HE HAS A SHARPIE, CANADA HAS THE LOCKS
Trump’s “Lake America” stunt overlooks one rather large Canadian detail: the locks controlling the route are not located at Mar-a-Lago
By Rob McConnell – Friday, August 28, 2026
President Donald Trump apparently believes that possessing a pen, a map and an executive order gives him the power to rename Lake Ontario “Lake America.”
It does not.
Trump’s order may instruct American federal agencies to use his invented name inside the United States, but it cannot rename Canada’s portion of the lake, compel Canadians to recognize it or erase a name with Indigenous roots stretching back centuries. Even some prominent Americans have dismissed the change. In other words, Trump has not conquered geography—he has merely issued new instructions to American mapmakers.
Perhaps before reaching for his famous marker, the president should have spent a few minutes studying how ships actually travel between the Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean.
Let us begin in St. Catharines, Ontario, where the Welland Canal allows ships to bypass Niagara Falls and travel between Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. The canal contains eight locks—and every one of them is Canadian.
Not four Canadian locks and four American locks.
Not seven Canadian locks and one little Trump lock with gold-plated doors.
Eight Canadian locks, operated in Canada.
According to the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation, the 43-kilometre Welland Canal raises and lowers ships between the two lakes through a remarkable Canadian engineering system. Without it, large commercial vessels cannot simply sail around the corner and continue on their way. Niagara Falls presents what might politely be described as a significant navigational inconvenience.
Then there is the Montreal-to-Lake Ontario section of the St. Lawrence Seaway. That portion contains seven locks: five in Canada and two in the United States. The first upbound locks are St. Lambert and Côte Sainte-Catherine, located on Montreal’s South Shore in Quebec.
That means ships travelling from the Atlantic toward the Great Lakes must pass through Canadian-controlled infrastructure before ever reaching Lake Ontario. Ships travelling from the upper Great Lakes toward the Atlantic must also navigate the Welland Canal and the locks along the St. Lawrence system.
This does not mean Canada should recklessly close the Seaway or selectively block American vessels. The Seaway is a binational transportation system governed by laws, treaties and decades of cooperation. Closing it as political retaliation would injure Canadian ports, workers, farmers, manufacturers and communities along with American interests.
But the geography delivers an important lesson: Canada is not powerless, irrelevant or merely a decorative border surrounding Donald Trump’s latest imaginary possession.
Trump may have a Sharpie, but Canada has the locks.
Perhaps someone in the White House might gently explain that before the president begins another round of cartographic arts and crafts.
The United States cannot turn a shared international lake into exclusively American territory by changing the wording on its federal maps. It cannot erase Canadian sovereignty with an executive order. Most importantly, it should not confuse Canada’s preference for cooperation with an absence of strength.
For generations, Canada and the United States have jointly operated one of the world’s greatest inland navigation systems. That partnership was built through engineering, diplomacy, mutual respect and an understanding that neither country owns the Great Lakes outright.
Trump’s juvenile renaming stunt mocks that history.
If the president genuinely wants to understand who “has whom by the short and curlies,” as the old expression goes, he might begin by locating St. Catharines and Montreal on his map. Then he could count the Canadian locks through which vessels must travel.
He may need to remove the Sharpie from his hand first.
Mr. President, Lake Ontario is not a Trump hotel, a golf course or a ballroom waiting for your name to be attached to it. You cannot purchase it, annex it, decorate it in gold or rename it simply because Canada refused to bow to your demands.
It was Lake Ontario before Donald Trump entered politics.
It is Lake Ontario today.
And long after his executive orders, tariffs, tantrums and oversized signatures have been consigned to history, it will remain Lake Ontario.
Canada knows its geography.
Perhaps it is time the President of the United States learned his.