What’s in Reagan advert that’s caused US-Canada trade talks collapse?

US President Donald Trump said he would immediately halt all trade negotiations with Canada over an ad in which his predecessor Ronald Reagan said tariffs “hurt every American.”

The ad, sponsored by the Canadian province of Ontario and released last week, includes excerpts from a speech Reagan gave in 1987 that focused on foreign trade.

Trump called the ad “fake” While the Ronald Reagan Foundation said it “misrepresented” the former president’s speech.

While the minute-long ad only includes excerpts from the original five-minute speech, it does not alter Reagan’s words. However, it changes the order in which the comments are made.

Below are the lines from advertisement in italics, followed by an explanation of how they appear (indicated in bold) in the original text address.

“When someone says, ‘Let’s put tariffs on foreign imports,’ it sounds like they are doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs. Sometimes that works for a little while, but only for a little while.”

This is the opening line of the one-minute ad. The words have not been changed.

But Reagan didn’t speak those lines until about halfway through his original speech.

The 1987 radio address — an address to the nation on free and fair trade — begins with Reagan saying that the Japanese prime minister will visit the White House and “recent controversies” over trade will be discussed. Reagan recently imposed tariffs on some Japanese goods due to a dispute over a trade agreement.

By the time he reached the ad’s opening line, he had made clear his aversion to tariffs, described “the prosperity and economic development that only free trade can bring,” and said that high-tariff legislation made the Great Depression worse.

“In the long run, such trade barriers harm every American, worker and consumer.”

In advertising, these words come immediately after the first line. And once again, Reagan said those words.

However, in the original title the two sentences are not connected. In fact, they’re more than a minute into the conversation, and the “In the long run…” line comes first.

After introducing the Japanese state visit, Reagan began explaining why he had recently imposed tariffs.

“Imposing such tariffs or trade barriers and restrictions of any kind are steps I would hate to take,” he says in the original letter. “I will state the sound economic reasons for doing so in a moment: And such trade barriers in the long run harm every American worker and consumer.“

Regan says some companies were “engaging in unfair trade practices” and contravening an agreement with the US – so this was a “special case”.

This sets the tone for the rest of the speech, which he devotes to outlining his commitment to free trade and the dangers of high tariffs.

“High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliatory measures by foreign countries and provoke fierce trade wars.”

This is the third line of the ad, and again these are Reagan’s words. But again, in the original letter they do not directly follow the previous line in the ad. There’s about a minute between them in the title.

In his 1987 speech, he said this line in the middle of his speech while describing what he saw as the consequences of tariffs. He says:

“What ends up happening is: First, domestic industries begin to depend on government protection in the form of high tariffs. They stop competing and stop making the innovative management and technological changes they need to succeed in global markets. And then, while all this is happening, something worse happens. High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliatory measures by foreign countries and provoke fierce trade wars.”

“And then the worst happens. Markets shrink and collapse, businesses and industries close, and millions of people lose their jobs.”

Reagan says this line after the previous one, but the ad omits some of the sentences that separate them.

Here is the full run from one to the other in the original:

“High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliatory measures by foreign countries and provoke fierce trade wars. The result is more and more tariffs, higher and higher trade barriers, and less and less competition.

“Consequently, people quickly stop buying, because artificially high prices due to tariffs support inefficiency and mismanagement. Then the worst happens: markets shrink and collapse; Businesses and industries closed; Millions of people are losing their jobs.”

“Around the world, there is a growing realization that the path to prosperity for all nations is to reject protectionist legislation and promote fair and free competition.”

Here, the ad goes back about a minute – but the words are the same.

In the original text, Reagan extols the economic benefits of free trade and continues: “Now, that message of free trade is the message I delivered to the leaders of Canada a few weeks ago, and it was warmly received there. In fact, There is a growing realization around the world that the path to prosperity for all nations is to reject protectionist legislation and promote fair and free competition.

He then speaks of the “sound historical reasons” for this realization: “For those of us who lived through the Great Depression, the memory of the suffering that crisis caused is profound and painful.”

He says experts believe that the high-tariff legislation passed at the time “significantly deepened the Depression and prevented economic recovery.”

“America’s jobs and growth are at stake.”

This is how Reagan ended his speech both in the speech and in the declaration, regarding the tariffs.

The last part of his speech was omitted from the ad — in which he says he is determined to “spare the American people from prosperity-destroying protectionist legislation” and criticizes opponents in Congress who “want to seek a quick political advantage” and “forget about” the millions of trade-related jobs.