Canada’s Justin Trudeau ‘set to announce resignation’

Canada’s embattled prime minister will reportedly announce his decision as early as Monday, before a national caucus meeting on Wednesday.

Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is expected to resign this week. Picture: AFP.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was reportedly set to ­resign as Liberal Party leader as early as overnight on Monday after an internal revolt led to increasing calls for him to stand down.

The embattled leader will ­likely announce his decision ­before a national caucus meeting on Wednesday, the Globe and Mail newspaper reported.

Three sources close to internal party matters said Mr Trudeau ­realised he had to make an announcement before he met his caucus to avoid looking as if he was being forced out by his MPs.

They said it was unclear whether he would leave immediately or stay on as Prime Minister until a new leader was elected.

The party’s national executive is set to meet this week, probably after the caucus meeting.

Mr Trudeau swept to power in 2015 and led the Liberals to two more ballot box victories in 2019 and 2021.

But for months he has trailed his main rival, Conservative Pierre Poilievre, by 20 points in public opinion polls. One recent survey by polling firm Abacus found more Canadians hold a more favourable view of US president-elect Donald Trump than Mr Trudeau.

And he has been ­engulfed in a political crisis for weeks after the resignation of his finance minister, Chrystia Freeland, last month over his approach to Mr Trump’s proposed tariffs and other spending proposals that would affect Canada.

A growing chorus of voices from within his party, including longtime allies, called on him to resign even as he named a new cabinet days after Ms Freeland quit, changing one-third of his team in a bid to settle the political turmoil.

In a further blow Jagmeet Singh, leader of the New Democratic Party and an erstwhile ally of the Prime Minister, announced just before Christmas his party’s decision to abandon Mr Trudeau and the Liberals.

Mr Singh said the NDP would seek Mr Trudeau’s removal as soon as possible, potentially by a no-confidence vote.

The NDP, the Conservative Party and Bloc Quebecois together would have enough votes to pass a no-confidence motion against Mr Trudeau when parliament reconvenes in late January.

Ms Freeland had said she left the cabinet because she thought Mr Trudeau wasn’t taking ­adequate steps to prepare for a possible trade war with the US after Mr Trump said he would ­impose up to 25 per cent tariffs on Canada and Mexico.

The incoming president has threatened to impose the tariffs on all Canadian products if Canada does not stem what he calls a flow of migrants and fentanyl into the US – even though far fewer of each cross into the US from Canada than from Mexico.

Mr Trudeau hit back last month, saying Americans would also suffer if the president-elect followed through with his threats.

Almost $C3.6bn ($5.8bn) worth of goods and services cross the border each day. Canada is the top export destination for 36 US states.

On immigration, the US Border Patrol reported 1.53 million encounters with migrants at the southwest border with Mexico ­between October 2023 and last September, compared with 23,721 encounters at the Canadian border.

Voters also blame Mr Trudeau for rising costs and housing shortages that were aggravated by ­looser immigration policies.

In November, he flew to ­Florida to meet Mr Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate in a bid to head off a trade war.

But since then Mr Trump has also landed humiliating blows against Mr Trudeau on social media, repeatedly calling him “governor” of Canada and ­declaring that the US’s northern neighbour becoming its 51st state is a “great idea”.

In his first two terms as Prime Minister, Mr Trudeau brought in Senate reforms, signed a new trade deal with the US and introduced a carbon tax to reduce the country’s greenhouse gas emissions. The married father of three also legalised cannabis, held a public inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women, and passed legislation permitting medically assisted suicide.

But by October, he was flailing in the polls and about two dozen Liberal MPs signed a letter calling on him to quit. At the time, Mr ­Trudeau said he would carry on, and the Liberal caucus has no mechanism available to push the leader of the party out.

An election must be held no later than October.

With AFP