Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent needled Canada over the prospect of an independence referendum in Alberta this week, as President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney are locked in a clash over Ottawa’s role in the hemisphere.

“Alberta is a natural partner for the U.S.,” he told conservative podcaster Jack Posobiec in an interview Thursday. “They have great resources. The Albertans are very independent people. Rumor that they may have a referendum on whether they want to stay in Canada or not.”

A U.S. Cabinet secretary cheering on a split in Canada is only the latest point of contention between the onetime close allies.

The specter of Albertan separatism is real for Canada. Organizers throughout the province need only to collect 178,000 signatures by May 2 to force a referendum on independence. If successful, the Canadian government would need to negotiate in good faith on a potential separation.

Conservative influencers in America have gleefully talked up the prospect of Alberta leaving Canada and eventually joining the U.S. Meanwhile, Carney and his Liberal caucus is attuned to the threat.

“People are talking,” Bessent said. “People want sovereignty. They want what the U.S. has got.”

Global Affairs Canada did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the barb.

Bessent, who called Carney a “globalist” and panned the Canadian leader’s time working as a climate envoy at the United Nations, spoke amid a series of clashes between Trump and Carney in Davos, Switzerland, where the two spent time this week at the World Economic Forum.

After Carney on Tuesday spoke of a “rupture” in the world order caused by great powers including the United States, Trump fired back, saying Wednesday that “Canada lives because of the United States.”

He then disinvited Carney from his new Board of Peace initiative.

“Canada doesn’t live because of the United States,” the prime minister responded Thursday in Quebec City. “Canada thrives because we are Canadian.”