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51st or Fight: Trudeau leaves, Trump Arrives
Justin Trudeau is leaving you, Donald Trump is coming for you.
The timing couldn’t be worse. The threat couldn’t be bigger. The solutions couldn’t be more elusive.
Canada and the US are headed for a serious and economically dangerous trade war in less than two weeks, and President-elect Donald Trump, seeing Canada in a vulnerable leadership moment, smells blood.
In politics, as in most things, there is no opponent more powerful than time and, after nine years in power, time crushed Justin Trudeau’s political career. The “Sunny Ways” majority government of 2015 for Trudeau gave way to the medieval darkness of his current minority government, beset by dire polls, recurring scandals, and painful internal betrayals. What happened?
In short, there were no new policy ideas to bring back the light. The list of victories that Trudeau mentioned in his resignation speech (some genuinely transformative, others still deeply divisive) — the Canada Child Benefit that lifted over 300,000 children out of poverty (child poverty rates in Canada are now going back up), the first G7 country to put a price on carbon, renegotiating NAFTA, leading the country through the pandemic, legalizing cannabis and medically assisted dying, negotiating a health accord with the provinces, bringing in universal daycare — all these were, in the end, not nearly enough. Politics is all about tomorrow, not yesterday, and the tomorrow promise of Trudeau, once his brand, was gone.
Since the pandemic, Trudeau has been, like incumbents around the world, on his back foot on the trinity of core issues galvanizing populist support: inflation, immigration, and housing prices. His policies to address these were reactive, well behind the instincts of the leader of the official opposition, Pierre Poilievre. It didn’t help that the fiscal guardrails Trudeau had set up were blown. The Liberals were more than CA$20 billion past their target ahead of the fall fiscal update, an update his finance minister was set to give on Dec. 16. Instead, she dropped a radioactive resignation letter that very morning, pointing to Trudeau’s fiscal strategies as “costly political gimmicks” — and laying bare the internal divisions within the Cabinet. He was out of supporters, out of ideas, and looked out of touch.
It finally ended on Monday, an icy Ottawa day with the kind of cold that you can almost grab with a gloved hand and snap over your knee. The prime minister stood alone in front of the cottage where he had done so many press conferences during the pandemic and where I recall sitting to interview a gray-bearded version of him on a similarly frigid winter day back in 2020. Now, he was notably different. Stripped of the pretense and dramatics that sometimes characterized his tenure, he presented a more authentic version of the man most Canadians had long ago lost sight of, telling them that he was resigning as leader and prime minister.
For a boy born on Christmas Day, the pathetic fallacies that marked Justin Trudeau’s life had one last small signal to send. Just before he left the shelter of the cottage to make his resignation announcement, a gust of wind suddenly blew his speech off the podium, papers scattering into the January air. It was over.
For his party, Trudeau’s departure could not come soon enough, and while Liberal Party leaders are still dithering on the rules for a leadership race, the math is cruel. Parliament is prorogued — suspended — until March 24, on Trudeau’s orders. There will be a confidence vote soon after, so expect a Canadian federal election to kick off immediately and run into May. In other words, Trudeau gave the next leader a short runway — more like a cliff. The next PM will barely have time to find the bathrooms and grab a cup of coffee before they will have to hit the hustings and try to climb out of the political hole that finds them 25 points behind the Conservatives.
For Canada, this could not come at a worse time. In less than two weeks, Trump will be sworn in as US president, and he has promised to slap Canada with 25% tariffs and use “economic force” to try to absorb the country as the 51st state.
As I wrote last year, Trump’s threat to absorb Canada as the 51st state has gone from a joke to a trial balloon — and it is quickly becoming a policy goal.
Trump the Isolationist has looped inside out and become Trump the Expansionist, with designs on Greenland, Canada, and Panama. His foreign policy for Central America is basically now the famous palindrome: a man, a plan, a canal, Panama.
Is he serious?
Yes.
Always take the president of the United States seriously, especially when he says he’s being serious. He may be using aggressive rhetoric as a negotiating tool to get better deals, but the threats are very real. Trump believes in tariffs like a priest believes in God.
When Trump threatens to beggar Canada with the economic force of 25% tariffs, it is the ONLY THING THAT MATTERS.
Canadian industry is bracing for a dramatic, painful economic shock. From. Its. Closest. Biggest. Trading. Partner.
