French Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced his resignation on Monday, acing the bitter cold and an unhappy nation, saying he stayed in the job despite growing in popularity because he was a “fighter.” The prime minister acknowledged in his own words that his own caucus had shoved him out in his usual self-absorbed manner while thanking no one in his customary self-absorbed manner.
The perfect secretary blasted on the liberal politics that made him famous and that he pushed for nine years in office when asked by a writer if another leader might be able to defeat opposition leader Pierre Poilievre, whose Conservative Party currently leads Trudeau’s Liberal Party by 25 points in most polls. He also made an allusion to the problems that the incoming Trump administration posed to him.  ,
” Pierre Poilievre’s vision for this country is not the right one for Canadians”, Trudeau said, taking his rival to task for wanting to” (stop ) the fight against climate change”, not focusing on “diversity”, and “attacking journalists” and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation ( CBC ).  ,
A former play teacher and ski instructor, Trudeau swept to business as a liberal poster child in 2015, fighting on” beautiful techniques” and doing things better. As Canadians seethe over the high cost of living, crime and disorder, the effects of higher immigration rates, and the cost of his environment policies, he leaves office as a deeply unhappy and divisive figure. His departure speech summed up the idea that he was out of touch, longing for guns and abortion, long-standing wedge issues in American politics rather than pockets issues as the population of Canada ages more and more in comparison to its American neighbors.
No election is anticipated until the spring at the earliest because Trudeau officially prorogued ( suspended ) Parliament until the Liberal Party chooses a new leader. The delay allegedly gives the ruling party an opportunity to recover, but critics claimed Jagmeet Singh, the leader of the left-wing New Democratic Party, has been able to pass the company boundary for collecting their pensions as a result.
The drama unfolds amid Canadian concern over the incoming Trump administration’s threat of 25 % tariffs on both Canada and Mexico if drugs and migrants cross the border without crossing. Trump has mostly avoided Mexico while focusing much of his attention on Canada, making fun of the possibility that Canada could become the 51st state and calling Trudeau a “governor.” However, the concern is evident in Canada: Taxes could value 2.4 million jobs and send the nation into crisis, according to economist Trevor Tombe at the University of Calgary.
For his part, Trump greeted Trudeau’s departure with more speak of a consolidation. Some, like as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, said Trump “liberated” Canada. Such talk chafed several French commentators, who emphasized profound discontent with Trudeau dating to before Trump’s vote,  , though one notable critic observed a connection.
” I see a direct line from Trump’s Truth Social outburst of Nov. 25 to this week’s activities”, longtime political journalist Paul Wells wrote on Substack. With Elon Musk continuing his kibitzing in the elections of nations around the world, Canada will then serve as a warning to governments abroad: Trump and his staff can take you along.” Trudeau’s sphere again thought a minute Trump victory would help them make the situation against Pierre Poilievre,” said the president.
Trudeau wasn’t usually seen as quite a duty. In the 2015 election, he elevated a defunct Liberal Party to a majority-dominant position. He pulled in young voters, drawn by his star and promises of electoral reform ( an concern he abandoned after he took office ), embraced liberal causes, and signaled a new approach to politics,  , summed up by his reply to a problem on appointing a sex-balanced cabinet:” Because it’s 2015″.
In 2024, those same Millennials will turn Conservative. According to The Globe and Mail, 34 percent of Gen Z voters said they would vote Conservative, while 38 percent of Canadians between the ages of 30 and 44 did so in a November survey from Abacus Data. Both cohorts gave the cost of living and housing affordability precedence over the environment and climate change. Additionally, they indicated less immigration sensitivity than older voters. ” The short-term scarcity of not being able to afford a home, about feeling insecure about where the economy is going and how fast it’s changing, has taken precedence”, David Coletto, Abacus Data‘s CEO, told The Globe.  ,
In addition to pushing for a child tax credit and a$ 10-a-day daycare program, Trudeau’s early accomplishments in office included the decriminalization of marijuana. Canadians largely give him credit for successfully guiding the first Trump administration and ensuring continued access to the U.S. market through the USMCA trade agreement. He largely led a good-times government, though. He marched in pride parades, pushed a carbon tax to fight climate change, and spoke of indigenous reconciliation.  ,
In all of this, Trudeau often acted like a blue-state governor. He embraced Black Lives Matter protests and voiced his opinions on U.S. events like the Supreme Court’s decision on Roe v. Wade and school shootings. He drew endorsements from Democrats, including President Obama ( with whom he formed a “bromance” ), Hillary Clinton, and Bernie Sanders.
