Two things happened. Trudeau announced his intention to resign and Trump came into power (and threatened a trade war on day 5 of his presidency). It is impossible to determine which effect is causing the change in the Liberal’s fortunes.
I would be willing to argue it is 3/4 Trump and 1/4 Trudeau, but we will of course never know. In any case, we will not have a carbon tax election, which will be a problem for Poilievre.
Finally, I think prorogation also has an effect. The Conservatives have no longer a platform for their political vandalism. The well for social media clips has dried up and they now have to crash the parties of Liberal MPs to stay relevant. Not a good look.
Léger may or may not be right, but it is likely the pollster that understands Quebec best. The current context couldn't be better for Carney. With the looming tariff threat, many of the wedge issues Poilievre has been capitalizing on are becoming irrelevant for a lot of voters. For many, the key election question will likely be: Who is best equipped to navigate the economic storm triggered by Trump? And Carney’s résumé couldn’t be more suited for the challenge. That said, the political landscape can shift quickly in either direction, especially in the current climate (anyone remember Harris strong strart?).
Agree. Key election question is as you say, ‘who is best equipped to navigate Trumps economic storm’ and who is best able to lay-up Canada for broad economic diversification and stronger geopolitical alliances . It would be nice to see other countries express support for Canada in significant ways - sometimes feels like we are out there on our own. Mark Carney has statesmanship and recognition on the world stage which will help - Poilievre has neither
I think voters have been trying to send a clear message for a while now. They don’t dislike the Liberals in general, and they certainly don’t like the Conservatives, but that they’re flatly rejecting a subset of policies that the Liberals have stubbornly tied themselves to. If the only way to reject those policies was to eliminate the Liberal party, that was a price they were willing to pay
But since there’s now a plausible path to get rid of that subset of policies without ditching the entire party, people are willing to give them another shot. Particularly because they much prefer the Liberals over the Conservatives on almost every other issue
The big risk is that the Liberal inner circle is going to misread a polling shift driven by the hope that they’re ditching their policies as permission to double down on those policies
When Carney first announced, I thought if he was lucky he'd get the Liberals to 25% and 80 seats or so and possibly do well enough to stay on as leader. If Mainstreet and Ipsos are capturing something real here, the Liberals might even be able to hold the CPC to a minority if their luck holds. I'm figuring Carney's team is a bit better than Kim Campbell's (and a guy like Carney's probably smart enough to learn from Campbell and Turner's mistakes too), so if they can hold on for a tough three or four months without the bottom falling out, they may be able to make Poilievre a one-term PM come 2028 or 2029. I still don't see how the Liberals win, but at least there's a glimmer of hope for the LPC that wasn't there before; donations will be higher, candidates/staffers/volunteers will be more motivated and the leader will be an asset to the party. Those are all things that wouldn't have happened if Trudeau had stayed on.
Correlation is not causation.
Two things happened. Trudeau announced his intention to resign and Trump came into power (and threatened a trade war on day 5 of his presidency). It is impossible to determine which effect is causing the change in the Liberal’s fortunes.
I would be willing to argue it is 3/4 Trump and 1/4 Trudeau, but we will of course never know. In any case, we will not have a carbon tax election, which will be a problem for Poilievre.
Finally, I think prorogation also has an effect. The Conservatives have no longer a platform for their political vandalism. The well for social media clips has dried up and they now have to crash the parties of Liberal MPs to stay relevant. Not a good look.
Léger may or may not be right, but it is likely the pollster that understands Quebec best. The current context couldn't be better for Carney. With the looming tariff threat, many of the wedge issues Poilievre has been capitalizing on are becoming irrelevant for a lot of voters. For many, the key election question will likely be: Who is best equipped to navigate the economic storm triggered by Trump? And Carney’s résumé couldn’t be more suited for the challenge. That said, the political landscape can shift quickly in either direction, especially in the current climate (anyone remember Harris strong strart?).
Agree. Key election question is as you say, ‘who is best equipped to navigate Trumps economic storm’ and who is best able to lay-up Canada for broad economic diversification and stronger geopolitical alliances . It would be nice to see other countries express support for Canada in significant ways - sometimes feels like we are out there on our own. Mark Carney has statesmanship and recognition on the world stage which will help - Poilievre has neither
I think voters have been trying to send a clear message for a while now. They don’t dislike the Liberals in general, and they certainly don’t like the Conservatives, but that they’re flatly rejecting a subset of policies that the Liberals have stubbornly tied themselves to. If the only way to reject those policies was to eliminate the Liberal party, that was a price they were willing to pay
But since there’s now a plausible path to get rid of that subset of policies without ditching the entire party, people are willing to give them another shot. Particularly because they much prefer the Liberals over the Conservatives on almost every other issue
The big risk is that the Liberal inner circle is going to misread a polling shift driven by the hope that they’re ditching their policies as permission to double down on those policies
When Carney first announced, I thought if he was lucky he'd get the Liberals to 25% and 80 seats or so and possibly do well enough to stay on as leader. If Mainstreet and Ipsos are capturing something real here, the Liberals might even be able to hold the CPC to a minority if their luck holds. I'm figuring Carney's team is a bit better than Kim Campbell's (and a guy like Carney's probably smart enough to learn from Campbell and Turner's mistakes too), so if they can hold on for a tough three or four months without the bottom falling out, they may be able to make Poilievre a one-term PM come 2028 or 2029. I still don't see how the Liberals win, but at least there's a glimmer of hope for the LPC that wasn't there before; donations will be higher, candidates/staffers/volunteers will be more motivated and the leader will be an asset to the party. Those are all things that wouldn't have happened if Trudeau had stayed on.
Interesting. Quebec can change as we saw when Jack Layton led the NDP.