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Front Burner Transcript for June 13, 2025

Guest Host: Allie Jaynes

ALLIE JAYNES: Hi, I'm Allie Jaynes, in for Jayme Poisson.

[Music: Theme]

AJ: You know who I feel bad for this morning? The person figuring out who stands where for the G7 family photo. Do you put Donald Trump next to Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who he recently berated in the Oval Office, or South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who he lectured about a non-existent white genocide in his country? Okay, probably not. Uh, maybe next to the NATO secretary general? No. Uh, okay. Leaders of France, Germany, Japan, all of who are dealing with tariff blowback. Probably not. Okay. Uh, Trump has said nice stuff about Mexico's Claudia Sheinbaum. Or maybe Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni? That could work. Anyway, you get the picture. Starting Sunday, political and economic representatives of a world order that Donald Trump is intent on shattering are gathering in Kananaskis in Alberta's Rocky Mountains. That on its own would be high stakes. But when you add to it Mark Carney's aggressive national to-do list, you've got two days that could show us how much Canada and the world have changed since Trump became president a second time. CBC’s senior writer Aaron Wherry is with me, and he's going to be travelling to Alberta to cover the event.

[Music: Theme]

AJ: Hello, Aaron.

AARON WHERRY: Hey.

AJ: Okay, so that stuff I mentioned off the top isn't even all of it. I mean, just to give one more example, Carney has invited India's Narendra Modi. Ottawa accused his government of playing a role in the 2023 murder of a Canadian citizen, Hardeep Singh Nijjar. So lots of tension in this group, I would say. So, you know, can we just start with like a general vibe check?

AARON WHERRY: Yeah, I think the vibe is, let's see how this works. I think in the pre-Trump era, particularly, it was easy to sort of discount these summits. And now it really does feel, for reasons we'll get into, like let's see how these two days go and, and what exactly happens and what exactly these leaders can possibly agree on.

AJ: Yeah, I mean, because I don't think that any of this, as you're saying, you know, this, this guest list would not be that consequential if it weren't for Donald Trump, right? I mean his actions since November have really scattered the deck for everyone who's attending. And we've heard a lot over the past few months about, like, countries establishing a new order that doesn't include the U.S. Or at least, you know, one where the U.S.'s role is majorly diminished. And so, do you think that that dynamic is gonna be at play here?

AARON WHERRY: I think we could see a bit of it. Usually these summits are about finding consensus on things and sort of laying out a resolution about where the collective seven leaders of the world's leading democracies, you know, where they stand and how they view the world and what they want to do. And I don't think you're going to see that level of consensus. And I think you may see, in some ways, where the United States and the other six kind of part ways. And, you know, we have seen signs of Canada, Britain, France, Germany, cooperating in a way or aligning themselves in a way that we haven't before. And I think, you know, as much as they will try to sort of paper over differences as much as possible over these two days, I think you could start to see that dynamic sort of emerge in how the leaders talk about not only the summit, but sort of where they see the world at this point.

AJ: Right. I want to leave Canada's goals aside for a moment 'cause we'll get into that in more detail in a sec. But if everyone but the U.S. got everything on their wish list, what would they walk away with? Like what is the point, do you think, this year?

AARON WHERRY: I mean, I think if this was a, you know, normal G7 or a pre-Trump G7, you would expect to see a statement on Ukraine, a statement on climate change, maybe some discussion of artificial intelligence and the global economy and promoting open trade. I think in this case, you know, you might imagine that these leaders would want to use the moment to talk to Trump about what he's doing, particularly with tariffs, and try to broker or advance their own countries towards agreements with the United States, or, or sort of their collective countries towards agreements with the United States. But that's-- that would be sort of the baseline expectation, I think, in terms of the issues and the things that they would be wanting to discuss if it was possible to find consensus here.

AJ: I mean, talk to me more about the kind of balancing act you think that they're all facing here in terms of trying to deal with Trump. Like, they are mostly in, you know, various states of tariff hell and needing to kind of not poke the bear too much, and also not, like, capitulate to him. Like how, how are they gonna, you know, deal with that balancing act?

AARON WHERRY: Yeah, I think that's a real tension and a real... I imagine every leader coming into this summit is trying to figure out exactly how to play these two days and how to play their conversation with Donald Trump. I heard one sort of official say in another interview, a former Canadian official, say, you know, you don't want to, in the interest of trying to find consensus, sort of get pushed to the lowest denominator. You know, sort of chase consensus to the point where you just end up agreeing about very little. But you also don't want to go in there and have a big fight. The ghost of Charlevoix, the last time Canada hosted this, sort of hangs over this summit in a way that the goal is to kind of get through these two days, advance some agreement on certain issues, but don't have this kind of spectacular fallout the way we saw in 2018.

