On April 28, Canadians elected the Liberal Party of Canada to a fourth consecutive term. This is a rare feat for a political party in Canada and in this case, one of special significance, for just months ago, the Liberals seemed destined for near-complete destruction. The cost of living was spiking, the quality of life was falling, and through it all Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had become historically unpopular. His party had also become historically unpopular and was able to press on only by being propped up by the New Democratic Party and then proroguing Parliament. At that time, polls showed the Conservative Party under Pierre Poilievre would triumph to a degree never before seen in Canadian history.
But then Donald Trump got involved and did so in a couple of different ways.1 First, following a fateful meeting with Justin Trudeau, he began to refer to Canada as the 51st state and its Prime Minister as a mere governor. He made it clear that he believed Canada should revoke its sovereignty and become part of the United States. Second, he began to treat Canada as more of an enemy than an ally, putting heavy tariffs in place and speaking of how Canada has been taking advantage of the United States by stealing her jobs and maintaining unfair trade surpluses. Almost instantly, the political scene in Canada was utterly transformed.
Justin Trudeau eventually resigned and the Liberals chose Mark Carney as his successor. Carney, a former governor of both the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, was almost entirely unknown to Canadians before putting his hat in the ring and being appointed Prime Minister. In his short initial tenure in office, he quickly passed some of the measures promised by Pierre Poilievre, such as revoking the hated carbon tax, while adopting several components of the Conservative platform as his own. This took the wind out of the Conservative sails and essentially narrowed the election to a referendum on which leader could best stand up to Donald Trump and save the Canadian economy. Many believed it came down to the choice between a career politician with no business experience or a wealthy businessman with slim political experience.
Canada has always been a country that regards the Liberal Party as its “natural governing party” and that proved true once more. Canadians quickly forgave or forgot about their concerns from the last 10 years of Liberal governance and grew enthusiastic about Carney. The Liberal slide was not only stopped but utterly reversed. Though the Liberals fell just short of a majority government, they won 25 seats more than the Conservatives and now begin this term with quite a strong mandate. The New Democratic Party was devastated and has nearly ceased to exist—their supporters swinging to the Liberals helped secure the victory. Between the seven NDP seats and the 23 won by the Bloc Québécois, the Liberals should be able to cling to power easily enough by forging alliances.2
Shockingly, Pierre Poilievre, the man who until recently seemed sure to be Canada’s next Prime Minister, lost his seat. Though he intends to remain the leader of his party, he cannot be present in the House of Commons when parliament is in session, and this calls into question whether he can effectively serve as leader of the opposition party. Most people assume his party will soon find a seat for him, but that process may take many months. It’s almost impossible to describe how big a shock and how big a collapse this represents for both the man and his party.
So what does the future hold? Mark Carney is a self-proclaimed elite globalist who is also socially progressive and an adamant environmentalist—all matters that help predict his course for the next four years. His platform is one of running vast deficits as a means of propping up the Canadian economy while he transforms it from depending upon its relationship with the United States to instead looking east to Europe and West to Asia. During the election, he presented himself as a man who will stand up to President Trump, but it’s possible he will soon strike a tone of collegiality and attempt to renegotiate the relationship between the countries.3 Yet solving the American issue may actually harm him since, when that threat has been quelled, Canadians will quickly remember other urgent matters like inflation, the cost of living, sparse housing, and faltering healthcare—the very matters that caused his predecessor’s downfall.
There will be lots of time to analyze how the Conservative’s massive lead evaporated. Donald Trump will certainly be at the center of any analysis, though I expect it will also prove to be a combination of the Liberals outfoxing the Conservatives and the Conservatives focusing so much energy on Justin Trudeau that when he stepped down, they became almost irrelevant. In the end, they were unable to make an effective pivot from Trudeau to Trump. Many will wonder whether the Conservatives were too conservative or not conservative enough and as the party picks itself back up, it will need to decide whether it will bear down into policies that are fiscally and socially conservative or whether it will align itself just to the right of the Liberal Party. (For what it’s worth, I’d prefer the former but predict the latter.)
In the meantime, here are some matters that would be good to pray about.
- Canadians tend not to speak about how they vote, but I expect many or most are disappointed at the results of the election. Hence, it would be good to pray that Canadian Christians will not despair over what they assume will be a bad government, but instead fix their ultimate trust on God.
- Prime Minister Carney’s social policies are likely to be extremely progressive and will inevitably continue to come into contact with Christian convictions and freedom of religion. Pray that Christians will remain free to worship according to Scripture.
- The Liberal Party has long fostered animosity toward pregnancy care centers. They have attempted to further restrict them and strip them of their charitable status in the past and are likely to press forward with this policy in the near future.
- There are also indicators that the Liberals may wish to revoke the charitable status of churches—at least churches that will not in some way indicate they are “affirming.” While the Christian faith in no way depends upon charitable status, it would be a major change for Christians to no longer be issued tax receipts for their donations.
- The Liberal government seems intent on increasing euthanasia in Canada by further extending it to young people and those whose only condition is a mental illness. Medical Assistance in Dying is already common among senior citizens and those with terminal illnesses and may soon become much more so. Pray that Canadians would once again come to value life.
- Of course, and as always, pray that this government, despite many of its policies, would enable Christians to “lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Timothy 2:2).
- Let me reiterate what I’ve said in the past: I hold no animosity toward President Trump. I am simply describing his effect in another country. ↩︎
- See here for a bit more analysis. ↩︎
- WSJ has some suggestions on how he may proceed. ↩︎
