Canada’s new Prime Minister and Liberal Leader Mark Carney
Toronto: Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberal Party won Canada’s federal election on Monday, capping a stunning turnaround in fortunes fuelled by US President Donald Trump’s annexation threats and trade war.
After polls closed, the Liberals were projected to win more of Parliament’s 343 seats than the Conservative Party, though it wasn’t immediately clear if they would win an outright majority or would need to rely on one or more smaller parties to form a government and pass legislation.
The Liberals looked headed for a crushing defeat until the American president started attacking Canada’s economy and threatening its sovereignty, suggesting it should become the 51st state. Trump’s actions infuriated Canadians and stoked a surge in nationalism that helped the Liberals flip the election narrative and win a fourth-straight term in power.
“We were dead and buried in December. Now we are going to form a government,” David Lametti, a former Liberal Justice Minister, told broadcaster CTV.
“We have turned this around thanks to Mark,” he said.
The Conservative Party’s leader, Pierre Poilievre, hoped to make the election a referendum on former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whose popularity declined toward the end of his decade in power as food and housing prices rose.
But Trump attacked, Trudeau resigned and Carney, a two-time central banker, became the Liberal Party’s leader and prime minister.
Even with Canadians grappling with the fallout from a deadly weekend attack at a Vancouver street festival, Trump was trolling them on election day, suggesting on social media that he was on their ballot and repeating that Canada should become the 51st state. He also erroneously claimed that the US subsidizes Canada, writing, “It makes no sense unless Canada is a State!”
Trump’s truculence has infuriated many Canadians, leading many to cancel U.S. vacations, refuse to buy American goods and possibly even vote early. A record 7.3 million Canadians cast ballots before election day.
“The Americans want to break us so they can own us,” Carney said in the runup to election day. “Those aren’t just words. That’s what’s at risk.”
As he and his wife cast their ballots in their Ottawa district on Monday, Poilievre implored voters to “Get out to vote — for a change.” After running a Trump-like campaign for months, though, his similarities to the bombastic American leader might have cost him.
Reid Warren, a Toronto resident, said he voted Liberal because Poilievre “sounds like mini-Trump to me.” And he said Trump’s tariffs are a worry.
“Canadians coming together from, you know, all the shade being thrown from the States is great, but it’s definitely created some turmoil, that’s for sure,” he said.
Historian Robert Bothwell said Poilievre appealed to the “same sense of grievance” as Trump, but that it ultimately cost him with voters.
“The Liberals ought to pay him,” Bothwell added, referring to the US president. “Trump talking is not good for the Conservatives.”
Carney and the Liberals cleared a big hurdle by winning a fourth-straight term, but they have daunting challenges ahead.
Foreign policy hadn’t dominated a Canadian election as much as it did this year’s since 1988, when, ironically, free trade with the United States was the prevailing issue.
In addition to the trade war with the US and frosty relationship with Trump, Canada is dealing with a cost-of-living crisis. And more than 75% of its exports go to the US, so Trump’s tariffs threat and his desire to get North American automakers to move Canada’s production south could severely damage the Canadian economy.
While campaigning, Carney vowed that every dollar the the government collects from counter-tariffs on US goods will go toward Canadian workers who are adversely affected by the trade war. He also said he plans to keep dental care in place, offer a middle-class tax cut, return immigration to sustainable levels and increase funding to Canada’s public broadcaster, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
