What’s in a name? Trump’s 'Lake America' move gets a tit-for-tat response from Canada

Canada is responding to a growing dispute with US President Donald Trump by removing his name from a street in the Canadian capital. Ottawa City Council voted unanimously on Wednesday night to begin the process of renaming Trump Avenue, a residential street in the Central Park neighbourhood. The street will keep its current name until a new name is selected, with residents expected to form a committee to decide on the replacement. The change is expected to take effect next year.

Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe said the decision was linked to Trump's increasingly strained relationship with Canada. "I don't like the idea of anything that's named for Donald Trump, who's demonstrated hostility towards Canada, in our city," Mayor Mark Sutcliffe said. Trump Avenue is located in an area where several streets are named after places associated with New York, Trump's hometown.

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The move comes as relations between Canada and the United States have deteriorated amid disputes over trade and Trump's repeated comments about Canada potentially becoming the 51st US state. The latest tensions have also centered on the name of Lake Ontario. Trump signed an executive order directing the US government to rename the lake ‘Lake America’ for federal purposes. The order requires US federal agencies to update maps, documents and geographic databases to reflect the new name. "We're going to be changing the name of Lake Ontario effective immediately to Lake America," the 80-year-old Republican told reporters in the Oval Office.

The executive order applies to US federal government usage and cannot by itself require Canada, international organizations or other countries to adopt the new name. The Lake America move came amid an escalating trade dispute between Washington and Ottawa. Trump has imposed tariffs on Canadian goods, while Canada has responded with its own trade measures.

The dispute over the lake's name has added another symbolic point of tension between the two neighboring countries, while Ottawa's decision to remove Trump's name from a residential street provides a separate Canadian response to the increasingly strained bilateral relationship.