Ontario Premier Doug Ford on Saturday unveiled a sign near Lake Ontario declaring “Lake Ontario — Now and Always,” taking direct aim at President Trump after he signed an executive order seeking to rename the Great Lake shared by the Canadian province and New York state.
“I’m here on the shores of beautiful Lake Ontario, a crown jewel of our province and our country,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford said in a short video message posted on social media.
“You may have heard that President Trump is trying to rename this lake, all because he doesn’t like Ontario and Canada standing up for ourselves,” Ford said. “But let’s be serious. Long before President Trump, this lake was called Lake Ontario, and long after President Trump is gone, it will still be called Lake Ontario.”
Ford said the large blue sign was installed as a clear message to Mr. Trump — and to anyone else watching — that “it’s Lake Ontario now and forever.”
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The sign, which also carries the French wording “Lac Ontario — Aujourd’hui et pour toujours,” stands at Fifty Point Conservation Area, a park in Hamilton, Ontario.
The dispute comes during an ongoing trade war between Canada and the United States. Last week, Mr. Trump moved by executive order to rename Lake Ontario “Lake America” and said the U.S. does not expect to be “doing much business with Ontario any longer.”
The name Ontario is derived from the Iroquoian word “oniatarí:io,” meaning “lake of shining waters,” according to the Center for Great Lakes Literacy.
On Friday, the leader of the Seneca Nation, one of the Iroquoian-speaking nations with deep ties to the region, also condemned Mr. Trump’s attempt to rename Lake Ontario and urged that the executive order be withdrawn.
Seneca Nation President J. Conrad Seneca said the order violates a treaty more than 225 years old and reflects “blatant disrespect” toward the Indigenous peoples who gave the lake its name. He said Lake Ontario should retain its name in recognition of the Indigenous communities in both the U.S. and Canada that lived around and along its waters long before either country existed.
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“The President cannot assert ownership over our culture or erase it through irresponsible political action,” he said in a statement.
Following failed trade talks between the two nations, the U.S. began imposing 50% tariffs on hundreds of Canadian goods. Mr. Trump also announced that the U.S. will impose a 50% tariff on all Canadian automotive and steel imports beginning in January, while claiming that “Canada has been ripping off the United States of America for years.”
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney then announced new retaliatory tariffs against the U.S., saying that it would impose tariffs of up to 50% on about $20 billion of U.S. imports.
Kathryn Watson,
Kaia Hubbard and
contributed to this report.
