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In a recent article about the strained U.S. relationships with other countries, Time Magazine included a made-up quote from Canadian satire site The Beaverton — seemingly as fact.
In the Oct. 1 article, there’s a section that references U.S. Ambassador to Canada Pete Hoekstra’s recent appearance at an event hosted by the Halifax Chamber of Commerce.
At the event, Hoekstra voiced his disappointment with the anti-American sentiment that’s spread across Canada in light of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs and his quips about Canada becoming the 51st state.
Time quoted Hoekstra: “‘A Canada that it would be very easy to target with 500% steel tariffs, or one patriot missile aimed at Parliament Hill,’ he added, rather incredulously.'”
Except Hoekstra didn’t say that — The Beaverton, a satirical news site in Canada akin to The Onion, made it up for this article titled, “US Ambassador threatens to tariff, annex, and bomb Canada if anti-American sentiment doesn’t improve.”
Hoekstra’s team confirmed to CBC News that the quote isn’t real.
“The statement attributed to Ambassador Hoekstra by Time Magazine is a fabrication. The ambassador did not make this statement,” Ottawa U.S. Embassy spokesperson Ariel Pollock wrote in an email.
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“That’s absolutely a made-up quote,” The Beaverton’s Ian MacIntyre told CBC News.
Time Magazine issued a correction on Friday after CBC News reached out for comment. “The original version of this story incorrectly attributed a quote from a satirical site to Pete Hoekstra, the U.S. Ambassador to Canada,” the correction says at the end of the original article.
MacIntyre said that when he wrote the piece, he was riffing off of Hoekstra’s “unnecessarily provocative comments.”
At the Halifax Chamber of Commerce event, the ambassador repeatedly expressed displeasure with Canadian attitudes toward the U.S., saying, “I’m disappointed that I came to Canada — a Canada that it is very, very difficult to find Canadians who are passionate about the American-Canadian relationship.”
“I heightened a bunch of them to absurd levels,” MacIntyre said about Hoekstra’s comments.
That includes the false comment about aiming a Patriot missile at Parliament Hill.
“We don’t try to trick people,” said MacIntyre, who’s also an editor. “I promise I wrote that line thinking this is the silliest joke I can write and people will obviously think it’s a joke.”
The Beaverton is a parody publication and doesn’t claim otherwise.
“We’re not trying to make fake news or hoodwink people, and it’s always baffling when anyone thinks we’re real, let alone a guy that was an important journalist,” MacIntyre added.