All this lines up perfectly with the Top Risks of 2025 that our parent company, Eurasia Group, released this week, as you have read about. Risks such as Trumponomics — high tariffs on all allies and foes — mixed with the risk of The Rule of Don, a mercurial leader who has destroyed norms and wants the rule of the jungle over the rule law, is a lethal combination for a middle power country like Canada.
The rules-based international order is the architecture of the multilateral world, one that the US built in its own image after World War II and, until now, has been the backstop. This order has led to incredible prosperity for both the US and Canada, and billions of others. It is now disappearing faster than the fact-checkers at Meta.
As Trump throws economic bombs, Canada will have to muddle through the next three to five months without a leader who has a national mandate, leaving premiers like Ontario’s Doug Ford to lead the fight. And credit to him: Ford, so far, has done a superb job defending his province and speaking out.
Trump is coming for Canada and wants it to be the 51st state, in part or in whole — and if there was ever a time for someone to prove they have the stuff for leadership in a time of crisis, it is now. To twist an old expression, it is the 51st or fight.
Canadians better be up for a fight.
Canada's Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Marc Miller speaks at a press conference about the government's border plan as Public Safety and Finance Minister Dominic LeBlanc listens, on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, on Dec. 17, 2024.
Canada does about-face on immigration
Canadian Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced last Friday that Ottawa will pause new parent and grandparent sponsorship applications to address a 40,000-application backlog. Simultaneously, thousands of migrant caregivers find themselves in limbo as the government hits the brakes on proposed pathways to permanent residency, leaving many without legal status.
The moves represent the latest reversals of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s ambitious immigration policies, implemented in 2016, which sought to expand family reunification and increase overall permanent residency applications to 305,000 a year. Those numbers climbed further after the COVID-19 pandemic when the government admitted over 437,000 new permanent residents and 604,000 temporary workers in 2022, and 471,550 new permanent residents and 1,646,300 temporary workers in 2023. During the same period, the government also finalized close to 2,000,000 study permits. Those permits have now been capped at 437,000 for 2025.
Immigration is seen by some as the undoing of Trudeau, who announced his resignation on Jan. 6 after nine years in power. The PM’s ambitious post-pandemic immigration targets brought the population to 40 million, but housing shortages, rising rents, and stretched social services fueled voter discontent. Traditionally low opposition to immigration soared from 27% to 58% in the past two years, “the most rapid change over a two-year period since Focus Canada began asking this question in 1977,” according to Environics.
Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks to reporters, announcing he intends to step down as Liberal Party leader, from his Rideau Cottage residence in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, on Jan. 6, 2025.
Trudeau steps down, and a leadership race kicks off
On Monday morning, Jan. 6, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addressed reporters on the stairs of Rideau Cottage, his official residence in Ottawa, to announce his resignation. He began by stating that “Parliament has been paralyzed for months. This morning, I advised the governor general that we need a new session of Parliament. The House is prorogued until March 24.”
This means that instead of returning on Jan. 27, as previously scheduled, the Canadian legislature will not sit for another two months. This prevents the opposition from presenting a non-confidence motion to topple the government, as it had threatened to do.
“I intend to resign as party leader and prime minister after the party selects its next leader in a robust, competitive nationwide process,” Trudeau explained. “Last night, I asked the president of the Liberal Party to begin that process.”
The move obliges Trudeau’s party to hold a rapid-fire leadership race to choose a new leader – the winner of which will face voters in an election that must be held no later than Oct. 20, 2025. This makes it difficult for the party to bring in outside candidates and instead favors current cabinet members, whom Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre wasted no time attacking.
What Poilievre really wants is an immediate election. His party is currently ahead by 25% in the polls, and he has every interest in going to voters before the Liberals have the chance to improve their fortunes.
Trudeau, meanwhile, blamed caucus infighting for his decision. “If I continue to fight internal battles, I cannot be the best option in the next election.” At the time of his resignation, 59% of Liberal Party supporters, as well as three of his four national caucuses, said he should resign. He also threw shade at former Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, saying that he had hoped she would take on one of “the most important files in my government” but that “she chose otherwise.”
