Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau taunted Donald Trump after Canada defeated the United States 3-2 in overtime to win the 4 Nations ice hockey competition. On X, formerly Twitter, Trudeau wrote: "You can't take our country – and you can't take our game." The post went viral receiving more than 31,000 retweets and 4.8 million views.
Before the match Trump goaded the Canadians on his Truth Social website, sending a message to the U.S. team "to spur them on towards victory tonight against Canada" which "will someday, maybe soon, become our cherished, and very important, Fifty First State." Trump also once again referred to the Canadian prime minister as "Governor Trudeau." Similar comments were made by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt who said: "We look forward to the United States beating our soon to be 51st state."
In recent months Trump has repeatedly called on Canada to join the American Union as its 51st state, though a YouGov poll found 77 percent of Canadians oppose the idea. Prior to the match in Boston some fans booed the Canadian national anthem, after the American anthem was booed in Montreal during a previous 4 Nations game on February 15.
The Canadian anthem was sung by Chantal Kreviazuk who changed the lyrics from "in all of us command" to "that only us command" to protest Trump's 51st state comments. Speaking to The Associated Press Kreviazuk said she made the change "because I believe in democracy, and a sovereign nation should not have to be defending itself against tyranny and fascism."
Canada's winning goal was scored by Connor McDavid, following a pass from Mitch Marner. Speaking after the game McDavid said: "It's not an Olympic gold medal but it means the world to our group. Everybody battled so hard. It was special. It wasn't necessarily the prettiest but we found a way."
