the right reason to put tariffs on chinese evs would be to help protect a developing canadian ev industry. unfortunately, from what i can gather, china has an absolute advantage on canada in this sector, and no amount of tariffs will ever make canadian evs competitive with chinese evs outside of canada. we would only ever be producing for domestic markets. so, we'd have to determine whether we think the consequences - tariffs on canola - outweigh the benefits. that would be choosing jobs in ontario over jobs in saskatchewan. can farmers produce something else? can ontario manufacture something else? or is this even suggestive of a failed state?

that's not why we're doing it.

the reason we're doing it is to align with american policy. 

why are the americans doing it? because they want americans to continue to use carbon-emitting vehicles, which canada also benefits from financially, at the expense of the world's climate. as such, we're essentially aligning with a pro-carbon policy, in an attempt to save our automotive sector, which is moving in the opposite direction.

the gamble is that trump will be replaced by somebody less pro-carbon, and that wants to align the americans with a reasonable economic and climate policy. however, that doesn't really resolve the issue. the americans will likely still maintain tariffs against the chinese evs, and we're tied to them when they do. saskatchewan will have to take the hit, at an unclear benefit to ontario workers.

the optimal outcome from canada's perspective would be to convince chinese companies to assemble their vehicles in canada. this would be a break from the americans, but likely in the direction they're eventually heading in.

it is difficult to argue in favour of the utility of blindly holding to american policy with no clear benefit to ontario manufacturing, at the expense of the country's farmers.