We’ll be watching to see which candidates arise as possible contenders to replace Trudeau in the weeks ahead. Possible names include Freeland, cabinet colleagues Dominic LeBlanc, Francois-Philippe Champagne, and Mélanie Joly, as well as former Bank of Canada and Bank of England Governor Mark Carney and former BC Premier Christy Clark.Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks to reporters, announcing that he intends to step down as Liberal Party leader and prime minister from his Rideau Cottage residence in Ottawa, Canada, on Jan. 6, 2025.
Justin Trudeau: The rise and fall of a political golden boy
Justin Pierre James Trudeau’s political life began in the cradle. Born Christmas Day, 1971, to Margaret Sinclair and Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Canada’s 15th prime minister, their eldest son grew up in the spotlight and an atmosphere of privilege. Now, he’s out in the cold, abandoned by his closest allies and maligned by his opponents as Canada, too, joins the global anti-incumbent mood.
Rise to power
As a young man, Trudeau taught drama and snowboarding, but in 2000, his emotional eulogy at his father’s funeral put him on the radar as a future leader. Trudeau delivered public speeches, engaged in advocacy, andmet and married media personality Sophie Gregoire in 2005; the pair were promptly dubbed “the Kennedys of Canada.”
In 2007, Trudeau sought and wonthe party’s nomination in Papineau, a blue-collar Montreal riding that was not a safe Liberal seat, but that he took by just over 1,000 votes in the 2008 election. Trudeau chose Papineau to silence critics who dismissed him as a political lightweight, trading on his family name. He subsequently made headlines again as a young MP in 2012 when he wona charity boxing match against Conservative Sen. Patrick Brazeau. The triumph was unexpected, but it and the Papineau victory highlighted one of Trudeau’s key political qualities: his ability to win when the odds are stacked against him.
The events also positioned Trudeau as a leading contender for the Liberal leadership, which he won in 2013, handily defeating more seasoned political rivals. Trudeau’s message of “hope and hard work” and telegenic appeal galvanized the demoralized base of the third-place Liberals, promising renewal.
Trudeau carried his “Sunny Ways” mantra forward to the 2015 federal election. His focus on youth, diversity, and progressive policies offered a sharp contrast to Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government, suffering from voter fatigue after nine years in power. The Liberalssurged from third place to win a majority government, with Trudeau becoming Canada’s 23rd Prime Minister.
Progressive achievements
Trudeau’s tenure began with sweeping promises: climate action, reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, electoral reform, and restoring Canada’s global standing. His gender-parity Cabinet,“because it’s 2015” made him the standard bearer for progressivism at home and abroad. The Liberals introduced the Canada Child Benefit, cut middle-class taxes, and legalized recreational cannabis. On the international stage, Trudeau championed multilateralism, free trade, and feminism, curating a swoon-worthy, media-friendly brand as the heir apparent to liberals such asoutgoing US President Barack Obama.
Trudeau won two subsequent elections in 2019 and 2021, though with diminished mandates. His signature initiatives included a national carbon tax, the renegotiation of NAFTA (USMCA) in 2018, the advancement of LGBTQ+ rights, legalized assisted dying, and stronger gun control. To maintain the support of the New Democratic Party for his current minority government, he also enacted a national $10-a-day daycare and free dental care for children, the elderly, and the disabled, and paved the way for a national pharmacare program.
Creeping failures
However, Trudeau’s tenure is also marred by broken promises and ethical lapses. His failure to implement electoral reform and maintain “modest” deficitsalienated both left- and right-wing segments of his base. TheSNC-Lavalin political interference scandal in 2019, coupled with Trudeau’s lavish vacations and the emergence of a series of blackface photos from his youth, further damaged his credibility on ethical and racial issues.
Indigenous leaders accused him ofnot making meaningful progress on reconciliation, while frustration over inflation, housing costs, and an overstretched healthcare system have fueled public anger. Trudeau also greenlighted immigration policies that saw millions of newcomers enter the country between 2022 and 2024, further straining the country’s already scarce housing supply.
On the international front, Canada’s relationship with China deteriorated following the arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou. Canada’s relationship with India also suffered following accusations by Trudeau that the government of Narendra Modi masterminded the assassination of a Khalistani terrorist on Canadian soil. A recent public inquiry also revealed foreign interference in the Canadian electoral system, with accusations that Trudeau did not act on crucial information about his own MPs.
