reporting on the Canadian prime minister saying those exact words anywhere else. If he had, it would have been newsworthy.
Trump has repeatedly threatened to "annex" Canada and make it a 51st state. As of October 2025, Canada's exports to the U.S. accounted for 67.3% of all the nation's exports, making it the lowest non-pandemic level since a new method of data calculation was established in 1997, according to Reuters.
Though Carney did announce a more explicit pivot from Canada's historic ties to the U.S. as a trading partner, he did not produce the quote circulating online.