Justin Trudeau’s political fate rests in the voters’ hands Monday. The prime minister faces the prospect of ending his tenure after calling a snap election to secure his leadership role and grow his party’s power in Canada’s House of Commons.
Once confident of a victory, polls now show a dead heat between the cosmopolitan liberal and center-right challenger, Erin O’Toole.
Like his counterpart to the south, Trudeau is criticized for continuous COVID-19 shutdowns, perpetual handouts, and accompanying inflation. Consumer prices in the Great White North rose over four percent in August compared to the same period last year, the highest rate the country has seen in nearly two decades.
Trudeau engages in similarly smug class warfare that we see in America between urban, coastal views and heartland values.
There is also backlash because the election, originally scheduled for 2023, occurs during a pandemic. When Trudeau called for a vote five weeks ago, polls were in his favor, with both liberals and conservatives supporting many of his coronavirus mandates, but more recently, voters perceive the moves as a draconian exercise.
One report called Trudeau’s race an “unexpected slog due to a lackluster campaign, the reemergence of old scandals, and public anger over its timing.”
When Trudeau first ran in 2015, he was seen as energetic, young, and photogenic; his win ended nearly a decade of Conservative Party rule. Four years later, multiple images of him in blackface contributed to his party losing 20 seats, though he was re-elected.
During his campaign across Canada, angry protesters, sick of his edicts, harassed Trudeau at many stops. Most Canadians find the prime minister cynical and angry, though his long-time friend Barack Obama recently endorsed him.
Justin Trudeau was hit with a handful of rocks as he exited a Monday event in #LdnOnt – a seeming escalation of the protests that have caused security concerns at other campaign stops. Full story, reactions & analysis by @CalviatLFPress: https://t.co/7F8QG9fIWO#Elxn44 #cdnpoli pic.twitter.com/eLFlYruQC3
— London Free Press (@LFPress) September 7, 2021
After a slow start, Canada is now one of the most vaccinated countries in the world, with 82 percent of the population over 12 receiving at least one dose, and more than 70 percent of citizens fully vaccinated.
“Trudeau is still likely to win, due to name recognition, and large liberal areas like Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver,” Gerry Bakic, a retired public servant from the western Ontario city of Thunder Bay, told PJ Media Sunday. “But there’s certainly fatigue surrounding him, hence the close nature of the polls. No doubt this is his last hurrah.”
O’Toole attempted to frame the contest as his fight against a vain elitist who called an election during the pandemic’s fourth wave.
“Every Canadian has met a Justin Trudeau in their lives — privileged, entitled, and always looking out for number one,” O’Toole explained in a recent speech.
But the 48-year-old has pulled his party toward the center, disavowing social and fiscal policies that made him its leader. O’Toole suddenly favors a carbon tax he promised to kill, and reversed the party’s position on guns earlier this month, now pledging to maintain the Liberals’ current list of prohibited firearms. Whereas Trudeau recently reopened the international border to the vaccinated, O’Toole says he will close the borders to prevent new variants from coming in.
In his closing pitch, O’Toole pleaded, “do not reward Mr. Trudeau for a pandemic election. Don’t reward Mr. Trudeau for spending $600 million on his power grab, and not on the crisis.”
The Toronto-area MP was endorsed Sunday by one of Canada’s largest newspapers.
Sunday’s front page:https://t.co/OPuuxpFvLa
#elxn44 #election2021 #cdnpoli #canada #erinotoole #toronto pic.twitter.com/AbEpoFv2ZK— Toronto Sun (@TheTorontoSun) September 19, 2021
In the end, it seems the incumbent must rely on lukewarm progressives to hold their nose and support him again, despite many broken promises.
