(Bloomberg Businessweek) -- A new front in Donald Trump’s trade wars could be the Detroit River and the bridge across it. Opened in 1929, the Ambassador Bridge is a critical trade artery linking the U.S. and Canada. About $100 billion in commerce crosses it annually, a figure just shy of U.S. trade with the U.K. Now the fight to replace the aging span has reached the Oval Office.
Both the Canadian government and the bridge’s private U.S. owners, the Moroun family, plan to build rival bridges not far from where the Ambassador connects downtown Detroit with Windsor, Ont. The race has been marked by bad blood and court battles, spanning successive governments in the U.S. and Canada. Patriotic themes suffuse both campaigns. The Canadian bridge is dubbed “the Gordie” after ice hockey icon Gordie Howe. Meanwhile, the Morouns have been appealing to Trump’s Buy American instincts, asking him to intervene. Matthew Moroun—who took over his family’s transport company from his father, the combative, publicity-averse Matty Moroun—wants Trump to rescind a key waiver granted by Barack Obama in 2012 that exempted the Canadian bridge from having to use only U.S. steel.
The saga might get more interesting. Among the bidders vying to build the Gordie is a consortium including Aecon Group Inc., whose proposed takeover by a Chinese company is being reviewed by Justin Trudeau’s government on national security grounds. That raises the prospect of a bridge being built into Detroit by a Chinese company, for the Canadian government, under an exemption from Buy American rules, and over complaints from a U.S. company.
Ending the steel exemption would disrupt plans for Canada’s bridge—perhaps fatally. The Gordie is already more expensive than the bridge the Morouns are planning. The Canadian span has been estimated to cost $3.1 billion. The Morouns say their bridge, which would be a six-lane span next to the four-lane Ambassador, would cost $1 billion; they’ve already spent $500 million. Matthew Moroun argues the Gordie is unnecessary and will never recoup its costs, and that Canada has used its government agencies to undercut U.S. business. “As an American company, we feel like we’re being abused,” says Dan Stamper, president of the Moroun-owned Detroit International Bridge Co., which owns the old bridge.
The Ambassador is something of a monopoly—the only crossing in the corridor that can accommodate all traffic. A tunnel under the river is owned by the cities of Detroit and Windsor, but most big rigs don’t fit in it. The Morouns bought a controlling interest in the bridge in 1979, prompting litigation with Canada that was settled in 1990. The family collects tolls in exchange for maintaining the bridge, an unusual arrangement for such a crucial infrastructure link.
Plans for the Gordie ramped up under former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who sparred regularly with the Morouns. His minister of transport, Lisa Raitt, called the bridge issue “the most litigious file I had.” She says the Ambassador is crumbling and calls it “a farce of a border crossing,” adding she thinks the Morouns’ goal was to pursue building a new span to head off Canada’s project and avoid losing toll revenue. “The Morouns are not building the bridge, give me a break,” she says. (Matthew invited Raitt to watch the company break ground.) The younger Moroun hopes Trudeau will eventually decide not to proceed with the Gordie.
That doesn’t sound like Ottawa’s intention. Trudeau’s infrastructure minister, Amarjeet Sohi, says Canada has bought almost 85 percent of the land needed for the Gordie (the Morouns own some of the remainder) and will choose a builder by June. Sohi says Canada is “proceeding as the initial agreement is designed” and isn’t planning on losing its Buy American waiver. Minister of Transport Marc Garneau doubled down. “We need two bridges. We’re going to build ours, the Gordie Howe, and the Ambassador Bridge can be built providing they meet certain conditions,” he says. “We’re not going to change that.”
Traffic across the Ambassador has fallen 44 percent since 2000. The Morouns nonetheless say they’re ready to start building this summer. Sohi also wants to start the Gordie this year. But the Morouns say Canada is sabotaging them with a poison pill included in the terms to approve their new bridge: a requirement to tear down the old Ambassador. Moroun says that condition was explicitly meant to delay his project by restarting environmental reviews the family needs to begin construction. But there’s little sign the U.S. will intervene. A spokesman for Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross says the secretary supports growth in that corridor and “understands the importance of robust transportation infrastructure” to U.S.-Canada trade.
Most people just want something built. Canadian lawmaker Brian Masse, who represents a district in Windsor, cites a series of disputes with the Morouns that have riled Canada’s side of the river. “It is a microdrama that seems to be dragging the entire North American continent’s supply chain downhill,” he says. “I just wish that we could actually get to building a bridge.” —With Jennifer Jacobs
To contact the author of this story: Josh Wingrove in Ottawa at jwingrove4@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Matthew Philips at mphilips3@bloomberg.net.
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