Then-U.S. president Donald Trump, left, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau talk prior to a NATO round table meeting at The Grove hotel and resort in Watford, Hertfordshire, England, in December, 2019Frank Augstein/The Associated Press
Of all the people who might have been inclined to jump off a cliff in despair over Donald Trump’s recent election as U.S. President, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau might have been first to take the leap.
After all, he and Mr. Trump haven’t exactly shown any great affections for one another in past dealings. It’s not difficult imagining the president-elect regarding Mr. Trudeau in much the same light as he did U.S. Vice-President Kamala Harris: as a radical, far-left lunatic.
Mr. Trump has promised to apply new tariffs to a range of imports from various countries, including Canada, that have the potential to be economically debilitating. Migrants worried about being rounded up by Mr. Trump’s new border czar might attempt to flee north before that happens.
These are just some of the headaches the election result has created for the Trudeau administration.
Now, some might say Mr. Trudeau won’t have to worry about these things for much longer. A federal election has to happen in the next year and the federal Liberals haven’t a whiff of being re-elected, so deeply unpopular is the Prime Minister and his government.
But wait. What if Mr. Trump’s victory actually presents an opportunity for the Liberals? What if all the doomsday scenarios that have been presented about Mr. Trump’s true intentions – that he plans to rule as an autocrat, plans a vindictive hunt for the “enemy within” and will lock them up – actually come true? What if he tries to take advantage of the unfettered checks on his power he now has, thanks to the majorities Republicans appear to have in the Senate and the House of Representatives?
Is there a chance, in the picture I just painted, that Canadians, looking on from a safe distance north of the 49th, may recoil in horror over what they are witnessing and start to think the federal Liberals aren’t as bad as they had thought? That federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is a Trump wannabe with better hair and less makeup? After all, the Conservatives have been accused of playing from the Trump Republican playbook by, among other things, demonizing the mainstream media in an attempt to discredit their criticisms of the Poilievre Conservatives.
Maybe in this context, Mr. Trudeau won’t look so bad after all.
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Okay, granted, it’s a long shot. And if I was the Prime Minister I wouldn’t be holding out a ton of hope of this playing out as I described. But there is certainly a chance he could get some kind of boost from Canadians who, previously in the we-need-a-change-at-the-top camp, start hearing voices saying: be careful what you wish for.
Also, if Mr. Trump attempts to bully Canada in any way – and let’s face it, anything is possible – Mr. Trudeau may figure there is nothing to lose and everything to gain by standing up to him. A lot of Canadians might admire that, in fact, which might allow them to see the Prime Minister in a more favourable light.
All that said, you’d still likely want to be in Mr. Poilievre’s shoes today than Mr. Trudeau’s – a Trump victory or not. There are lots of reasons and theories about why the Republicans did as well as they did, but the most compelling is a strong desire for change. U.S. President Joe Biden was deeply unpopular, a majority did not like the direction in which the country was heading, and decided the Republicans understood that best.
And there is certainly a strong scent of that reality in Canada.
In fact, if you’re Mr. Poilievre, you’re likely looking at what took place in America and thinking: I just need to keep doing what I’m doing. And that is hammering the government on the single issue that matters to people the most – the high cost of everything, including housing.
Mr. Poilievre would also be wise to dial back any of his tendencies that give off a Trump vibe. Sure, the former and soon-to-be-again president of the United States has his admirers in Canada. But polls suggest most Canadians don’t find much to respect about the man and worry about him capitulating to his worst impulses and destabilizing the world even more than it is now.
Only Mr. Trudeau knows why he decided to fight on when most of the country and many in his own party believe strongly that it’s time he moved on. But maybe he thinks a year is a very long time in politics and anything can happen.
Maybe something has just happened that may provide him with the political lifeline he is desperately searching for.