The Latest: Canada PM calls Trump tariffs a ‘direct attack;’ Trump downplays Signal exposure

Prime Minister Mark Carney says President Donald Trump's auto tariffs are a 'direct attack' on Canada, but he’ll need to see the details before taking retaliatory measures. There are no signs that the Signal chat controversy will fade soon for Trump, who has said he stands by his national security team and has assailed the credibility of the reporter who broke the story. The Associated Press is returning to a Washington courtroom Thursday to ask a judge to restore its full access to presidential events. And Trump plans to sign more executive orders.

Here’s the Latest:

There are no signs that the Signal chat controversy will fade soon for Trump, who has said he stands by his national security team and has assailed the credibility of the reporter who broke the story.

Pete Hegseth told reporters in Hawaii he had not texted "war plans" or "attack plans" in the Signal group, pointing out he had called his post a "team update."

"My job, as it said atop of that (post), everybody's seen it now – 'TEAM UPDATE' – is to provide updates in real time, general updates in real time, keep people informed," he said before boarding a plane for Guam without taking follow-up questions. "That's what I did. That's my job."

The president showed his fury on social media early Thursday, declaring it "disgraceful" that U.S. District Judge James Boasberg has been assigned another hot button case involving the Trump administration.

Cases are randomly assigned to the 20 judges in the Washington court.

Boasberg was assigned on Wednesday to preside over a lawsuit filed by the group American Oversight against several Trump administration officials and the National Archives and Records Administration. It alleges they violated federal recordkeeping laws when they used a Signal chat group to discuss military strikes against Houthi militants in Yemen.

Boasberg's assignment to the Signal lawsuit came just two days after the Trump administration, in the Venezuela deportation case, invoked the "state secrets" privilege to refuse to share details with the judge about the timing of deportation flights to El Salvador.

"There is no way for a Republican, especially a TRUMP REPUBLICAN, to win before him," Trump said. He added that Boasberg is "Highly Conflicted." Trump and his allies have called for impeaching Boasberg.

The U.S. cities most vulnerable to a trade war with Canada turn out to largely be in the states that helped return Donald Trump to the White House - a sign of the possible political risk he's taking with his tariff plans.

A new analysis released Thursday by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce detailed the areas most dependent on exports to Canada, with San Antonio and Detroit topping the list of 41 U.S. metro areas. The findings show that the United States' 25% tariffs on Canada and Canada's retaliations could inflict meaningful damage in key states for U.S. politics.

The analysis was conducted before Trump announced Wednesday that he was placing additional 25% tariffs on imported autos and parts starting on April 3.

Long-threatened tariffs from Trump have plunged the country into a global trade war - all while on-again, off-again new levies continue to escalate uncertainty.

Trump is no stranger to tariffs. He launched a trade war during his first term, taking particular aim at China by putting taxes on most of its goods. Beijing responded with its own retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products ranging from fruit to automotive imports. Trump also used the threat of more tariffs to force Canada and Mexico to renegotiate a North American trade pact, called the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, in 2020.

Fast-forward to today and economists stress there could be greater consequences on businesses and economies worldwide under Trump's more sweeping tariffs this time around - and that higher prices will likely leave consumers footing the bill. There's also been a sense of whiplash from Trump's back-and-forth tariff threats and responding retaliation, including some recently-postponed taxes on goods from America's largest trading partners.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney says he needs to see the details of Trump's executive order before taking retaliatory measures. He called it unjustified and said he will leave the election campaign to go to Ottawa on Thursday to chair his special Cabinet committee on U.S. relations.

Carney earlier announced a CA$2 billion ($1.4 billion) "strategic response fund" that will protect Canadian auto jobs affected by Trump's tariffs.

Autos are Canada's second largest export, and Carney noted it employs 125,000 Canadians directly and almost another 500,000 in related industries. Carney says it is appropriate that he and Trump speak on the phone. The two have not spoken since Carney was sworn in March 14.

The Associated Press is returning to a Washington courtroom Thursday to ask a judge to restore its full access to presidential events. That's weeks after the White House retaliated against the news outlet last month for not following President Trump's executive order to rename the Gulf of Mexico.

In a previous hearing last month, U.S. District Court Judge Trevor N. McFadden refused the AP's request for an injunction to stop the White House from barring reporters and photographers from events in the Oval Office and Air Force One. He urged the Trump administration to reconsider its ban before Thursday's hearing. It hasn't.

The AP has said it needs to take a stand against Trump's team for punishing a news organization for using speech that it doesn't like. The news outlet said it would still refer to the Gulf of Mexico in its style guidance to clients around the world, while also noting that Trump has renamed it the Gulf of America. The White House said it has the right to decide who gets to question the president.

"For anyone who thinks the Associated Press's lawsuit against President Trump's White House is about the name of a body of water, think bigger," Julie Pace, the AP's executive editor, wrote in an op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal. "It's really about whether the government can control what you say."

The president has dismissed the AP as a group of "radical left lunatics" and said that "we're going to keep them out until such time as they agree that it's the Gulf of America."