K.I. SAWYER \u2014 Arriving aboard the new Air Force One at K.I. Sawyer International Airport Thursday afternoon, President Donald Trump announced what he called \u201cOperation Clear Skies,\u201d authorizing retaliatory strikes against \u201cstrategic Canadian smoke-producing assets\u201d after another week of thick wildfire haze blanketed Michigan\u2019s Upper Peninsula.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Standing before a crowd waving American flags and repeatedly pointing toward the northern horizon, Trump said enough was enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve been trashing the big, beautiful Upper Peninsula for years,\u201d Trump declared. \u201cBeautiful people. Great people. The best peninsula\u2014everyone says so. They keep sending smoke over here. Nobody asked for it. Nobody wanted it. We\u2019re not having it anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The president insisted Canada had ignored repeated diplomatic requests to \u201ckindly keep the smoke on their side,\u201d forcing the United States to take what he described as \u201cvery decisive, very beautiful action.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going after the smoke at the source,\u201d he said. \u201cPeople said it couldn\u2019t be done. I said, \u2018Watch us.\u2019 Canada is going to have the cleanest air they\u2019ve ever seen because there won\u2019t be anything left making smoke.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Administration officials later clarified that the operation would target \u201careas generally associated with smoke,\u201d while acknowledging they had not yet determined exactly where those areas were.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump also unveiled plans for an \u201cinvisible anti-smoke wall\u201d stretching along the northern border.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cCanada can keep whatever they\u2019re making up there,\u201d he said. \u201cJust don\u2019t blow it over the big, beautiful U.P.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The announcement was part of a larger package of Upper Peninsula initiatives unveiled during the president\u2019s visit. Trump pledged to reactivate K.I. Sawyer as a full active-duty Air Force base, describing it as \u201can incredible base that never should have been closed,\u201d and announced that Lake Superior would officially be renamed Lake America.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the greatest lake in the world,\u201d Trump said. \u201cSo why are we calling it Superior? Superior to what? America? I don\u2019t think so. Lake America. Much stronger name.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While the smoke dominated the address, Trump briefly pivoted to another issue he said had gone unresolved for far too long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAnd another thing\u2014the Edmund Fitzgerald,\u201d he said, pausing as the crowd cheered. \u201cEverybody knows where it is. It\u2019s in Lake America. It\u2019s an American ship. Canada isn\u2019t going to be laying claim to a shipwreck that is rightfully ours anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The president did not elaborate on how one might \u201ctake back\u201d a shipwreck resting more than 500 feet beneath the surface, though he hinted that \u201cvery talented divers\u201d had already been consulted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Reaction across the Upper Peninsula was mixed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some residents applauded the president\u2019s tough stance, saying anything that restored blue skies was worth considering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Others questioned whether striking Canada might actually create more smoke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By Thursday evening, officials confirmed visibility across the region remained poor, although several Yoopers admitted the sky looked \u201ca little more patriotic somehow.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
K.I. SAWYER \u2014 Arriving aboard the new Air Force One at K.I. Sawyer International Airport Thursday afternoon, President Donald Trump announced what he called \u201cOperation Clear Skies,\u201d authorizing retaliatory strikes against \u201cstrategic Canadian smoke-producing assets\u201d after another week of thick wildfire haze blanketed Michigan\u2019s Upper Peninsula. Standing before a crowd waving American flags and repeatedly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":173,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[9],"tags":[32],"class_list":["post-172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-politics","tag-k-i-sawyer"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/trumpkisawyer.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=172"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":174,"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/172\/revisions\/174"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailypasty.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}