Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Tuesday said he spoke to US President Donald Trump on Monday but denied he had retracted comments last week that irritated the US President.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Carney "was very aggressively walking back" some of the remarks he made during a speech in Davos in which he urged nations to accept the end of a rules-based global order.

Asked by reporters whether he had walked back the comments, Carney said "No".

That contrasts with Bessent, who told Fox News that Carney was “aggressively walking back” his remarks during the call.

While warning that the tariff would be “a disaster for Canada,” Bessent emphasised that the president’s recent conversation with Carney suggested a shift in tone from the Canadian leader.

"I was in the Oval (Office) with the president today. He spoke to Prime Minister Carney, who was very aggressively walking back some of the unfortunate remarks he made at Davos," Bessent said.

Carney said Trump phoned him on Monday and they had a “very good conversation” that touched on Ukraine, Venezuela and Arctic security. He stressed that his message to the president was consistent with the one he delivered in Switzerland last week.

“To be absolutely clear, and I said this to the president, I meant what I said in Davos,” Carney told reporters in Ottawa.

“Canada was the first country to understand the change in US trade policy that he initiated, and we’re responding to that. We’re responding positively by building partnerships abroad, building at home and prepared to respond positively by building that new relationship with CUSMA. He understood that.”

CUSMA is the acronym often used by Canadian officials for the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement, the trade deal Trump agreed to during his first term.

In his speech at the World Economic Forum, Carney declared the international rules‑based order a “fiction” that is now effectively dead, urging mid‑sized nations to build new systems of cooperation and resist economic coercion by aggressive superpowers.

Carney said he walked Trump through Canada’s push to diversify trade — “12 new deals, four continents, in six months” — including Ottawa’s new tariff-relief deal with China and the opportunity to advance USMCA

“This is the context of our discussion: what Canada is doing positively to build new partnerships around the world,” he said.

Trump threatened 100 per cent tariffs on Canadian goods on Saturday if Canada “makes a deal with China.” Carney has emphasized that Canada is not seeking a free-trade deal with Beijing and the recent agreement is focused on lowering certain tariff barriers.