WASHINGTON: What began as a dispute over trade has now reached the map. President Donald Trump on Thursday ordered the U.S. federal government to call Lake Ontario “Lake America,” adding a provocative new chapter to strained relations with Canada as the two countries remain locked in a tariff dispute and face stalled trade negotiations.
Trump announced the change from the Oval Office and said it would take effect immediately. The order applies to U.S. federal maps, documents and official references, but it does not require Canada, international organizations or other bodies to use the new name.
“We’re going to be changing the name of Lake Ontario effective immediately to Lake America,” Trump told reporters.
Lake Ontario is one of North America’s five Great Lakes and has carried its current name for more than 400 years. About 52% of its surface area is in Canada, with the remainder in New York state.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney rejected the change, pointing out that the lake’s name predates both Canada and the United States as nations.
“We know that America is changing. Their trading relationships, their foreign policies, their national monuments, their hydronyms,” Carney said on social media.
“Canadians also know that naming reality means calling it Lake Ontario then, now and always,” he added.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul also dismissed the change, saying, “New York won’t be calling it that.”
The announcement came as U.S.-Canada trade relations remain tense. Negotiations collapsed last week after three days of intensive discussions, with both sides blaming the other for the breakdown. The dispute has already resulted in tariffs affecting tens of billions of dollars in cross-border trade.
Trump has repeatedly criticized Canada’s trade policies and has pushed the idea of Canada becoming the 51st U.S. state, a proposal Canadian leaders have rejected.
The president also suggested Thursday that other geographic names could face similar treatment.
“We have a gulf and we have a lake, now all we need is an ocean,” Trump said, suggesting the Atlantic or Pacific oceans could potentially be renamed.
The decision drew criticism from U.S. and Canadian officials, including Vermont Gov. Phil Scott, a Republican, who described it as “petty and disappointing.”
Indigenous leaders also objected to the move, noting that the name Ontario has Indigenous origins and predates both modern nations. Grand Chief Pierre Picard of the Wendat Nation in Quebec said the decision amounted to an attempt to erase history.
The order is binding only on the U.S. federal government, meaning Canada is free to continue using Lake Ontario. But the dispute over the name adds another symbolic strain to a relationship already under pressure from tariffs, political disagreements and unresolved trade talks.
