Montreal, Canada – Just a few months ago, Canada’s governing Liberal Party seemed poised for a resounding 2025 election defeat.
Opinion polls showed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s party trailing the opposition Conservatives by as many as 26 percentage points.
An affordability crisis and widespread dislike of Trudeau had caused the Liberals’ support to plummet, and calls were growing for the embattled prime minister to resign ahead of a looming federal vote.
Yet now, experts say the political tide is shifting due to a range of factors, including Trudeau’s decision to resign, a Liberal leadership race that has boosted the party’s momentum, and US President Donald Trump’s repeated threats against Canada.
The Liberals have quickly narrowed the gap behind the Conservatives, according to recent surveys, with one poll published last week showing the party with a lead over the Tories for the first time since 2021.
“Two months ago, the Liberals were on the ropes, and many believed they were politically finished,” said Semra Sevi, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Toronto.
“Now, they are resurgent.”
Trudeau’s resignation
Trudeau’s decision in early January to step down as prime minister and Liberal Party leader once his replacement is chosen is one of the main factors responsible for the party’s changing fortunes, experts told Al Jazeera.
Trudeau, who has been prime minister since 2015, had faced years of mounting public anger over his government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as skyrocketing housing prices and a cost-of-living crisis.
The prime minister and his party also had failed to effectively counter years of attacks from a surging Conservative Party and its firebrand leader, Pierre Poilievre, who has promised change while blaming Trudeau for all of Canada’s ills.
With Trudeau stepping down, the political dynamics have changed, said Darrell Bricker, CEO of Ipsos Public Affairs, the firm that published the late February poll showing the Liberals with their first lead in four years.
Bricker explained that some voters had joined the Conservative camp more due to a desire for change than support for the party’s agenda or Poilievre.
“Now [they are] thinking there might be another option for change,” Bricker told Al Jazeera. “And that’s Mark Carney.”
Carney, a former governor of the Bank of Canada, is the frontrunner in the race to replace Trudeau as leader of the Liberal Party and by extension, as Canada’s next prime minister.
The race has helped re-energise the Liberal base and garnered national media attention, boosting interest in the party.
“Mark Carney has that new car smell about him and people are really interested in taking a test drive,” Bricker said of the leadership contest, which will be decided in a March 9 vote.
Conservative messaging
At the same time, the Conservative Party appears to be struggling to refocus its messaging in a post-Trudeau era of Canadian politics.
“One of the things that Poilievre was very successful in over the space of the past two years was characterising the Liberal record in a way that Canadians learned to oppose what the Liberals were doing,” said Bricker.
Poilievre had successfully vilified Trudeau in particular, he added. “But what’s happened is because the prime minister is gone, well you can’t continue to blame him.”
Poilievre and the Conservatives have tried to tie Carney, who previously served as Trudeau’s economic adviser but was never an elected member of the Parliament of Canada, to the Liberal government’s record.
They have dubbed him “Carbon Tax Carney” in reference to an unpopular, Liberal government carbon pricing programme that Carney had publicly supported but has since said he plans to scrap if elected.
Poilievre also regularly attacks the “Carney-Trudeau Liberals” on social media.
But Bricker said that over the past few weeks, Canadians have become less interested in the last 10 years of Liberal policies than in what’s happening today – particularly as it relates to the United States.
The Trump factor
Indeed, the statements coming out of the White House since Trump took office on January 20 have served as perhaps the most important factor in the Liberals’ resurgence, analysts say.
For months, the US president had threatened to levy steep tariffs on imports from Canada in a move that experts say would devastate the Canadian economy.
Trump followed through with that plan this week as his sweeping, 25-percent tariffs on most Canadian goods came into effect in the early hours of Tuesday. Ottawa has responded by putting reciprocal measures in place against the US, fuelling fears of a trade war.
The tariffs, coupled with Trump’s repeated push to make Canada the 51st US state, have fuelled widespread anger and a surge in Canadian nationalism. Many Canadians are now calling for the country to break away from the US, which they no longer view as a stable ally.
Genevieve Tellier, a political science professor at the University of Ottawa, said the so-called “ballot question” in the Canadian election will no doubt be which party is best suited to respond to Trump and manage Canada-US ties.
“Before [the focus] was, could the Liberals beat the Conservatives?” Tellier told Al Jazeera. “Now it’s not the case, it’s more about economic leadership, it’s how do you respond to [the] Americans?”
Poilievre’s combative style has served him well in opposition, she explained, but some Canadians are now questioning whether he can bring people together.
“The problem for Poilievre is that often he says the same thing as Donald Trump,” Tellier added. “There are many things on which we see some similarities.”
Meanwhile, Trudeau’s unified “Team Canada” approach to the US president’s threats has been well-received by Canadians, which has helped the Liberals. “And for once, the government has acted quickly, which was not really the case before,” Tellier said.
Early election call?
In the meantime, as Canadian anxiety persists around the Trump administration’s policies, the timing of the federal election has taken on a new importance.
The election must be held by October 20, but the Liberals – as the party in government – can trigger a vote before then.
Sevi at the University of Toronto said calling an election soon after their new leader is chosen on March 9 could help the party maintain its momentum, “especially with the pressure to address the tariff threats and economic concerns like housing and inflation”.
Tellier said an early election call also would allow the Liberals to avoid some potentially sticky political decisions.
Trudeau suspended Parliament in early January when he announced he was stepping down. It is set to resume in late March.
If lawmakers return to the House of Commons, the next Liberal leader would have to form a cabinet and deliver a speech outlining the new minority government’s priorities, both of which could prove controversial.
“If you call an early election, you don’t have to do all those things,” Tellier said.
Ultimately, whenever a vote is scheduled, experts agree that Canada is heading into a very different contest than the one that had been predicted just a few months ago.
“The election is shaping up to be much more competitive than expected,” Sevi told Al Jazeera, “with foreign policy, leadership, and economic issues all playing major roles.”
