In a near unprecedented political comeback and a very clear elbows up to Donald Trump and his tariffs, Canada‘s ruling Liberals will continue to reign following tonight’s Great North election results.
While the incumbents were once presumed heading for a huge defeat when Justin Trudeau was Prime Minister, the now Mark Carney-led Liberals secured a minority government early Monday in Canada’s 343-seat Parliament. The Election Day comes on what is also a day of mourning in Canada after the horrific killing of 11 people and the wounding of dozens at a Vancouver street festival this weekend.
That’s a fourth consecutive term for the Liberals, who have ruled Canada for most of the bilingual country’s 158-year history. Getting a little tighter than expected for the Liberals in the first results that came in from Atlantic Canada, the election was essentially over when the votes were counted in the population heavy provinces of Ontario and Quebec.
At 7:12 pm PT, just after the voting ended in British Columbia, the CBC called it for Carney and the Liberals. Right now, the Liberals have 147 seats, the opposition Conservatives have 104 with smaller parties decimated in what has become a rare two-party Parliament. With 172-seat required to form a majority government and around 100-ridings still very close, it is looking likely that Carney will actually end up having the first Liberal majority government since 2019.
It’s a dramatic shift from just a few months ago when the Conservatives and their leader Pierre Poilievre were up more than 20-points from the Liberals. The Tories were seen and were acting as a MAGA-friendly government-in-waiting.
Then, in a historic political comeback of its own, aspiring strongman Trump beat Kamala Harris in America’s election in November and everything changed.
Before Trump even returned to office, the former Celebrity Apprentice host was giving sarcastic shout-outs to “Governor Trudeau” amidst his proclamation that Canada should become America’s 51st State. The potentially crippling tariffs President Trump slapped on Canada (and sometimes un-slapped, and then re-slapped) adrenalized patriotism among Canadians. Trudeau’s resignation not even thought enough of a lifeline for Liberals to keep power.
Yet, never previously elected to anything Bank of Canada and Bank of England boss Carney cruised to victory in the March leadership race with tough talk about fighting Trump and re-crafting the Canadian economy. Within weeks, newly minted as the 24th PM of the Great North, Carney called the election, and garnered the high profile support of a “Canada Is Not For Sale” declaring Mike Myers and Neil Young and held a small but constant lead over the big crowd drawing Poilievre from the drop.
By the midway point of the campaign, it had become a one issue race with Carney, Poilievre and other party leaders were all condemning Trump’s attacks on the Canadian economy and sovereignty.
In one of the few surprises of the race today, the evening of the vote saw the Elections Canada site going down across the country starting around 4:30 pm PT. “
Our website is having technical difficulties,” the independent agency said in a banner on the site. “As a result, some of our online services and tools are currently unavailable. We are aware of the issue and are working hard to fix it. We apologize for any inconvenience.” The consequence of that still unexplained crash was that vote results were made public much slower than usual. The site became partially accessible around 6 pm PT.
