The first-ever mapping website is adamant: It won’t change the name of Lake Ontario to “Lake America” despite President Donald Trump’s executive order.
MapQuest’s X account shared a screenshot of the body of water on Thursday, saying: “We’re not changing it.”
The post received over 70,000 likes. None of the account’s 24 posts in July got more than two.
“Shocking to see you’re still alive,” Eric Trump responded. “I thought the iPhone 3 took you out 15 years ago.”
MapQuest calls itself “the OG of online mapping” in its X bio. It first launched in 1996 and was bought by AOL for $1.1 billion four years later, at the height of the dot-com boom.
However, by 2008, MapQuest fell behind Google Maps. It was sold to System1, an online advertising firm, in 2019.
There’s no official word yet from Google or Apple on whether they will change the name of Lake Ontario on their map services.
MapQuest has also made a site that lets users pick their own name for the body of water and generate a joke screenshot. The most-liked replies included “Lake of Hormuz” and “Lake Gulf of Mexico.”
Trump’s “Lake America” order resembles one he signed at the start of his term in January 2025, renaming the Gulf of Mexico to “Gulf of America.”
At the time, MapQuest similarly released a tool that let users generate a screenshot with their own chosen name.
Google Maps and Apple Maps label the basin “Gulf of America” for US users; however, international users still see “Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America).”
Trump’s executive orders compel federal agencies to use the new names, but not private companies or other entities.
The president wants to rechristen Lake Ontario because trade tensions between the US and Canada have reignited.
It is the smallest of the Great Lakes, straddling the US-Canada border with Toronto on its northern shore and New York state to the south. The word Ontario has Indigenous origins, meaning “great lake” or “beautiful water.”
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney rejected Trump’s name change in an X post late on Thursday.
“Canadians also know that naming reality means calling it Lake Ontario — then, now and always,” he wrote.
The spat kicked off when Canada walked away from trade talks last week. Then on Saturday, Trump’s 50% tariffs took effect on some Canadian products, ranging from whisky and hockey sticks to dairy, clothing, and lumber. He has also threatened to impose the levy on cars and steel.
Canada announced retaliatory tariffs of up to 50% on Tuesday, targeting key industries like steel, dairy, and agricultural equipment. They’re set to take effect September 8.
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