US senator says Trump would laugh at Canada's military spending as Canadian security forum begins

HALIFAX, Nova Scotia -- A U.S. senator and supporter of Donald Trump said Friday the president-elect would laugh at Canada's current military spending plans and said the country must do more.

Idaho Republican Sen. Jim Risch, ranking member of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, made the remarks at the start of the annual Halifax International Security Forum which attracts defense and security officials from Western democracies.

According to NATO figures, Canada was estimated to be spending 1.33% of GDP on its military budget in 2023, below the 2% target that NATO countries have set for themselves.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said Canada will meet the alliance’s target by 2032.

“With all due respect. We're good with friends with Canada and they say ‘Well, we're working on this.' We say ‘What does that mean? And they say ’Well, we're kind of looking at 2032,'” Risch said during a panel discussion.

“If Trump were in this room you would get a large guffaw from him on 2032. It's got to be better than that. It truly, truly has to be better than that."

Canadian Defense Minister Bill Blair said his government knows it needs to increase defense spending, but he has to ensure Canada gets “good value” for its investments.

“When our allies say they want us to meet the commitment, I’ve told them the answer is ‘Yes,’ and I’ve told them you’re pushing on an open door,” Blair said. “We are going to make those investments.”

Canada already plans to buy surveillance aircraft, helicopters and restock its ammunition supplies. And has plans to buy submarines in the future.

Trudeau recently re-established a special Cabinet committee on Canada-U.S. relations to address his administration’s concerns about another Trump presidency.

Former U.S. ambassador to Canada Kelly Craft said in the waning days of the U.S. presidential election campaign that Canada would be wise to accelerate its timeline for meeting its NATO spending commitments in the event of a Trump victory.

Retired Lt.-Gen. Andrew Leslie — a former lawmaker in Trudeau's government — told a Parliament defense committee two days after the U.S. election that he detects “no sense of urgency” from the government to meet those commitments.

After Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, NATO allies agreed to halt budget cuts and move toward spending 2% of their gross domestic product on defense within a decade. Canada was barely spending 1% at the time.

Last year, as it became clear that Russia’s war with Ukraine would grind on, they decided that 2% should be a spending minimum.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has said he expects around two thirds of the alliance’s 32 member countries to spend 2% of GDP on their defense budgets this year, up from just three countries a decade ago.