Canada claps back at Trump's efforts to rename Lake Ontario as 'Lake America'

Ontario Premier Doug Ford, right, and Niagara West Member of Provincial Parliament Sam Oosterhoff unveil a sign for Lake Ontario at the Fifty Point Conservation Area in Grimsby, Ontario, Canada, on Saturday, Aug. 29, 2026. (Keito Newman/The Canadian Press via AP) Keito Newman/The Canadian Press/AP hide caption

Ontario Premier Doug Ford unveiled a giant billboard on the Canadian shoreline on Saturday, with the message "Lake Ontario — Now and Always," hitting back at President Trump's efforts to rename the lake "Lake America." The sign, written in both English and French, was put up near the U.S. border, along a major road many Americans travel on when visiting Canada.

"President Trump can call it whatever he wants, but I can tell you the rest of the world will always call it Lake Ontario," Doug Ford told reporters .

"We're resilient and we're strong Canadians who are always going to protect our sovereignty, always, and we'll never ever back down from a bully, ever."

Ford echoed Canada's prime minister Mark Carney who last week said in a post on X, "Canadian women and men … know that things must be called by their name, and this lake is called Lake Ontario — today and forever."

President Trump signed an executive order last week directing the federal government to rename the lake, which sits between New York and Canada. It's the latest in his escalating dispute with Canada, and follows a similar move from the president last year to rename the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of America .

"We have a gulf, and we have a lake, now all we need is an ocean," Trump told reporters at the Oval Office signing.

Trump went on to say he was renaming the lake because trade talks with Canada had gone badly.