[music]

AJ: Let's talk about the ghost of Charlevoix. Um. I mean, it feels in a lot of ways like a lot of déjà vu to the moment we're in now. Like there was a CBC headline from back then that says, "G7 unity torpedoed by angry Trump tweets dismissing Trudeau as 'dishonest & weak.'" Just remind us what was going on. You know, what were the stakes? What happened?

AARON WHERRY: Yeah. So, I mean, that summit in Charlevoix, in 2018, the last time Canada hosted, is mainly known for what happened, really, after the summit had ended. They'd agreed to a communiqué, the summit seemed to have been pulled off. And then Justin Trudeau sort of talked in his press conference about some issues he had with tariffs and the way the United States was conducting itself.

SOUNDCLIP

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: And it's kind of insulting. And I highlighted that it was not helping in our renegotiation of NAFTA. And that it would be with regret, but it would be with absolute certainty and firmness that we move forward with retaliatory measures on July 1st, applying equivalent tariffs to the ones that the Americans have unjustly applied to us.

AARON WHERRY: Donald Trump apparently saw those comments, and I think it's fair to say blew a gasket, and announced that the U.S. was renouncing the communiqué and wouldn't sign on to it.

SOUNDCLIP

LARRY KUDLOW: It's a betrayal, okay. Essentially, double-crossing. Not just double-crossing President Trump, but the other members of the G7 who were working together and pulling together this communiqué.

PETER NAVARRO: There's a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump, and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door.

AARON WHERRY: But I think, you know, it's also useful to remember that, like, even during that-- those two days, the tension was really high. They had haggled over the communiqué for hours and hours. You know, there was a big dispute over whether or not the communiqué could refer to the, quote unquote, "rules-based international order," because, you know, the United States didn't really want to acknowledge that. There was a dispute over climate change that came out in the communiqué, where the other six countries took one position on climate and energy policy and the United States took another. There was a very famous photo that came out of that summit, of Donald Trump kind of sitting with his arms crossed, staring at the other leaders while they at the last minute tried to come to some agreement on the communiqué.

AJ: It felt kind of renaissance painting-ish. Like very--

AARON WHERRY: Yes.

AJ: It was an amazing photo.

AARON WHERRY: It was sort of a, it was sort of the perfect encapsulation of like Donald Trump and the world at that moment. And you saw after that summit, the next year, France hosted it and they didn't even bother with trying to put out a big communiqué at the end of the summit. It just wasn't-- I think they probably just decided it wasn't worth the trouble. But with that as the example, one of the things that people are going to be watching from Mark Carney is simply whether he can get through this summit with less drama. And if so, that will kind of be considered a victory.

AJ: Right. So let's talk more about that, because Trump 2.0 is even more unbridled than the Trump in these previous summits. We just saw him deploy the National Guard in Los Angeles.

SOUNDCLIP

DONALD TRUMP: If we didn't get involved, right now Los Angeles would be burning, just like it was burning a number of months ago with all the houses that were lost. Los Angeles right now would be on fire. And we have it in great shape. We're not playing around.

AJ: He has supported arresting California's governor, who called Trump a dictator.

SOUNDCLIP

KRISTI NOEM: We are staying here to liberate this city from the socialist and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country.

AJ: He's throwing himself a military birthday parade this weekend.

SOUNDCLIP

REPORTER: As tanks roll towards Washington to prepare for President Trump's military parade, the president with this warning to anyone who might show up to protest.

DONALD TRUMP: And if there's any protestor who wants to come out, they will be met with very big force. By the way, for those people that want to protest...

AJ: And there are nearly 2,000 anti-Trump protests planned across the U.S. for Saturday, just the day before the G7 starts. So what kind of line do you think that Carney and other leaders have to walk here, given just how hot the Trump situation is?

AARON WHERRY: Yeah, I think there's kind of two issues here. One is, how engaged will Donald Trump be in the G7 and how distracted will he be by what's going on at home for him, and how will that sort of influence his own approach to these two days. And then I think the other thing is, especially at the closing news conferences, when typically each leader sort of talks to the press, there was, especially in the first Trump term, there was, at least in Canada, this kind of constant or regular expectation that the prime minister, in that case Justin Trudeau, would be asked for their opinion or their view of what was happening in the United States, particularly when it seemed to kind of breach democratic or, you know, rights kind of based concerns. And I think there is going to probably be a moment or there could be a moment where, you now, Mark Carney and the other leaders are asked, what about what's going on in the Unites States? And I think they will have to figure out how to navigate their answers to those questions, not least because we know that if Donald Trump is listening and watching, his reaction might not be polite.

[music]

AJ: This is coming amidst this, you know, ReArm Europe or Readiness 2030 plan.

SOUNDCLIP

ANDRIUS KUBILIUS: 450 million European Union citizens should not have to depend on 340 million Americans to defend ourselves against 140 million Russians who cannot defeat 38 million Ukrainians.