The black swans
Ultimately, Trudeau was undone by two black swans. The first was Donald Trump. The US president’s year-long tariff war with Canada in 2016 forced Trudeau to sideline domestic priorities to tackle the renegotiation of NAFTA. Trump’s Muslim ban also inspired Trudeau’s viral tweet welcoming refugees to Canada, which was followed by a surge in immigration and refugee claims – now a hot-button issue as anti-immigrant sentiment rises and the government backtracks on its welcoming policies.
The second swan was the COVID-19 pandemic. Trudeau drew initial praise for rapid financial relief programs, but also criticism for vaccine procurement delays and vaccine mandates. In 2022, Ottawa was occupied by a “Freedom Convoy,” which paralyzed the nation’s capital and saw Trudeau invoke the Emergencies Act, Canada’s equivalent of martial law. That event galvanized the Conservative opposition and contributed to the election of a new Conservative leader, Pierre Poilievre, Trudeau’s fiercest critic, who nowappears poised to replace Trudeau.
The end
By 2025, Justin Trudeau’s political career had come full circle. He rescued his party from its third-place finish in 2013, only to return it to a possible third – or even fourth-place finish – were an election to be held today. He once again found himself the object of derision by Trump, and also an object of rancor at home.
Then, after the shock resignation of Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland on Dec. 10, the dominoes began to fall inside the Liberal Party. With the looming threat of a non-confidence vote when Parliament resumes in January, three of the four Liberal regional caucuses demanded that Trudeau quit, and with a general caucus meeting set for this Wednesday, Trudeau finally decided the odds were insurmountable. On Jan. 6, 2025, he announced his plan to stand down as Liberal Party leader.
What’s next?
Trudeau leaves his party, and his country, with a very murky future. He has no obvious natural successor, and the timeline and process for a leadership campaign are not yet known. The Liberals’ organization is severely weakened – with the party practically non-existent west of Ontario – and their policy agenda is exhausted. According to Eurasia analyst Graeme Thompson, “Whoever ascends to the leadership may well face snap elections, and there is a real risk that the party could fall to third or even fourth place. It also faces the stark choice between pivoting back towards the political center or cementing its alliance with the leftist NDP.”
All this comes at a moment of considerable uncertainty for Canada, with the economy sputtering, tensions over immigration and the cost of living rising, Quebec separatism beginning to re-emerge, and Ottawa facing a new Trump administration that will drive a very hard bargain in trade talks, over border security, and on the broader foreign and defense policy front. If the Conservatives win the next election as expected, they will inherit serious challenges on several policy fronts, beginning with US-Canada relations and delivering on campaign promises to cut taxes, boost growth, and rein in the cost of living.
Trudeau’s full legacy will be judged in time. But for a leader who promised "Sunny Ways," his political twilight is anything but.
Six issues that will shape US-Canada relations in 2025
In December, Justin Trudeauwarned that dealing with President-elect Donald Trump would be “a little more challenging” than last time around.
With Trump threatening massive tariffs that would hit Canada hard, taking aim at the country’s anemic defense spending, criticizing its border policy, eyeing its fresh water, and more, 2025 will indeed be a rocky time for US-Canada relations. But Trudeau might not be around for much of it. Down in the polls and facing calls from a majority of his caucus to resign, Trudeau is mulling his future and could resign any day.
Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievreis heavily favored to win the upcoming federal election, which would make Trump his challenge – a challenge Canadians, in fact, prefer the Conservative leader take on over his Liberal opponent.
Whoever leads Canada in the months to come, these are the top US-Canada issues they’ll be focused on:
1. Trade and tariffs
Trade between the US and Canada is worth over $900 billion a year, so the exchange of goods and services will be a top issue regardless of who’s in office. But Trump’s threat to levy a 25% tariff on imports has taken it to another level. The tariffs would raise prices in the US and hit Canadian industry, particularly the energy, automotive, and manufacturing sectors, with added costs. The Canadian Chamber of Commerce predicts the tariffs, and Canadian retaliation, would cost Canada roughly CA$78 billion – 2.6% of its GDP – a year and lead to recession. Canadian exports to the US would plummet, says the Chamber, with a predicted 60% drop in the mining and quarrying industries, 39% in m0tor vehicles, and 27% in metals – which would be costly for both countries. Ontario, the country’s most populous province and home to its auto sector, would be hit especially hard – which is why Premier Doug Ford is threatening to stop energy exports to the US if Trump proceeds with his plan.
