Drive to dump Trudeau has momentum, Liberal MP says

Article content

Justin Trudeau’s political crisis is deepening, with more members of his Liberal Party publicly calling for the prime minister to step aside and give a new leader a chance before an election in 2025.

Jenica Atwin, a Liberal who serves as parliamentary secretary to a cabinet minister, told a newspaper in her home province of New Brunswick that Trudeau should leave and that she won’t run for reelection if he stays.

Chad Collins, an Ontario member of parliament, said that around 50 elected Liberals — perhaps more — are part of a growing group that wants the prime minister’s resignation. Other Liberals in the anti-Trudeau camp have given similar numbers. That would be about a third of the 153-person Liberal contingent in the House of Commons.

Monday’s resignation of Chrystia Freeland, Trudeau’s powerful finance minister and his longtime deputy, was a massive shock that has irreparably damaged the prime minister, Collins said in an interview.

Freeland said she quit after being told she would be moved to a different role in the cabinet. Trudeau delivered that news on Friday, she said — just three days before she was due for a major speech that would update the country on its fiscal and economic situation.

“I don’t know who’s giving him advice. I can guess. It’s not good advice,” Collins said. “But the buck stops with him with the decisions he makes, and we’re now seeing the fallout that’s come with what many would consider a very poor decision.”

“In terms of who the successor is, I don’t know at this point whether or not we could do much worse,” he said.

The 52-year-old Trudeau has been under pressure to leave for months. In June, the Liberals lost a special election in a Toronto district that they had held for decades. In September, they lost a seat in Montreal in similar fashion. Soon after, about two dozen Liberal lawmakers signed a letter asking him to go.

But Freeland’s resignation — coming at a time when Canada’s economy faces the threat of tariffs from the incoming Trump administration — has turned bubbling discontent into a full-scale crisis for Trudeau. The prime minister has canceled all of his usual year-end television interviews and said almost nothing publicly since Freeland quit, other than some brief comments at two Liberal events.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

Try refreshing your browser, or
tap here to see other videos from our team.

Play Video

“This isn’t just about one man — it’s about saving our party from a historic defeat,” Wayne Long, another Liberal member of parliament from New Brunswick, wrote in an open letter on Wednesday. Polls suggest the Conservative Party, led by Pierre Poilievre, is on course to win a majority government in the next election.

More Liberals will step away from politics if Trudeau tries to stick around, Collins warned. “I think the risk he runs is that he’ll have a skeleton crew of experienced elected representatives.”