The White House celebrated the United States’ victory over Canada in the men’s hockey final at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics with a political message, sharing a social media post showing a bald eagle attacking two geese that symbolize their respective countries.
Sunday’s image was in response to a 2025 post by then-Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that said, “You can’t take away our country and you can’t take away our game.”
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Prime Minister Trudeau’s statement came after Canada’s victory over the United States in the Four-nation Hockey Tournament, at a time when US President Donald Trump has regularly advocated for Canada to become the 51st US state.
Canadian politicians did not comment directly on the White House post, which came after the United States won Olympic gold following a 2-1 sudden-death overtime victory in Italy, but journalists and other observers criticized the Trump administration’s tone.
Stewart Prest, a political science professor at the University of British Columbia, responded to the post by writing, “Stay classy, America.”
Journalist David Rider responded to the White House post, highlighting the decline in the number of Canadians visiting the United States.
“As President Trump and the White House gloat, there should be a scoreboard tallying up the billions of Canadian tourism dollars lost to the U.S. faster than the border states and Florida and Las Vegas can roll out their ‘Come Back and We Love You’ campaigns,” Ryder wrote in X.
After the United States’ victory on Sunday, President Trump posted on his Truth Social platform: “Congratulations to our great USA ice hockey team. They won the gold medal. Wow!”
“Many wins!!! President Donald J. Trump,” he added.
US and Canada tensions
Hockey games between Canada and the United States are always filled with good-natured banter between fans, but Sunday’s game comes amid months of political tension between the neighboring countries.
Immediately after the 2024 presidential election, Mr. Trump began floating the idea of annexing Canada to become the country’s 51st province, prompting condemnation from Canadian politicians.
When he took office early last year, he quickly made it clear that he viewed Ottawa, historically one of Washington’s closest allies, as a rival.
Throughout the past year, President Trump has often pointed to the U.S. trade deficit with its northern neighbor and imposed or threatened to impose additional tariffs on Canada.
Most recently, the U.S. president threatened to impose 100 percent tariffs on Canadian imports to punish Ottawa for signing a trade deal with China.
At the World Economic Forum in Davos last month, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney harshly criticized Trump without mentioning the US president by name.
He argued that a world order that accepts American hegemony in exchange for “public goods” produced by Washington (which he called “bargains”) no longer works.
“Let me be frank: We are not in a transition, we are in the middle of a discontinuity,” Carney said.
“Over the past two decades, a series of crises in finance, health, energy, and geopolitics have exposed the risks of extreme global integration. But more recently, great powers have begun to use economic integration as a weapon, tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, (and) supply chains as vulnerabilities to exploit.”
During last year’s campaign, Carney shot an ad with comedian Mike Myers, in which they both wore Team Canada hockey gear.
Meyer’s shirt read “Never 51.”
President Trump seemed to take a special interest in Sunday’s game, sharing three different posts about it.
Meanwhile, the White House’s X account shared seven posts about the US victory.
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, who is facing calls to resign after suggesting he would not oppose Israel’s expansion into much of the Middle East, has steered the conversation in a very different direction.
“What? Is the man who scored the goal that won America’s first gold medal in hockey since 1980 Jewish? Oh my god. I’m sure the Jew haters will say Mossad was behind it!” Huckabee wrote in a social media post.
“We would like to congratulate America on this great victory and thank Jack Hughes for his love for America and his teammates!”
Secretary Carney expressed pride in his country’s Olympic performance, including that of the hockey team.
“You will go home with 21 hard-fought Olympic medals, but what Canadians will remember most is that you wore the Maple Leaf with pride, grit and determination,” he told X.
Congressman Randy Fine, an ally of President Trump who has made racist and Islamophobic comments, responded to Carney’s message with “Congratulations, Governor,” as if the prime minister were the leader of an American state rather than a sovereign nation.
Last year, Mr. Trump regularly referred to Mr. Carney’s predecessor, Mr. Trudeau, as “the governor.”
