WASHINGTON — Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney made clear Tuesday he wanted to defuse tensions with the United States, even after President Donald Trump feigned ignorance at the many reasons for his newly elected counterpart’s visit.

Carney made clear during an Oval Office meeting that he would be open to mending the countries’ wounded alliance, which has been complicated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats. Congressional Democrats remain perplexed by his actions toward a once-close ally.

Trump said the two leaders and countries have “a lot of things in common” but acknowledged shortly after Carney arrived that the duo had some “tough points to go over.” After the Canadian leader declared that his country would never be on the selling block, Trump would not rule out a potentially forced union.

Carney, following the example of other world leaders since Trump returned to power, started with some praise, calling his American counterpart a “transformational president” who was merely trying to bolster the U.S. economy and protect American workers. The Canadian leader, however, lived up to his campaign rhetoric when he said Canada was not for sale.

Notably, during an Oval Office session with reporters, Trump appeared to pour some cold water on the recent tensions, saying: “Regardless of anything, we’re gonna be friends with Canada.”

Here are three takeaways from the high-stakes meeting:

‘Very friendly conversation’

During the raucous Oval Office session, Trump was asked if there was anything Carney could say to convince him to stop “tariffing Canada.” The mercantilist American president replied: “No.”

“But this is not necessarily a one-day deal,” he added. “This is over a period of time. They have to make that decision.”

Trump did noticeably attempt to cast the talks as civil.

“This is not going to be like we had another little blow-up with somebody else,” he said appearing to refer to his Oval Office argument with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in February. “This is a very friendly conversation.

“But we want to make our own cars. We don’t really want cars from Canada, and we put tariffs on cars from Canada. And at a certain point, it won’t make economic sense for Canada to build those cars,” the former real estate tycoon said. “And we don’t want steel from Canada because we’re making our own steel, and we’re having massive steel plants being built right now as we speak. We really don’t want Canadian steel, and we don’t want Canadian aluminum and various other things, because we want to be able to do it ourselves.”

To be sure, things had already taken an awkward turn ahead of Carney’s West Wing visit, which also included a private working lunch and another private leaders’ meeting. Asked Monday to set his expectation for Carney’s first Washington visit as prime minister, Trump told reporters: “I don’t know. He’s coming to see me. I’m not sure what he wants to see me about, but I guess he wants to make a deal. Everybody does.”

On Tuesday morning, the familiar red and white maple leaf flag of America’s northern neighbor flew above Blair House, the White House’s official guest residence located just across Pennsylvania Avenue. It was an odd image, considering Trump’s repeated threats about — somehow — making Canada the 51st U.S. state.

Private-sector intelligence firm Oxford Analytica, in a May 2 forecast email, said its analysts expect Carney to “pursue a moderate, centre-right agenda and will seek early negotiations with Washington over the Canada-U.S. economic relationship.”

‘Not for sale’

A deal-minded Carney gave no indication Tuesday he would back down from his declaration during his victory speech last week that Canada would never give in to Trump’s talk of annexing it.

Here was the Canadian prime minister in his April 29 speech: “America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country. But these are not idle threats. President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us. That will never, that will never ever happen.”

Here was Carney on Tuesday: “If I may, as you know, from real estate, there are some places that are never for sale. We’re sitting in one right now. You know Buckingham Palace, [which] you visited, as well. And, having met with the owners of Canada over the course of the campaign the last several months, it’s not for sale and won’t be for sale.”

But Trump did give Carney credit for what the prime minister said next on a potential U.S. annexation.

“The opportunity is in the partnership and what we can build together. We have done that in the past, and part of that, as the president just said, is with respect to our own security,” Carney said. “And my government is committed for a step change in our investment in Canadian security. … And I’ll say this as well, that the president has revitalized international security, revitalized NATO, and us playing our full weight in NATO.”

But Trump did not back down, either.

“I do feel it’s much better for Canada,” he said of the country becoming the 51st state. “But we’re not going to be discussing that unless somebody wants to discuss it. I think that there are tremendous benefits to the Canadian citizens — tremendously lower taxes, free military, which, honestly, we give you essentially anyway, because we’re protecting Canada — if you had a problem,” Trump said as Carney looked on with a serious expression.

“It would really be a wonderful marriage, because it’s two places that get along very well,” Trump said, before later adding: “Time will tell. It’s only time, but I say, ‘Never say never.'”

Aides aggravation

Trump spent much of his first term dealing with higher-than-normal rates of White House and administration turnover. This time, he has mostly praised his second-term team — until Tuesday, when he flashed some frustration over what his aides have described as a wave of upcoming trade deals with other countries.

“I think my people haven’t made it clear,” he told reporters. “We will sign some deals. But much bigger than that, we will put down the price … that people are going to have to pay to shop in the United States.”

“This is the market where everyone wants to be,” the president said, mentioning several times on Tuesday that the American consumer market was such a draw that other nations would soon fall in line.

Yet, during an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” that aired Sunday, Trump said Americans should purchase fewer goods: “I don’t think that a beautiful baby girl … that’s 11 years old needs to have 30 dolls. I think they can have three dolls or four dolls because what we were doing with China was just unbelievable. We had a trade deficit of hundreds of billions of dollars with China.”

Lawmakers were inevitably watching the Trump-Carney meeting closely.

Last month, four Senate Republicans joined Democrats in the chamber in voting in favor of a measure from Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., that would end the Canada tariffs. The measure almost certainly will never be brought up in the Republican-controlled House.

During a floor speech the day after Carney was elected, Senate Foreign Relations member Chris Coons, D-Del., said that “Trump was the issue” during the recent Canadian election.

“[Canadians] elected a new prime minister, Mark Carney, who ran on a platform of standing up to America, of standing up to Donald Trump,” Coons said. “Look, folks, the actions [Trump has] taken, in slashing foreign aid, in abandoning decades-old bipartisan programs around the world that save lives, and that help other countries to trust and rely on us, have weakened us abroad and created openings for our pacing threat: the People’s Republic of China.”

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