Google Maps to display Lake Ontario as Lake America in U.S.

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“It’s official! LAKE AMERICA on Google Maps,” White House communications director Steven Cheung posted on the social media website X on Sunday.

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“No one’s going to call it Lake of America."

Google Maps to display Lake Ontario as Lake America in U.S.

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Appearing on ABC’s “This Week” program on Sunday, Ontario Premier Doug Ford said the name change won’t stick, despite Trump signing the executive order on Thursday.

“It was like something out of ‘Saturday Night Live’ when (Trump) signed a document saying change it to Lake America,” Ford said.

“No one’s going to call it Lake of America. It’s been Lake Ontario for hundreds of years. It’s going to continue being Lake Ontario.”

On Saturday, Ford unveiled a large sign in Winona, a small lakeside community part of Hamilton, Ont., which says, “Lake Ontario, now and always.”

Also on Saturday, Trump posted a video rendered by artificial intelligence where he replaces a Lake Ontario sign with another that reads “Welcome to Lake America,” then dances to the YCMA song by the Village People.

Prime Minister Mark Carney responded to Trump’s bid to rename the lake in a social media post on Thursday. Carney said Canadians know Lake Ontario will always be known by its original name, “then, now and always.”

Lake Ontario, one of the five Great Lakes, is located between Ontario and New York. The Canadian province is named after the lake.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul said after Trump signed his order that New York won’t call it that.

Tensions between the two countries have escalated since trade talks fell apart on Aug. 21.

Both countries have accused each other of implementing last-minute changes to a proposed interim trade deal.

On Tuesday, the federal government unveiled upward of $27 billion in retaliatory measures, set to kick in on Sept. 8, responding to new U.S. tariffs.

Trump first threatened to rename the body of water during an escalating war of words with Ontario’s premier.

Ford had called the president a bully and a loser on Aug. 24, while Trump said the premier was a “less charismatic” and less intelligent version of his late brother Rob Ford.

The premier said during his ABC appearance on Sunday that things “got heated” between Trump and himself, but “you’ve eventually got to stand up to someone who just continuously attacks our country and insults our country.”

“It’s unfortunate that he stoops down to that level and unfortunately I did that day,” Ford said, adding he wants to see both sides return their focus to advancing a mutually beneficial free-trade deal.

Trump signed a similar executive order last year to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.

The orders only apply to U.S. federal documents and geographic services, but some online map services and American news agencies have since called it the Gulf of America.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 30, 2026.

— With files from Kelly Geraldine Malone in Washington

Kyle Duggan, The Canadian Press