Trump says US and Canada have reached last-minute deal to delay 50% US tariffs on Canadian imports

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Tuesday he was delaying the 50% U.S. tariffs on $20 billion worth of Canadian imports after the two countries reached a last-minute deal less than two hours before the sanctions were to go into effect.

The announcement, which Trump made on his social media platform, buys time for more negotiations and avoids, for now, another strain in already tense relations between the historic allies.

“I have paused the 50% Tariffs against Canada, that were scheduled to kick in tomorrow morning for a three day period, based on the fact that Canada and the U.S.A., subject to the finalization of documents, have a DEAL!” Trump posted on Truth Social.

If they had gone into effect as scheduled at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday, Trump’s import taxes would have hit Canadian products ranging from hockey sticks to tongue depressors.

But the political impact would likely have been bigger than the economic one. Canada had threatened to retaliate against any new tariffs with levies of its own, aggravating a trade fight between countries that sold each other $880 billion worth of goods and services last year.

A White House proclamation said Canada had expressed a commitment to remove measures the Trump administration considers discriminatory against U.S. alcohol, dairy and motor vehicle exports. Canada did not immediately confirm those commitments.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said in a statement “substantial progress” had been made but that important work remained, confirming Canada had agreed to the three-day delay while negotiations continued.

Carney and Trump had spoken twice by phone in the past two days about the ongoing negotiations, including a call Tuesday afternoon, Carney’s office said, underscoring the last-minute push for a deal.

Both countries had reason to step back from the brink. Nearly 72% of Canada’s goods exports last year went to the United States. And the Trump administration would be taking a risk by imposing a hefty new tariff — paid by U.S. importers who try to pass along the cost to consumers via higher prices — ahead of November’s midterm elections. U.S. voters are already frustrated with the high cost of living.

“I don’t think either side really wants these tariffs to come into effect,’’ Ryan Majerus, a partner at King & Spalding and a former U.S. trade official, said before the delay was announced. “There’s a pretty strong push on both sides to find an off-ramp here.’’

Canadian Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Candace Laing said in a statement that the three-day tariff delay offered businesses some relief but fell short of the certainty a signed interim agreement would provide.

“This limbo state is not anyone’s preferred outcome,” she said, urging negotiators to reach a deal quickly.

Trump’s approach to dealing with Canada marks an extraordinary departure from the traditionally cooperative relationship between the two countries. Trump has hit Canadian goods with tariffs — in a push to bring manufacturing back to the U.S. — and has repeatedly made inflammatory comments about turning Canada into America’s 51st state.

Trump has made tariffs the centerpiece of his second-term economic agenda. Last year, he imposed double-digit import taxes on almost every country, justifying them by declaring the longstanding U.S. trade deficit a national emergency. The Supreme Court in February ruled that he’d overstepped his authority, striking down those tariffs and setting the stage for the federal government to pay refunds to importers.

So Trump has looked for other legal authority to impose tariffs.

To hit Canada, he reached back to the Great Depression, invoking Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930 to threaten 50% tariffs on products that account for about 5% of Canadian exports to the United States.

Nearly a century ago, with the U.S. and world economies in collapse, Congress passed the 1930 tariff law, imposing taxes on imports from around the world. Known as the Smoot-Hawley tariffs, named for their congressional sponsors, they are notorious among economists and historians for limiting world commerce and making the Great Depression worse.

Section 338 tariffs have never been used before.

Section 338 authorizes the president to impose tariffs of up to 50% on imports from countries that have discriminated against U.S. businesses. No investigation is required to justify the levies. Nor is there any limit on how long the tariffs can stay in place.

The U.S. is renegotiating a North American trade pact — the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement — that Trump strong-armed America’s neighbors into accepting in his first term. The threat of Section 338 tariffs gives the United States leverage to seek fresh concessions from Ottawa.

Gillies reported from Toronto.

Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc makes brief comments to reporters outside the U.S. Department of Commerce following a meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, in Washington, Monday, Aug. 17, 2026. (Kelly Geraldine Malone/The Canadian Press via AP)

United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, center, leaves the U.S. Department of Commerce following a meeting with Canadian officials, in Washington, Monday, Aug. 17, 2026. (Kelly Geraldine Malone/The Canadian Press via AP)

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — An Idaho prosecutor is seeking the death penalty against a woman charged with murder in the 2025 deaths of her twin toddlers.

Andrea Shaw, 23, has pleaded not guilty and has said the 18-month-old twins became sick and died after receiving flu shots and routine childhood vaccinations. But Payette County Prosecutor Mike Duke wrote in court documents that an autopsy revealed symptoms consistent with smothering and wrote that suffocation “is the only conceivable explanation” for their deaths.

Deputy prosecuting attorney Ryon Sirucek notified the court of his intent to seek the death penalty last week.

In the court document, Sirucek said the state would try to show that four aggravating factors make capital punishment appropriate in the case: That more than one murder was committed at the time; that the killings were especially heinous, atrocious or cruel; that the defendant showed “utter disregard” for human life; and that she would likely pose a continuing threat to society.

“That's outrageous,” said Shaw's attorney, Joseph Filicetti. “They're not going to be able to prove the underlying case beyond a reasonable doubt, so there's not a chance the death penalty is going to come into play.”

Filicetti said the defense team will be filing a motion to dismiss the case. The county coroner found the cause of death to be undetermined but consistent with hyperthermia or overheating, Filicetti said, but the coroner was not on the witness list for the grand jury. It is not clear whether jurors were informed of his findings. The pathologists who examined the twins also said their causes of death were undetermined, Filicetti said.

The prosecutor's office wrote in court documents that the temperature in the twins' room would often reach 100 degrees, but that the children had survived high temperatures before and that their time of death didn't correlate to the peak temperature of the day.

“They don't have any motive, they don't have any backstory, they don't have any confession ... She didn't do any of that, and they can't prove she did any of it,” Filicetti said.

The twins were found dead in their shared bed May 1, 2025, according to court records. They had been vaccinated eight days earlier, and the day after their vaccinations Shaw took them to the emergency room, reporting that they were lethargic and felt feverish. The doctor felt the symptoms were a reaction from the vaccinations, and the twins were given Tylenol and a popsicle and sent home, according to the court records.

A few days after the twins' deaths, Shaw went on an internet show produced by Children's Health Defense, an anti-vaccine group founded by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. He has not been affiliated with the group since December 2024, when he formally resigned as chairman to join President Donald Trump’s administration.

Medical experts point out that the childhood vaccines at issue — hepatitis A, influenza and DTaP — are safe and effective for kids and recommended by various medical groups.

Shaw is also a plaintiff in a federal lawsuit brought by Children’s Health Defense and others against the American Academy of Pediatrics, accusing the organization of racketeering and lying about the safety of vaccinations. The American Academy of Pediatrics has asked the court to dismiss the lawsuit, calling it the “latest missive in a campaign targeting” the academy and its “use of science-backed evidence in vaccine policy.”

A grand jury indicted Shaw on the murder charges in July, and she is being held without bond. A trial has been set for January.

Associated Press writer Josh Kelety contributed.

This image taken from KIVI-TV video shows Andrea Shaw attending a court hearing remotely, July 2, 2026, in Payette County District Court in Payette, Idaho. (KIVI-TV via AP)