Carney taps business executive Mark Wiseman to serve as Canada's ambassador to the U.S.

Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Monday that business executive Mark Wiseman will serve as Canada's ambassador to the U.S.

Wiseman, a longtime friend of the prime minister who has held senior roles at some of the country's largest pension funds, takes over for the departing Kirsten Hillman on Feb. 15, 2026.

Wiseman is headed to Washington at a pivotal time for Canada-U.S. relations. In the months since U.S. President Donald Trump launched his trade war on Canada, the relationship has been badly frayed.

"Mark Wiseman brings immense experience, contacts, and deep commitment at this crucial time of transformation of our relationship with the United States. As a core member of our negotiating team, he will help advance the interests of Canadian workers, businesses, and institutions, while building opportunities for both Canada and the United States," Carney said in a statement.

Wiseman will be tasked with helping lead the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) review talks, which are expected to get underway in the new year. As part of those discussions, Wiseman will try and help broker some relief from the punishing tariffs Trump has imposed on goods coming from some key Canadian sectors, like steel, aluminum, autos and lumber.

Trump's trade representative, Jamieson Greer, has already laid out what he expects to see from Canada to successfully broker an extension of that crucial pact, including changes to supply management as well as laws that protect Canadian culture, which U.S. tech giants have strenuously opposed.

Wiseman is no stranger to these irritants. Among Carney's first decisions after being sworn in earlier this year was naming Wiseman to the Prime Minister’s Council on Canada-U.S. Relations, a body first created by former prime minister Justin Trudeau just as Trump was about to be sworn in as president for the second time.

Wiseman's past public musings on supply management make him a controversial pick in some circles, notably in Quebec, where there is a contingent of politically active dairy farmers determined to keep that regime in place.

Wiseman previously said supply management, which protects the domestic dairy industry from some imports and guarantees farmers a minimum price for their products, benefits a "group of settled players," impedes innovation and keeps "prices artificially high for Canadian consumers."

Those comments have prompted concern that Wiseman will be a half-hearted defender of supply management when Trump and his team put it on the table for negotiation.

Speaking to reporters earlier this month amid reports Wiseman could get the U.S. job, Pascal Paradis, a Parti Québécois member of the Quebec's National Assembly, said his nomination would be "unacceptable" for Quebec.

"The Parti Québécois will never accept the nomination of Mark Wiseman as Canada's ambassador to the U.S. Why? Because Mark Wiseman is not a friend of the Quebec nation," Paradis said in a news conference in Quebec City.

Still, Carney himself has been adamant that supply management is safe on his watch.

"We've been clear about our approach to supply management. We continue to stand by that. We will continue to protect supply management," the prime minister said at a news conference last week after Greer's conditions for the CUSMA review were released.