The economic harm to Canada would be exacerbated by the fact that Ottawa would likely respond with its own retaliatory duties. The Trudeau government is working to secure an exemption from the policy for Canada but hasn’t managed to yet. But energy experts say they expect the tariffs won’t apply to Canadian oil either way.
Graeme Thompson, a senior analyst with Eurasia Group’s global macro-geopolitics practice, says Trump’s tariff threat is real but also part of the incoming president’s strategy. He’s trying to gain concessions on issues of concern, including border security and the (very limited) flow of fentanyl from north to south, and the US trade deficit with Canada ahead of the looming renegotiation of the USMCA.
Thompson notes that Canada is in a weak bargaining position given that it’s utterly dependent on its trade relationship with the US, “and for that reason, doesn’t have a lot of cards to play.” He also expects that even if Canada does secure an exemption on tariffs, Trump will be prepared to threaten them again in the future as leverage in any given negotiation.
“This is not a one-and-done,” Thompson says. “I think this is a mode of operations that will repeat several times for the next four years over a variety of issues.”
2. A (metaphorical?) border wall
Trump has made border security central to his tariff threat, arguing that the flow of fentanyl and illegal immigrants across the border poses a public safety threat to the US. Canada is already developing a border security plan to respond to Trump’s concerns. It’s also scrambling to prepare for a possible rise in asylum claims – which will exacerbate the current backlog – and irregular border crossings if Trump goes ahead with his plan for mass deportations.
Canada was already revising its immigration policy before Trump won, but it may introduce further restrictions – and continue to toughen its rhetoric – in the coming months. After Trump’s win, Immigration Minister Marc Miller said “not everyone is welcome” to go to Canada, emphasizing that his government was ready to work with the Trump administration on border security. At the same time, Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly said Canada was sticking to its new immigration plan, which would see fewer newcomers admitted to the country.
The Trudeau government reduced its immigration targets in October and cut the number of international students it welcomes. Its border security plan includes CA$1.3 billion in spending around five pillars that include a commitment to “detecting and disrupting the fentanyl trade” and “minimizing unnecessary border volumes,” including an end to flagpoling – or allowing temporary residents to leave the country (typically to the US) and return immediately to access immigration services at the border. But that may not be enough.
Thompson says leaders of the current government are “overestimating their ability to manage what is coming.” He notes future demands from Trump could include “tighter screening of regular immigrants into Canada. That means that much like with tariffs, the Canadian government may end up managing cascading demands from Trump, so no single promise or plan will likely be sufficient to placate the incoming US president.
3. Defense spending and securing the Arctic
US administrations, including Biden’s, have pressured Canada to increase its defense spending and hit NATO’s 2% of GDP target for years. In April, the Trudeau government outlined a plan to boost spending, focused in large part on building armed forces capacity in the Arctic. The new initiatives total roughly CA$81 billion over two decades and will push the country toward 1.76% of GDP by 2030. In December, the government announced a further adjustment to its Arctic presence, which will include more air and naval equipment, and a renewed cooperation strategy in the region with the US in the face of Russian and Chinese regional interests.
So far, Trump administration officials and other Republicans seem unimpressed with Canada’s defense plan. Former Trump ambassador to Canada, Kelly Craft, said the country could “do better.” That means spending more – and faster – especially since Trump has reportedly considered asking NATO allies to spend a whopping 5% of GDP on defense spending. He’s also threatened to leave countries that fail to spend more to fend for themselves against foreign aggression.
Philippe Lagassé, associate professor and Barton Chair at the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University, says Canada could raise military spending by increasing pay, boosting operations expenditures, and contracting more for services. He says procurement of military hardware would take longer. But in the face of financial constraints, such new spending would require raising taxes, growing the deficit, cutting other programs, or some combination of the three – which could prove a challenge for the current government or its eventual replacement.
Arctic defense may prove to be a smoother issue. “The US has been trying to get Canada to do more in the region for a while,” Lagassé says, “and we've responded to that. I don’t see that as a point of tension.”
“If anything,” he adds, “the US will be glad if we just get our act together because their sovereignty considerations up there are less than ours, and they have capabilities up there that we don’t, but they do want us to actually get our act together around it.”
