Canada approves latest Gulfstream business jet after Trump tariff threat
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Canadian regulators have approved Gulfstream’s latest business jet, less than a month after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened new tariffs on planes being shipped north of the border.
Transport Canada certified the Georgia-based company’s G700 and G800 jets on Monday, eight days after giving the green light to two older Gulfstream models, according to a departmental document.
trump Warning was given last month Unless the government approves four Gulfstream luxury planes, it will decertify all planes made in Canada and impose tariffs on them, marking the latest escalation in trade tensions between the two countries.
The approval from Transport Canada comes despite de-icing concerns raised by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which granted conditional certification to the G700 and G800 through 2024.
The FAA said General Dynamics-owned Gulfstream has until the end of this year to prove that the two types of aircraft operate properly “under potential operating conditions where ice could form in the fuel system,” according to the temporary waiver granted through 2024.
Experts had cast doubt on Trump’s ability to certify planes — normally the responsibility of the FAA, not the Oval Office — in a proposed move that would be a blow to aircraft manufacturers, airlines and travelers on both sides of the border.
Historically, the flying of the planes has been strictly safety-related by regulators, such as when the Boeing 737 Max 8 was banned from the skies for 20 months during the first Trump administration. Aviation authorities around the world issued the directive after a deadly crash in March 2019 that killed all 157 people on board an Ethiopian Airlines flight in the second of two MAX crashes less than five months apart.
Transport Canada has certified the American-made Gulfstream G500 and G600 business jets, according to a document posted on the federal government’s website. The jets were at the center of an aviation controversy last month with US President Donald Trump accusing Canada of ‘illegally’ refusing to certify several Gulfstream models. Trump threatened to impose 50 per cent tariffs on Canadian aircraft, including Bombardier jets, and said his administration would ‘decertify’ them. He has not followed through on his threat.
In a Truth Social post on January 29, Trump took aim at Bombardier, threatening to ground all Canadian-made planes and impose a 50 per cent tariff on them. White House officials later clarified that the effective ban on Canadian-made aircraft from U.S. skies would apply only to new aircraft, rather than the more than 5,400 Canadian-made aircraft and helicopters registered in the United States.
Bombardier and Gulfstream are head-to-head rivals, with the Global Series battling for market share against Gulfstream’s latest models.
Any blow to Bombardier would be a blow to American companies as well.
Bombardier said it employed 3,000 people at nine locations south of the border and had 2,800 U.S. suppliers. The company’s jets typically contain at least 40 percent American content.
Meanwhile, the US enjoys a large trade surplus with Canada in aerospace, meaning the general trade imbalance that Trump has cited to justify other levies does not apply.
Aircraft made in Canada include Bombardier luxury jets, de Havilland Canada Twin Otters and water bombers, A220 single-aisle jets made by French aerospace giant Airbus and helicopters from Texas-based Bell Textron.
