Last Week Today Episode 204 Show Notes for Monday, July 1st, 2025
Happy Canada Day, Canada Scraps Digital Services Tax, Feds Remove “Some” Interprovincial Trade Barriers, USAID Shuttered, the "One Big, Beautiful Bill" & Don’t Overstay Your Visa!
Happy Canada Day
Canada marked its 158th birthday on July 1st, 2025, with nationwide events, including multicultural festivals, fireworks, and community gatherings in cities like Halifax, Windsor, and Ottawa.
The June 20th, 2025 Ottawa Citizen post, “Canada Day tourism season looks strong as bookings climb in Ottawa,” notes an increased visitors to Canada’s capital, partly due to Canadians opting for domestic travel amid US trade threats.
Canada’s national broadcaster devoted the day to covering the various festivities across the country and waxing poetic over existential trade threats from the US, Canadian identity, nationalism, and historical reflection.
For more on that, check out the twelve hour government funded extravaganza on the topic, the July 1st, 2025 CBC News on YouTube post, “Canada Day 2025: Celebrate from coast-to-coast | CBC News Special.”
In case we missed the obvious subtext of CBC’s coverage, often awkwardly pushing itself and government talking points while covering the traditional celebrations normally held across the country, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney also felt the need to tell us what we should be celebrating and why.
Here’s his rant, courtesy of the July 1st 2025 CBC News post, “FULL SPEECH: Mark Carney’s 1st Canada Day address.”
Carney isn’t the only Canadian sending a message out on Canada Day.
Here’s the July 1st, 2025 WakeUpCanadaNews on Bitchute post, “WUCN-Epi#294- Happy Canada Day 2025,” with more of the same, but from a more conservative and new media focused perspective.
Here’s another message celebrating Canada Day.
It’s an oldie but a goodie, from the iconic Canadian country and folk singer-songwriter, “Stomping” Tom Connors.
Connors was known for his staunchly Canadian focus, never touring outside the country and even returning Juno Awards (the Canadian equivalent of the American Grammy Awards) to protest the Canadian organization's perceived focus on artists who had relocated to the United States.
Connors contribution to Canada Day festivities comes by way of the March 8th, 2013 Maureen Teresa Ward on YouTube post, “Canada Day Up Canada Way.”
Also in the News this Week
Canada Scraps Digital Services Tax
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has announced the cancellation of Canada’s Digital Services Tax (DST).
As outlined in the June 27th, 2025 CBC News post, “What is Canada's digital services tax — and why does Trump dislike it so much?,” the 3% tax on revenue from digital services, online marketplaces, advertising, and user data sales, was supposed to kick in on Monday. The legislation targeted large, mostly US based firms with global revenues over €750 million and Canadian digital revenue exceeding $20 million.
Originally announced by the Trudeau Liberals in 2020, the legislation aimed to address tax loopholes for tech giants like Amazon and Google, with retroactive application from 2022. Facing US opposition and threats of trade retaliation, Canada canceled the DST on June 29, 2025, to resume trade talks, avoiding a $2 billion initial payment and potential economic fallout.
For more on the situation from a Canadian perspective, check out the June 30th, 2025 CITY News post, “Canada quickly rescinds digital services tax, in trade talks with U.S. again.”
U.S. President Donald Trump opposed the DST primarily because he viewed it as a discriminatory measure targeting American technology companies, such as Amazon, Google, Meta, Apple, and Uber.
The 3% tax, enacted in June 2024 and retroactive to 2022, imposed a $2 billion initial payment on these firms for revenue generated from Canadian users.
Trump called it a “direct and blatant attack” on the U.S., arguing it unfairly burdened American businesses. He also criticized Canada for mimicking European digital tax models, threatening trade retaliation, including tariffs, to pressure Canada into rescinding the DST.
As of 2024, around 30 countries, including 11 European states, have adopted or proposed DSTs, often modeled after France or the UK, to address tax challenges from digital giants lacking physical presence in the countries where they’re doing business.
As outlined in the June 28th, 2025 Al Jazeera post, “What was Canada’s digital tax that Trump threatened trade talks over?,” examples include:
France: Has a 3% tax on digital revenue from advertising, platforms, and data sales for firms with global revenue over €750 million and French revenue above €25 million.
United Kingdom: Has a 2% tax on social media, search engines, and marketplaces for companies with global revenue exceeding £500 million and UK revenue over £25 million.
Italy, Spain, Austria: Have 3-5% taxes on various digital services, with Austria focusing on online advertising (5%).
Turkey: A 7.5% tax on a broad range of digital services.
For a US focused overview of the situation, check out the June 30th, 2025 NBC News on YouTube post, “Canada rescinds digital services tax after Trump says US will halt trade talks.”
