🇨🇦 Champagne Flies to Beijing, Comes Home Empty-Handed and Full of Excuses

Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne spent five days in China — flanked by Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem and a parade of Canadian bankers — and Chinese tariffs on Canadian pork are still exactly where they were when he landed. His verdict, as reported: the real win was «relationship-building.» Translation: Canadian farmers are still locked out of the Chinese market, but Bay Street got face time with Beijing officials. This trip follows Carney's January visit — the first by a Canadian PM in eight years — and comes days after Liberal MP Michael Ma practically auditioned for Chinese state media by questioning whether forced labour in China even exists. Ma apologized. Carney couldn't bring himself to say the word genocide. Champagne wouldn't rule out Chinese auto plants on Canadian soil. This isn't diplomacy. It's a government methodically dismantling Canada's economic leverage while calling it pragmatism. The pork tariffs remain. The platitudes multiply.

🍁 Maple Chronicles