Canadian Trade Official LeBlanc says USTR Greer has acted in good faith, via CNBC
- There were problems around the French langauge in negotiations.
Public attestations of counterpart good faith are a standard feature of live trade negotiations and have historically carried more weight as atmospherics than as substance; the tell has usually been whether officials move from tone to named sticking points, which is the case here with a language and drafting dispute surfacing in the US-Canada channel. Episodes of this kind tend to follow a familiar sequence: personal rapport language first, then leakage of specific frictions, then either a framework text or an escalation in rhetoric. The Canadian side has a track record of maintaining cordial public framing toward Washington counterparts even through acrimonious phases, so warm characterizations alone have not been a reliable signal of proximity to a deal. A linguistic and translation snag in drafting is a genuine but second-order obstacle in bilateral texts, and disputes of that type have typically been resolved at the technical level rather than derailing political talks. What matters next is whether working-level schedules or text exchanges are announced, since procedural follow-through has historically separated constructive framing from stalling. For the currency, CAD has tended to trade off concrete tariff and quota outcomes rather than negotiation colour.