Ontario Premier Doug Ford has unveiled a new – and very blue – response to United States President Donald Trump’s controversial order renaming Lake Ontario as “Lake America”.
On Saturday, Ford recorded a video of himself along the lake’s shore near Hamilton, Ontario, where he revealed a baby-blue, billboard-sized sign that reads “Lake Ontario” in large white letters.
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Underneath, a subheading underscores Ford’s message about the name: “Now and Always.” The message is also repeated in French, Canada’s second official language.
Ford, who has made a habit of needling the US president, explained that the sign was erected to reaffirm the Great Lake’s name “in case President Trump — or anyone else — forgets”.
“Long before President Trump, this lake was called Lake Ontario,” Ford said in his social media video. “And long after President Trump is gone, it will still be called Lake Ontario.”
The White House did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
With Canada and the US embroiled in a spiralling trade war, Trump signed an executive order on Thursday that changed how the US federal government would refer to the body of water.
The order, however, drew pushback from allies and critics alike. Vermont Governor Phil Scott, a fellow Republican, called the move “petty and disappointing”, and several politicians urged Trump to return to the negotiating table, rather than antagonise Canada, a longtime ally.
Canada is ranked as one of the US’s top two trading partners, and as of 2024, it is the largest destination for US exports.
The trade tensions, however, have led to a popular backlash in Canada, with boycotts of US goods and bans in several provinces against US liquor.
Ford, a right-wing populist, has emerged as a vocal proponent of Canadian retaliatory actions. Since Trump took office for a second term in 2025, he has called for Canada to cede its sovereignty and become a US state, and has issued several waves of tariffs against the northern country.
Ford’s “Lake Ontario” sign marks the premier’s latest salvo in his ongoing feud with Trump.
Earlier this week, Ford escalated his attacks against Trump after trade negotiations between the two countries fell apart, resulting in US tariffs of 50 percent on $20bn worth of Canadian goods.
“He can kiss my a** as far as I’m concerned. We’re going to go at him full steam,” Ford said about Trump during a Monday interview on a Toronto radio show.
Trump fired back on his Truth Social platform by mocking Ford as “less charismatic, intelligent, and overall unimpressive” compared with his late brother, the late Toronto Mayor Rob Ford.
“Someone should get these clowns to ‘fall in line’ or, the consequences for Canada will be far WORSE,” Trump added.
Saturday’s billboard is not the first stunt Ford has undertaken to stand up against Trump, either. Some of those actions have had international consequences.
Last year, Ford’s government spent $75m on an anti-tariff advertisement featuring the voice of former US President Ronald Reagan, which aired in the US.
“Over the long run, such trade barriers hurt every American worker and consumer,” Reagan can be heard saying in the message.
The US and Canada were in the midst of trade negotiations at the time, and Trump cancelled the talks in protest against the advertisement. Some members of the Trump administration compared the advertising campaign with election interference, as the advertisements aired before 2025’s off-year races.
Ford ultimately pulled the advertisement from the airwaves in October, saying he had achieved his goal “to initiate a conversation” about “the impact of tariffs on workers and businesses”.
Since 2018, Ford has led Ontario as its provincial head of government. The province is considered the centre of Canada’s automotive manufacturing industry, and its factories are tightly integrated with US car manufacturers across the border.
A prominent conservative and longtime leader in Toronto, Ford formerly drew comparisons with Trump. His entry into provincial politics coincided with Trump’s first term as president.
Early on, some of Ford’s supporters rallied around the tagline “Make Ontario Great Again”, a play on Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan. The phrase, in turn, had been popularised during Reagan’s 1980 run for president.
But Ford has rejected any comparisons with the US president, saying he and his family were involved in politics long before Trump.