AJ: Carney has pledged that Canada will increase its defence spending to 2% of our GDP. We just got into that on the show yesterday, if you guys want to find that in our feed. And all of this is to bulwark against an unreliable or potentially oppositional America, right. So, what changes are these countries talking about making?

AARON WHERRY: Yeah, I think it's fair to say there's now this worldwide effort to boost defence spending. Or at least, you know, in the Western world -- Europe and Canada and others. You know, we'll see how it comes up, if it comes in these next two days. But it is kind of oddly a place where the two sides, if there are-- if you want to put it that way, you know, sort of the United States and the rest of the world, the interests kind of align in a way. Because... You know, the U.S. believes that other countries should be spending more on the military because they're carrying too much of the burden. And so they, in a way, should be happy to see other countries spending more on the military. But I think from the other point of view, the European and Canadian view, the idea is almost more that if the U.S. Isn't going to backstop the, you know, Western world, then they have to spend money to make up for that gap. And so, I don't know if it's gonna come up necessarily or explicitly in this context in these next two days, but it is kind of an interesting spot where there is potentially a bit of an agreement on where the world needs to be going.

AJ: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. We've, you know, mentioned that many countries attending are in trade disputes with the U.S. Do you think there's a chance that there could be some movement on that in Kananaskis?

AARON WHERRY: I mean, it's always possible. There will be individual bilateral meetings between Trump and the different leaders. You never know what can come out of those conversations. I think, though, that especially from the Canadian side, the early sort of, um, expectation setting is, you know, don't expect a breakthrough before the G7 or at the G7. So I think that's probably a fair expectation that we're not going to see a bunch of trade deals signed next week. But maybe, even just rhetorically in Trump's interactions with these different leaders, you may see some signs of progress or some hint of where the discussion's going.

AJ: I mean, in a typical sense, is the G7 the kind of venue where real work gets done anyway? Like is it more just like, have a nice time, shake some hands, drink some wine, don't make anyone mad, you know, the hard work continues back at home, or does stuff get done on these kind of issues normally?

AARON WHERRY: I think it's a combination of the two. You know, talking to people who know sort of international affairs and foreign policy better, they will say there's still, there's value in leaders sitting down and talking to each other face to face and discussing their worldviews, explaining themselves to each other, building relationships. And I do think there are... you will see specific initiatives come out of G7 summits, you know, where the leaders agree to do things, where the leaders sort of come together and sort of galvanize action, you know, on, on... if you look at Ukraine, if you go back even further to the financial crisis in 2008, 2009. But it's not, it's not a comprehensive trade negotiation where negotiators are in the room hammering out a deal. It's two days of fairly high-level meetings. And that can lead to things, but it's not-- you know, I don't, as I say, I don't think you're going to see a bunch of trade deals next week that suddenly end this massive trade war.

[music]

AJ: Speaking of deals, our colleagues have reported that Mark Carney's government has been holding some high-level trade meetings with the White House over recent weeks, and they've got a working document that outlines details of a potential deal. Do we know any more about that?

AARON WHERRY: We don't know a ton. We know sort of in broad strokes that they're talking, that there have been some private conversations back and forth between Donald Trump and Mark Carney. We know that Donald Trump's grand proposal for military-- for, uh, missile defence, the Golden Dome, is up for discussion. But we don't really know exactly what's on the table or exactly, you know, what's kind of being offered. I think it would also be fair to say we don't even know what they're kind of getting to at this point. Like, are they getting to an actual deal? Are they getting to an agreement to get to an agreement? Which is sort of what we saw with the United Kingdom. I think, you know, Mark Carney himself has pointed to the fact that there hasn't been retaliation from Canada to the latest round of steel tariffs by the United States. And so that is, in Mark Carney's view, sort of something he's holding back because it looks like progress is being made.

SOUNDCLIP

MÉLANIE JOLY: We have had really strong counter-tariffs against the Americans already. We are looking at different scenarios right now. And we will take a decision, but we need a bit more time right now, not too long.

MARK CARNEY: We are in intensive negotiations with the Americans, and, in parallel, preparing reprisals if those negotiations do not succeed.

AARON WHERRY: I think that's, you know, reading the tea leaves, that seems positive. But again, I think it's probably expecting way too much to imagine that this is going to get solved over dinner next week in Kananaskis.

AJ: Right. So Carney has laid out his three priorities. And I don't want to be too disparaging, but there is like a kind of G7 Mad Libs quality to them. So why don't I go through them. The first is protecting Canadian communities and the world by strengthening peace and security, countering foreign interference [and transnational] crime, and improving wildfires response. The second is building energy security and accelerating the digital transition, with a stronger critical mineral supply chain and using artificial intelligence to boost economic growth. And the third is finding new, quote, "enormous private" investments to build infrastructure, jobs and markets. Does anything jump out to you about that?

