Making good on his threat, President Trump signed an executive order renaming Lake Ontario to Lake America amid his trade war with Canada.
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CNBC News reported that just before he signed the executive order on Thursday, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, “We’re going to be changing the name of Lake Ontario, effective immediately, to Lake America.”
One of the White House officials also told the world leader that the executive will direct current Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to update the Geographic Names Information System to ‘reflect that lake once known as Lake Ontario will, from this day forward, be known as Lake America.”
The official White House X account also confirmed the news. “EFFECTIVELY IMMEDIATELY: Lake Ontario is renamed to LAKE AMERICA!” the post read, with an American flag emoji.
Trump also stated in the Oval Office that his body-of-water name-changing may not stop at Lake American and the Gulf of America.
“If you think about it, we have a gulf, and we have a lake. Now, all we need is an ocean,” he said. “So, maybe we’ll have to change the name of the Atlantic and/or the Pacific. Maybe we’ll change them both.”
To show he was proud of his executive order, Trump posted numerous AI images, featuring him dancing to a Lake America sign and a photo of Canadian geese with blonde hair similar to his hairstyle marching with guns. An American flag is seen in the background.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney Speaks Out About Trump’s Lake-Changing Executive Order
Meanwhile, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney took to X to speak out about Trump’s decision to rename Lake Ontario.
“The name Lake Ontario comes from the Wendat word Ontari’io, which, appropriately, means ‘the lake is beautiful, the lake is big,’” he stated. “The name is more than 400 years old, predating both the Confederation of Canada and the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America.”
The fellow world leader further shared, “We know that America is changing. Their trading relationships, their foreign policies, their national monuments, their hydronyms. Canadians also know that naming reality means calling it Lake Ontario – then, now and always.”
Along with the Canadian prime minister, the president of Seneca Nation, J. Conrad Seneca, slammed Trump’s order.
“The President cannot assert ownership over our culture or erase it through irresponsible political action,” he shared in a statement. “His order should be rescinded, and the name Lake Ontario should be left as it is, reflective of the Seneca people, other Haudenosaunee nations, and all Indigenous people surrounding the lake.”
“To us, Lake Ontario is not a political pawn,” the statement further noted. “It does not separate the countries of the United States and Canada. It is all Indigenous land, which has been occupied by Indigenous people since time immemorial.”
Trump previously used an executive order to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.
When asked what message he was sending by renaming the Great Lake, Trump initially said there was “no message.” However, he then declared, “Canada has been ripping us off for a long time on trade.”