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The text began with something of a history lesson about how the “international system of rules” in place today came to be, and a warning that its architects were wrong that the system would cause authoritarian countries to adopt Western political freedoms as they joined it. The idea that democracy could fail may seem “outlandish,” Freeland said. “But other great civilizations have risen — and then fallen. It is hubris to think we will inevitably be different.”

When the economic future of people living inside liberal democracies is threatened, Freeland said, “that’s when people are vulnerable to the demagogue who scapegoats the outsider, the other — whether it’s immigrants at home or foreign actors.”

Freeland invoked Abraham Lincoln before launching into what seemed to be a direct message to Trump: “Facts matter. Truth matters. Competence and honesty, among elected leaders and in our public service, matter.”

In a part of the speech that focused on the Canada-U.S. relationship, Freeland acknowledged, “we also understand that many Americans today are no longer certain that the rules-based international order — of which you were the principal architect and for which you wrote the biggest cheques — still benefits America.” This is seen “most plainly,” Freeland said, in the steel and aluminum tariffs that the U.S. has imposed on Canada on a “national security” basis.

After repeating that the tariffs are “illegal,” “absurd” and “hurtful,” the prepared text broached new territory. “They are protectionism, pure and simple. They are not a response to unfair actions by other countries that put American industry at a disadvantage. They are a naked example of the United States putting its thumb on the scale, in violation of the very rules it helped to write.” The European Union and Mexico, which are also facing tariffs, “share our astonishment and our resolve,” Freeland continued.

“No one will benefit from this beggar thy neighbour dispute. The price will be paid, in part, by American consumers and by American businesses,” it read. “The price will also be paid by those who believe that a rules based system is something worth preserving.”