AARON WHERRY: So, it looks to me like an attempt in certain places to make the summit more tangible. You know, when they talk about wildfire response, that's something that the Canadian public can understand and see as very tangible. So if something comes out about that, it won't just look like two days of meetings. It will look like something very practical came out of this meeting. It does, though, at the same time look like trying to find points of agreement or points where all seven leaders are going to be able to sign off on these things. He's not going for Ukraine or climate change issues where there may be big differences of opinion. He's going for sort of very specific things. And I would wonder whether that's what we're going to see coming out of this, is sort of very specific commitments to these sort of three things that are, I would say, fairly uncontroversial.

[music]

AJ: Talking about controversy though, you know, as we were mentioning at the beginning, one of the people invited is Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. There's been some tense times here. So is this a sign of a diplomatic reset between the two countries?

AARON WHERRY: Possibly. I think we'll have to wait and see. The way to look at this is that Mark Carney is kind of in an odd position as both the Prime Minister of Canada and the Chair of the G7. And that's sort of the way he has explained it, I think, too. As Chair of the G7, he has decided to invite India. And it's, I think, useful to note that India has been invited to the last several G7s. You know, in addition to the seven leaders, we should say there's, you know, always a guest list of maybe a half dozen other countries that are invited to take part in the discussions. And so India has been there. You can see why. It's obviously a big country with huge economic power. Of course, the flip side of that is all of the issues between India and Canada right now. And the way Mark Carney has talked about it is that he's invited Mr. Modi, and that he and his counterpart have agreed to, in his words, "continued law enforcement dialogue." That there's been some progress on that. And so, I mean, I think we have to kind of wait and see what that looks like. But I think it kind of also fits within some larger things we're seeing from Carney, which is he's sort of taking the opportunity of him coming into office as prime minister as a chance to start fresh on a bunch of relationships, both internationally and within the country. And we'll see whether, you know, he can stay clear of the trouble or kind of advance things further than Justin Trudeau could. But at this moment, I think he's kind of using this as a new beginning to see what can happen.

AJ: I guess in some ways this is also kind of a test of how he'll handle a big international summit as prime minister. So what are you looking for there?

AARON WHERRY: So I think a couple things. One is just how well he chairs these meetings. Which can sound a bit trite, but I think, you know, there are seven of the most powerful leaders in the world sitting around a table. Managing those discussions isn't always easy, particularly when one of those seven leaders is Donald Trump. Mark Carney does actually have some experience. Even as he's a new prime minister, he does have some new exper-- or some experience with international summits because of his time as a governor of the Central Bank in Canada and England, and then, and also in his time as a deputy minister in the finance department here in Ottawa. So he, he's not entirely a rookie at these sort of settings. And so you would think he would have some sense of how to run one of these things. I think we'll see how that works. You know, given the guest list, given Donald Trump, given the tensions in the world, it's going to be quite challenging. But then I think the other part of it is, what's going to come out of this meeting? We've been told that we shouldn't expect a large joint communiqué at the end of this. We're more likely to see what has been described as action-oriented statements. And so, I think... Those communiqués that they issue at the end of these summits can be... they can be a lot. You know, the last one was, I think, uh, coming out of Italy, the last joint communiqué was 20,000 words. And it could seem like just a lot of words, but it is, it is an expression of where these seven countries stand and what they believe in and what they agree on. And if we don't come out of this with a communiqué, which seems like the very likely scenario at this point, I think that's going to tell us something about where things stand between these seven nations and with the world. You know, I had a conversation with Kim Nossal, a foreign policy scholar at Queens, last week, and his feeling was, if there isn't a big statement at the end of this G7, that is going to tell us how divided these countries are, and it's also going to send a message that on things like climate change, the other six countries are going to have to double down on their efforts because the United States isn't going to be with them. And so there's sort of two, I think, messages coming out of this, or two things to watch. One is just how peacefully these two days go. But then also, what is the message about how the world works now that's going to be sent by these two days and by how much or how little they can all agree on.

AJ: All right, well, we'll have to watch. Aaron, thank you so much, and I hope you have a great time in Alberta.

AARON WHERRY: Thanks.

[Music: Theme]

AJ: That is all for today. Front Burner was produced this week by Matthew Amha, Joyita Sengupta, Lauren Donnelly, Mackenzie Cameron, and Matt Meuse. Our intern is Katie Teeling. Our YouTube producer is Jon Lee. Our music is by Joseph Shabason. Our senior producer is Elaine Chau. Our executive producer is Nick McCabe-Lokos. I'm Allie Jaynes. Jayme will be back on Monday. Thank you so much for listening.

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Can the G7 find order in the chaos? - Transcript

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