So, while Canada may feel the pressure on defense spending – and may need to come up with a faster, heftier plan to placate Trump, it can always point to progress in the Arctic and is likely to do so.
4. Water, water everywhere?
In September, Trump floated an idea to solve California’s drought problems: import water from British Columbia. As Trump put it, the province has “a very large faucet” that, once turned, could supply drought-stricken US states with fresh water. Experts point out that Canada doesn’t, in fact, have water to spare, and Canada can’t just turn on a “faucet” to divert water to the US.
The water Trump referred to, coming from the Columbia River, is already spoken for, in part through an existing treaty between the US and Canada – the Columbia River Treaty, which sets out rules governing flood controls, dams, and hydroelectric power generation.
That arrangement is in the process of being modernized to account for new developments, including climate change. The Biden administration and the Trudeau government recently reached an agreement in principle after years of work that began during the first Trump administration. But this time around, should Trump decide to maintain an interest in water flows north to south, the terms of the treaty could – like free trade – come back up for negotiation, with the faucet on the table.
5. Critical minerals. It’s in the name
The US and Canada share several other areas of cooperation and competition, but one is of immediate interest that could incentivize working together. Both countries are spending big on critical mineral development, including co-investments in a development in Yukon.
Critical minerals are central to cellular phones, the electric vehicle industry – in which both the US and Canada are investing heavily – and national defense. So whatever other tensions shape US-Canada relations, cooperation on critical minerals will remain a shared goal, especially as the two countries look to rival Chinese and Russian interests in related sectors.
6. Setting limits on Big Tech
Both countries are also taking on big tech giants, such as Google, through anti-monopoly investigations lawsuits. Still, the US is pushing Canada to drop its 3% digital services tax on big tech companies, including Google’s parent company Alphabet. The Biden administration requested a dispute resolution process for the tax, claiming it unfairly targets big US tech firms. The Trump administration is likely to press the issue, too, which may leave the policy as a pawn in one set of negotiations – say, over tariffs – or another.
Does Canada have any leverage to rely on? Canada has some cards to play against Trump, but it’s not clear who’ll be playing them. The Trudeau government, down roughly 25 points in the polls, is not long for this world – and Trudeau himself may resign any day. The country is due for an election by the fall, but it could come much earlier.
Regardless of who’s in power, however, they’ll likely deploy the playbook from the last time Canada had to manage its relationship with Trump. That means working contacts in states, particularly border states in which the Republicans have an interest in winning or currently govern and contacts in Washington. Then, they work the message about Canadian, and shared, interests up to Trump. There’s also the threats of retaliatory tariffs and halting certain trade, like Ford’s threat to cut off energy to border states.
Together, pulling these levers may yield some results, but Canada is in for tough negotiations and is unlikely to emerge from them unscathed.
Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks at the federal Liberal caucus holiday party, the day after Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland unexpectedly resigned, in Ottawa, Ontario, on Dec. 17, 2024.
Chances of Trudeau staying as PM drop quickly
After Finance Minister Chrystia Freelandresigned in mid-December, Trudeau was said to be considering quitting. Since then, his Atlantic and Quebec caucuses – groups of members of Parliament from regions or provinces – have said he should go, which means the majority of Liberal members of Parliament are calling on him to quit. Trudeau’s former principal secretary – and Eurasia Group vice chairman – Gerald Buttsthinks Trudeau is less likely to stay on after the Freeland departure as his grip on power loosens.
“Mr. Trudeau was unlikely to lead the Liberal Party into the next election and is now much less likely to do so,” he writes. “That election will probably come sooner rather than later, and the odds of it producing a Conservative majority government are materially greater than they were before the events of 16 December.”
Before Christmas, Trudeau canceled all of his year-end press interviews save for one with comedian Mark Critch. A few days later, Trudeau was mocked and harassed while on vacation skiing in British Columbia.
The Liberals are down roughly 20 points in the polls, and the Conservatives are preparing a vote of non-confidence against the government through a committee backdoor trick by way of the standing committee on public accounts, which they control. The New Democratic Party has said it will vote non-confidence but hasn’t specified whether it’ll vote with the Conservatives if they proceed with their current plan, or wait to come up with their own. Whatever happens next, the days of Trudeau’s government appear to be numbered.Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks at a meeting of the Calgary Chamber of Commerce in Calgary, Alberta, Canada December 21, 2016.
