Trudeaus consign era of unhappy political marriages to the bin
From the beginning, the marriage of Justin and Sophie Trudeau was unconventional. Its ending was unconventional too - both refusing to ‘just suck it up’.
From the beginning, the marriage of Justin and Sophie Trudeau was unconventional. Public flirtations. Unabashed displays of intimacy. The year Trudeau was elected Prime Minister of Canada, the couple took part in a jaw-dropping Vogue shoot so steamy it all but made the pages curl.
Some constituents squirmed: the public face of a political marriage is traditionally that of a respectful, efficient, sexless alliance. This was like catching your parents in the act.
The rest of the world, however, couldn’t get enough of Trudeau and his equally photogenic wife Sophie Gregoire-Trudeau. The international press dubbed them the “Canadian Kennedys”.
But when a romance dies, it stays dead. And, for all their media savvy, the Trudeaus were never about pretending: it seems they were simply unwilling to let an authentic, passionate union become a charade.
It’s 2023: respectful, efficient – unhappy – political marriages belong to another era. One or both Trudeaus were unprepared to publicly “suck it up”.
An Instagram post on Wednesday marked the end of an 18-year marriage that produced three children: daughter Ella-Grace Margaret, and sons Xavier James and Hadrien.
“After many meaningful and difficult conversations, we have made the decision to separate,” it said.
In another break with convention, the split was announced while Justin Trudeau was midway through his tenure, insisting he intends to lead the Liberal party into a fourth campaign ahead of a scheduled federal election in 2025.
An official separation while one spouse still holds political office is incredibly rare. In Canada, it’s happened only once before: the first was Justin’s father, the late Pierre. In 1977, the former Canadian prime minister separated from Justin’s mother, Margaret after six years of marriage, eventually filing for divorce in 1983, a year before he resigned as leader of the Liberal party.
Divorce is miserable enough without it being endured in the public eye. And the vultures of gossip are always circling: how can a man who can’t keep his marriage intact hold an entire country together?
And so throughout history, a political partner — overwhelmingly female — has been obliged to swallow a bitter pill for the sake of appearances.
Details of John F. Kennedy’s complicated marriage to Jackie Kennedy reveal she may have been aware of several of her husband’s affairs. But the marriage endured.
Hillary Clinton pulled out all the stops to save husband Bill’s 1992 presidential campaign after news of the Gennifer Flowers affair broke, and later saved his presidency by blaming the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal on a “vast right-wing conspiracy”.
On the day he was impeached in 1998, she made a passionate personal appeal on his behalf as “a wife who loves and supports her husband”. (Bill was, unintentionally or not, less helpful campaigning for his wife’s 2016 presidential run against Donald Trump.)
Closer to home, Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke had an on-off affair with his biographer Blanche D’Alpuget for 20 years while married to Hazel Hawke. It wasn’t until 1995, four years after he left office, that he announced he was leaving his wife of 38 years to marry D’Alpuget.
Politicians make strange bedfellows; the pressure their hothouse job brings to bear on a relationship is immense. Even Barack and Michelle Obama, with perhaps the most outwardly enviable marriage of any First Couple, have acknowledged the effort and devotion that have gone into making their union last.
In his 2020 memoir A Promised Land, Barack Obama admitted (after he’d left office) that marital tension had been a hidden hallmark of his time in the White House. “Michelle very much believed in the work I did but was less optimistic about what I could get done. ... She’s more sceptical about politics and more mindful of the sacrifices to the family,” he told People magazine.
In the past, both Justin and Sophie Trudeau have spoken about the hardships that underpin married life, while emphasising their commitment in the face of such challenges. But, hey, it’s 2023. US website Politico reports that Sophie has a book in the works, “a deeply personal journey toward self-knowledge, acceptance and empowerment”.
The former TV presenter’s memoir is reportedly studded with wellness tips and journaling prompts. One of the questions it explores: “How can we let go of what doesn’t serve us and nurture what does?”
