U.S. President Donald Trump addressed Prime Minister Mark Carney directly in a speech Wednesday to the World Economic Forum, saying that “Canada lives because of the United States.”
“I watched your prime minister yesterday. He wasn’t so grateful, but they should be grateful to us. Canada lives because of the United States,” Trump said.
“Remember that Mark, the next time you make your statements.”
Trump spoke at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, to a room of hundreds of world government and business leaders, and follows Carney’s speech a day earlier.
The comments about Canada were made in the context of Trump’s continued push for the U.S. to acquire Greenland, a territory of NATO ally Denmark which he says the U.S. needs for “national security.”
“All we want from Denmark for national and international security and to keep our very energetic and dangerous potential enemies at bay is this land on which we’re going to build the greatest golden dome ever built,” said Trump.
Get breaking National news
For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen.
“We’re building a golden dome that’s going to, just by its very nature, going to be defending Canada. Canada gets a lot of freebies from us, by the way. They should be grateful also, but they’re not.”
Although Carney did not mention Trump directly in his speech at the WEF, he underscored Canada’s solidarity with Denmark and Greenland in making its own decision on its future.
“We stand firmly with Greenland and Denmark and fully support their unique right to determine Greenland’s future,” said Carney in his speech.
“Canada strongly opposes tariffs over Greenland and calls for focused talks to achieve our shared objectives of security and prosperity in the Arctic.”
© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.