Trudeau on the brink? More MPs demand resignation
Bad news for embattled Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: On Saturday, 51 members of his Liberal Party’s powerful Ontario caucus reportedlyagreed that he should resign, citing their plummeting fortunes under his leadership. Over half the Liberal caucus now want him to quit, as well as numerous party advisors, strategists and commentators.
The fresh calls come after NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, whose party had been propping up Trudeau’s minority government, pledged on Friday to bring a “clear motion of non-confidence” at the earliest opportunity. With Parliament out for winter break until Jan. 27, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre urged Canada’s titular head of State, Governor General Mary Simon, to recall MPs early to hold such a vote. That’s a constitutionalnon-starter, but it symbolically amps up the pressure nonetheless.
What are Trudeau’s options? Unless he asks the Governor General to prorogue the House anddelay its return, the opposition would plunge the country into an election - a race his party is likely to lose. One of the justifications for prorogation would be to allow the Liberals to hold a leadership race - but that would mean Trudeau would have to resign.
All this is happening just weeks before US President Donald Trump’s return to the White House on January 20. With the threat of 25% tariffs in the air, observers say Canada’s government can ill afford to continue its current drama, and Trudeau must decide his future as soon as possible.
FILE PHOTO: Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau listens to Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland during news conference in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, May 31, 2018.
Is Trudeau about to take a walk in the snow?
Canadians might not be feeling quite so superior about dysfunctional American politics after watching this week’s fiasco in Ottawa unfold like an episode of “Veep.” The resignation on Monday of Chrystia Freeland, Canada’s finance minister and deputy prime minister, sparked the most chaotic day in Canadian politics in decades.
Freeland was due to deliver a mini-budget known as the fall economic statement at 4 p.m. Yet, at 9 a.m., the finance minister rocked the Canadian capital when she revealed she was quitting the Cabinet, disbanding the double act that has led Canada for much of the past nine years.
In a searing resignation letter, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s chief lieutenant and ally said that the country faces a grave challenge, with the incoming Trump administration threatening 25% tariffs on all Canadian exports to the US.
She said Canada needs to keep its fiscal powder dry and not spend it on “costly political gimmicks,” referring to the sales tax holiday and US$175 per person thinly veiled electoral bribe that Trudeau promised — against the better judgment of his finance minister and her department.
Most damaging of all, Freeland crystallized the nagging sense, felt by many people, that Trudeau is more focused on his own future than on that of everyday Canadians.
“They know when we are working for them, and they equally know when we are focused on ourselves,” she said.
Coming from someone who has worked so closely with the prime minister, it was devastating stuff, and it has left Trudeau badly wounded — perhaps fatally — as other dissidents in the ruling Liberal Cabinet and caucus consider their next move. One Liberal member of Parliament said between 40 and 50 of 153 caucus members actively want Trudeau to resign, a feeling that was strengthened after the party was trounced in a by-election in British Columbia on Monday.
Trudeau said he will take the Christmas break to consider his options, which appear limited. The left-leaning New Democratic Party has helped prop up the minority Liberal government, but its leader, Jagmeet Singh, has also called for the prime minister to resign.
When Parliament resumes in late January, Pierre Poilievre’s Conservative Party will seek to table a vote of no confidence in the government at the first opportunity, and it looks like it will have the votes in the House of Commons to send Canada to its 45th general election.
Freeland’s bombshell was designed to cause Trudeau maximum inconvenience.
Finance officials were forced to put the mini-budget on hold until they could determine who should deliver it.
Poilievre stood in the House of Commons during the daily question period and asked, “A question for the finance minister: Who are you?”
The government’s own order of precedence suggested the industry minister, François-Philippe Champagne, would assume the duties of finance minister, but he was unaware of that reality when confronted by journalists and is said to have refused to read out a document he had no role in drafting. The next person in line, Randy Boissonnault, was forced to resign from the Cabinet last month, adding to the tragicomic mood.
By the day’s end, Trudeau had persuaded the public safety minister, Dominic LeBlanc, to assume the role of finance minister, and he was sworn in in time to table the fall economic statement in the House of Commons.