The prime minister and those around him came to interpret their impressive victory as an ideological mandate, according to Sean Speer in The Hub, an online Canadian conservative publication. They saw themselves as the standard bearers of the progressive global agenda.
The trucker convoy converged on Ottawa in 2022 to protest the government’s vaccination requirements, in a nation where nearly 90 % of the population voluntarily received the jab. Trudeau never attracted much attention from the American right.  ,
In what amounted to a brazen turn toward authoritarianism, Trudeau branded the truckers a “fringe minority” with “unacceptable views”, then invoked the Emergencies Act and froze protesters ‘ bank accounts.
The convoy attracted attention from all over the world, but it wasn’t particularly well-known in Canada. The nation grew weary of Covid lockdowns and Trudeau himself as a result. Trudeau’s divisive personality and willingness to engage in politics with the pandemie were also showcased.
The convoy followed a contentious 2021 election. Trudeau called the election with the intention of campaigning for his alleged pandemic stewardship despite having a high turnout in the polls. It was dubbed the” Seinfeld election” — the election about nothing, according to Canadians, which led Trudeau to campaign on lockdowns and vaccinations as wedge issues. He won a second minority government for which he lost the popular vote to the Conservatives but still won a plurality of seats thanks to his party’s effective vote in a Westminster system. As Speer wrote in The Hub,” The COVID-19 pandemic was in hindsight a linchpin moment when the government became more dogmatic, radical, and unrepresentative”.
The pandemic sent inflation soaring in Canada — , similar to the U. S. — , along with housing prices. The Trudeau administration responded to a constrained post-pandemic labor market by significantly increasing immigration to more than 1 million newcomers each year, easily exceeding previous goals. The surge in immigration, particularly among younger Canadians, was blamed on a single-payer system plagued by long wait times and a shortage of physicians for aggravated housing shortage and straining social services like health care. Analysts accused Trudeau of “breaking” the Canadian consensus on immigration, which had previously inflamed fewer passions than in the United States.
The Trudeau government recently reversed its immigration policies, but it may be too little too late for the Liberals, which could be relegated to fourth place in Parliament, according to seat projections. According to The Economist, Trudeau continued to offer “pious sermons that railed against their Conservative rivals ‘ coarser tactics, rather than pragmatic solutions to the problems that bedeviled anxious voters,” even with the polls projecting a wipeout.
That propensity for pious speeches was evident as recently as mid-December, when Trudeau blasted Americans for not choosing a female president. ” We were supposed to be on a steady, if difficult sometimes, march towards progress”, Trudeau said at a gala in Ottawa. ” And yet, just a few weeks ago, the United States voted for a second time to not elect its first woman as president. Everywhere, women’s rights and women’s progress are under attack. Overtly, and subtly”.
The Liberal Party has never had a female leader, according to critics. Trudeau’s finance minister and deputy prime minister — , and possible heir apparent — Chrystia Freeland subsequently resigned, citing differences over fiscal policy. In a subsequent video, it became clear that Trudeau had previously stated in a Zoom call that she would take on the position of managing U.S. relations, which would be a cabinet post with no real authority and essentially a demotion. She was only the most famous female cabinet member to break with Trudeau after failing to follow her advice. ” Faux Feminist”, the Toronto Sun ran on its front page afterward.
Poilievre, meanwhile, delivered a speech in Parliament responding to the Liberals ‘ political troubles by raising the plight of ordinary Canadians he’s met,” who tell me, I don’t know what the hell I’m gonna do”. He described a waitress who “had given up on ever owning a home or renting out” and a brewery worker who “had worked three jobs to make ends meet.
” These silly games over here, they’re very entertaining, the soap opera that everyone sees, that’s all fine”, Poilievre said. However, there are real people living here and we have a responsibility to help them.
It’s a message that Canadians are increasingly resonating with, and Trudeau seems to have forgotten about it long ago.
