Poilievre Wants Clarity on Carney’s Talk of Sending $1 Trillion in Investments to US

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre rises during Question Period on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Oct. 9, 2025. The Canadian Press/Adrian Wyld

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is asking for more clarity from Prime Minister Mark Carney regarding his comments that Canada could be sending $1 trillion in investments south of the border.

Carney made the comments Oct. 7 during a visit with U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House, saying Canada expects to send $1 trillion in investment stateside in the next five years if it gets the trade deal with the United States it expects.

“We are the largest foreign investor in the United States—half a trillion dollars in the last five years alone, probably a trillion in the next five years if we get the agreement that we expect to get,” Carney said Oct. 7.

Following Carney’s remarks, Poilievre accused him on Oct. 7 of trying to “sell out” Canadian workers, and has subsequently asked for more details on what was meant by Carney’s $1 trillion comment.

“How is he going to do that? He said it would be private investment. So is he going to pass a law forcing pension funds and insurance companies to push their money to the States out of Canada?” Poilievre asked Oct. 9 during a press conference. “Is he just going to keep in place the high taxes and anti-development policies that have already forced hundreds of billions of dollars of investment abroad?”

The clash between Poilievre and Carney comes amid ongoing negotiations between Canada and the United States over trade, including potential updates to the Canada–United States–Mexico Agreement (CUSMA), which is due for review in July of next year, as well as discussions about Canada’s steel, aluminum, softwood lumber, and energy sectors, which are currently subject to sectoral tariffs.

Clarifying Carney’s comment following the Oct. 7 White House meeting, Minister Responsible for Canada-U.S. Trade Dominic LeBlanc said the remarks only referred to the significant investment by private Canadian companies and pension funds in the United States.

Speaking Oct. 8 in the House of Commons, Poilievre elaborated on his concerns with the $1 trillion remark, saying Carney “is going to drive investment out of Canada, causing mills, mines and plants in Canada to close down,” but joking that, “we will go soft on [Carney] today, because I know he is recovering from surgery to have his elbows removed.”

For his part, Carney responded to Poilievre’s criticisms by saying it’s up to the “private sector” to decide where they invest.

“I would like to inform the Leader of the Opposition there is a thing called the private sector,” Carney said. “The private sector makes decisions about investment. The private sector makes decisions about jobs. With the best deal in the world, we will invest in this country, and we will build Canada strong.”

Poilievre then asked what Canada would get in return for “$1 trillion in job losses in Canada,” to which Carney responded that his Oct. 7 meeting with Trump was a “meeting of minds” in which important deals are being negotiated regarding “the future of the steel sector, the aluminum sector, and the energy sector.”