Feds Remove “Some” Interprovincial Trade Barriers
In other news this week, Internal Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland announced on June 30th, 2025, that the federal government is working to eliminate interprovincial trade barriers, fulfilling a promise made by PM Mark Carney to enhance internal free trade by Canada Day.
The June 30th, 2025 Bloomberg post, “All 53 federal exemptions in the Canada Free Trade Agreement that would inhibit interprovincial trade now removed: Freeland,” noted that:
In a statement, Freeland said Ottawa has now removed all 53 federal exemptions in the Canada Free Trade Agreement that would inhibit interprovincial trade. Prime Minister Mark Carney significantly reduced the number of federal barriers prior to the spring election, but there were still just shy of two dozen exemptions left in place, primarily for national security reasons.
According to the statement, most of the now-eliminated exceptions related to federal procurement rules, for example when it comes to financial entities, commercial land development, transportation services and space projects.
The news comes a day before the deadline Carney had promised, to eliminate internal trade barriers by Canada Day and in conjunction with the recent passing of the Liberals’ so-called One Canadian Economy Act (Bill C-5).
Reaction to the news has been mixed:
The Canadian Chamber of Commerce praised the removal of federal trade barriers as a “long-overdue modernization” of Canada’s internal trade framework according to the July 1st, 2025 Economic Times post, “Trade Minister Freeland announces removal of 53 federal trade barriers as Canada moves toward “one united economy” under Carney's vision.”
But some Canadians, as seen in posts on X, expressed skepticism about the announcement’s impact, noting that significant provincial barriers, such as Quebec’s language requirements and supply management in dairy, remain untouched.
For instance, a user (@shimjelly) called the announcement “mind-blowing” in its limitations, arguing that licensing and regulatory differences across provinces continue to hinder true free trade, suggesting the federal move is incomplete without provincial cooperation.
Reducing trade barriers could boost Canada’s economy by streamlining commerce across provinces, a long-standing issue.
For more in this, check out the February 5th, 2025 CBC News post, “Eliminating interprovincial trade barriers would grow GDP, domestic trade: Anand.”
USAID Shuttered
Also in the news this week, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) [1Capture15] has been officially shuttered, following President Trump’s February 7th announcement to dismantle it.
The move reflects a broader shift in U.S. foreign policy, prioritizing domestic interests and some have even been charged with corruption over their USAID activities:
On June 12, 2025, four individuals, including Roderick Watson, a USAID contracting officer, and three corporate executives (Walter Barnes, Darryl Britt, and Paul Young), pleaded guilty to a decade-long bribery scheme involving 14 USAID contracts worth over $550 million. Watson manipulated the procurement process to favor companies Apprio and Vistant, receiving bribes such as cash, NBA tickets, laptops, cell phones, a country club wedding, and jobs for relatives. The companies also faced civil investigations under the False Claims Act and entered deferred prosecution agreements.
On May 19, 2025, Stephen Paul Edmund Sutton, a UK citizen, was extradited, pleaded guilty, and was sentenced for conspiring to commit theft in a USAID-funded power distribution program in Pakistan. As a logistics operations manager, Sutton took kickbacks, defrauding the agency of nearly $100,000, receiving at least $21,000 personally. He was sentenced to time served and turned over to immigration authorities.
On April 29, 2025, Ruth Chisina Mufute, a former project director for a North Carolina-based nonprofit implementing USAID projects, was arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and four counts of wire fraud. From June 2014 to May 2023, Mufute allegedly defrauded the nonprofit of $240,000 by falsely claiming housing allowance benefits for a property she owned in South Africa.
On February 4, 2025, Nikhil Parekh, a driver for an IT asset disposition company contracted by USAID, pleaded guilty to conspiring to sell stolen government-issued smartphones, laptops, and other IT devices worth at least $10,000. From 2019 to 2023, Parekh and co-conspirators sold these assets instead of destroying them, issuing false certificates of destruction.
These cases confirm instances of corruption and theft within USAID’s operations, lending some credence to the allegations amplified by figures like Elon Musk and Donald Trump, who have called USAID a “criminal organization” and pushed for its closure.
But they also only reflect a fraction of USAID’s $40 billion dollar annual budget. Claims of systemic corruption, as seen in X posts, seem to be exaggerating the scope without additional evidence of agency-wide malfeasance.
For a contrary, legacy media overview on this story, check out the July1st, 2025 Associated Press on YouTube post, “USAID closes its doors after six decades.”
It’s also worth noting that Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB) with a $3.3–$3.9 trillion dollar debt increase, and a whole bunch of other line items, some good, some bad, is slowly moving forward towards being accepted by both the US House and Senate.
For more on that story, check out the July 1st, 2025 The Economist post, “Donald Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” explained.”
Don’t Overstay Your Visa
And finally tonight, here’s the June 28th, 2025 Mongo Minds on Bitchute post, “American Citizen Overstayed Her 180 Tourist Visa In Mexico.”
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