President Donald Trump’s threat to ban a Canadian aircraft manufacturer from the American market would be “a disaster” for workers in deep-red Kansas, the state’s Democratic Senate nominee warned Tuesday.
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“Everyone is upset about this!” Adam Hamilton told CNN’s Jake Tapper.
Trump threatened Canadian jetmaker Bombardier in a Truth Social post over the holiday weekend, saying the company must manufacture its aircraft in the United States to keep access to American buyers.
Bombardier maintains its U.S. headquarters in Wichita and employs more than 1,000 people in Kansas. Hamilton warned that many additional jobs depend upon those workers.
“A thousand, 1,200, 1,500 Kansas working for Bombardier, their headquarters in the United States in Wichita, and then every one of those has a whole series of other jobs that are dependent upon them,” Hamilton said. “It’s a disaster.”
Hamilton, a former pastor who is challenging Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS), also criticized his opponent’s response to Trump’s threat. He argued that Marshall should have challenged the president, but instead offered only a “tepid response.”
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“He should have been fighting for the people of Kansas, not fighting for the president and his erratic way of imposing tariffs and threatening our best trading partners,” Hamilton said Tuesday.
Hamilton also warned that the state’s trade relationship with Canada could be jeopardized.
“Four billion dollars’ worth of trade comes from Kansas into Canada every year, and this is at risk,” Hamilton said.
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“It’s a no-win for Kansas,” he concluded.