It all felt like governing by improv, led by a prime minister in office but not in control. Nobody seems to have been more surprised than Trudeau by Freeland’s resignation, but he really should not have been. In her letter, Freeland said the prime minister told her last Friday that he no longer wanted her to serve as finance minister and offered her another position.
It has since been reported that in an hourlong Zoom call, he told her that she would be replaced as finance minister by former central banker Mark Carney; he asked her to be the point person for Canada-US relations but not as the minister of global affairs, a job held by Mélanie Joly. (Carney has not commented on his intentions, nor has he been named as Freeland’s successor.)
It is perhaps just as well for Canada that Freeland declined and offered her resignation.
The now-former finance minister is not popular with the incoming US president, a point Donald Trump made in a provocative post on social media late on Monday.
“The Great State of Canada is stunned as the finance minister resigns, or was fired, from her position by Governor Justin Trudeau. Her behavior was totally toxic, and not at all conducive to making deals which are good for the very unhappy citizens of Canada. She will not be missed!!!,” Trump wrote.
Freeland attracted the president-elect’s ire during his first term in office, when she appeared on a panel at a summit in Toronto called “Taking on the Tyrant,” against a backdrop of a rogue’s gallery of autocrats, including Vladimir Putin, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Bashar al-Assad and … Trump.
The then-president subsequently said, “We don’t like their representative [Freeland] very much.”
Trump’s reelection has proven to be the catalyst for the crisis that has hit the Canadian government. Trudeau and Freeland were simpatico for much of the government’s nine years in power — a free-spending Thelma and Louise, intent on pioneering feminist and social justice policies, even if they risked driving off a fiscal cliff (Canada’s debt has doubled under Trudeau).
But Trump’s threat of tariffs and his repeated references to Canada as the “51st state” have created existential panic in a country that sends three-quarters of its exports south of the border.
Trudeau and LeBlanc headed to Mar-a-Lago resort to pay tribute to the president-elect, only to be humiliated when it was leaked that Trump had said Trudeau could be governor if Canada joined the US as a state. If it was a joke, Canada isn’t laughing.
Trudeau has proven to be very New Testament in his approach to Trump, turning the other cheek, even while promising to retaliate to tariffs if necessary. More aggressive leadership has been assumed by a Trump-like, Old Testament, eye-for-an-eye politician, Ontario Premier Doug Ford. He has said that if Trump imposes sweeping tariffs, his province will suspend electricity exports to several northern states and block American alcohol sales to the Liquor Control Board of Ontario, the world’s largest alcohol purchaser.
Trump was at it again on Tuesday evening, saying “many” Canadians want Canada to become the 51st state because they would save on taxes. “I think it’s a great idea,” he said. His former security adviser John Bolton told the CBC that Canadians shouldn’t over-intellectualize the tweets. “I think he’s just mean” and is trying to humiliate Trudeau, Bolton said.
From Canada’s point of view, the most encouraging thing about the social media post Trump made after Freeland’s resignation was his mention that there may be a deal to be had. The president-elect has made clear his belief in tariffs, what he calls “the most beautiful word in the dictionary.”
He believes that the US is “subsidizing” Canada because it has a trade deficit that is largely the result of oil prices that have doubled in the past four years (60% of US crude imports come from north of the border). But the president-elect can’t ignore the belief held by two-thirds of Americans that his tariff plan will add to the rising cost of living.
Trump’s other concern is over porous borders in the north and south that are leaking migrants and fentanyl. However, as Canada’s ambassador in Washington, Kristen Hillman, pointed out, the 24,000 illegal migrants and 43 pounds of fentanyl intercepted at the northern border represent 0.6% and 0.2%, respectively, of the totals. Ottawa allocated an additional US$900 million for a “comprehensive” border security package in Monday’s fiscal update.
Canada has also indicated its willingness to be deputized in the trade war against China. The federal government said it will bring in more tariffs on Chinese solar products, critical minerals, semiconductors, and natural graphite, having already imposed 100% duties on Chinese electric vehicles and a 25% levy on steel and aluminum.
But it may be down to Ford and other provincial premiers like Alberta’s Danielle Smith to secure exemptions from the blanket tariffs Trump has promised.
It looks very likely that around the time Trump takes office, the ruling Liberal Party will be either embroiled in a messy leadership race or fighting a general election. In that case, the odds are that Trudeau, if he is still on the scene, will be too distracted to be an effective captain of Team Canada.