Hi, hello, I’m a Canadian who agrees with the idea that Trudeau is arrogant and out of touch. (*I also think this applies to almost all politicians)
tl;dr I suspect people think Trudeau is arrogant and out-of-touch because he was born into privilege, but more importantly, has been a politician in the highest office for the past 10 years during a time of worsening prospects for the electorate (regardless of his own impact on the situation, although that is not “no impact”). Literally nothing he could say could put a shine on that.
Trudeau is a figurehead as party leader, and as PM. I mean, not only that – the PM does have significant political power as well – but it means he’s a representative of all the actions that his government takes, and not without reason. People assume that the PMO exerts its influence on party members because it does. Above-board and otherwise (see the SNC-Lavalin scandal).
In my purely vibes-based view, that’s just how Canadian federal politics be. PM stays in power for long enough, lots of little grievances build up, eventually people get fed up and want change.
This isn’t really a shocking shakeup to me - the last Liberal regime lost power amid scandal and turmoil and it seemed much messier than this (although not as messy as the UK Tories’ clown car procession).
It’s more like Liberals doing internal realpolitik. They knew they were falling out of favour with the public, and they chose to pile as much culpability on Trudeau and torch him. I’d like to say it was because the stakes are higher and this is some high-minded bid to avert our being pulled into the US’s fascist death spiral, but honestly, I think it’s more likely just an attempt retain as much power as possible.
And boy did it pay off.
The Liberals were absolutely on an express flight out of power before Trump started a trade war. And because we still have FPTP ಠ_ಠ and the NDP are toothless cupbearers to the LPC, that meant that, with an election due soon, we were locked in for a conservative government. Not just that, polls were indicating a majority.
But the cons have been playing the right-populist game, riding Trump’s coattails. Their ‘platform’ relied on the continuation of friendly relations.
The tariffs were absolute manna from heaven for the LPC, but wouldn’t have been if Trudeau had remained at the helm because his approval ratings were dropping and our (largely US-owned and right-wing-biased) legacy media have been making hay with it. Fwiw, I’m pretty sure severalmany outgoing PMs have had worse approval ratings (lookin at you, BM the PM), but their party usually loses the subsequent election.
Which is probably why Freeland knifed Trudeau – to try to distance herself from his dropping approval rating and reclaim her mantle of “PM in-waiting”.
JT’s tenure as PM lasted 10 years. During that time, housing and healthcare problems have become crises, and while no single level of government could fix these, it’s clear to me that the LPC has not done enough to address the situation. Increasing numbers of Canadians cannot afford to buy a home, rent has ballooned unchecked in major metropols, and increasing numbers of Canadians do not have access to a family doctor.
And there’s also rising xenophobia and anti-immigrant sentiment, which is extremely worrying, and the Liberals are pro-immigration and have historically kept immigration levels high because this country depends on immigrant labour.
But when too many people can’t afford housing or find a doctor, the first thing a lot of people think isn’t that these are systemic failings that could have been prevented and remediated by good and timely policy interventions, it’s “there are too many people and they’re taking all the [house] [doctor] [jerb]!” And immigrants make a very convenient scapegoat, especially when it’s being modelled to such great political success by our neighbours.
I will also say that since you either aren’t Canadian, or are (as you admitted) unfamiliar with Canadian politics, I can see how you’d be confused by what seems like a sudden animus towards Trudeau if your opinion is based on his international relations and foreign policy. I have very little to say about either of those things. I agree, it’s largely been fine.
What I do have problems with has been his domestic policy, and there’s a (non-exhaustive) laundry list, so if you want as much granularity as I can try to give in a frankly prodigious act of procrastination, I put it in a different post because this hit the character limit.
When he was first chosen as LPC leader, I hadn’t even realized that he was a party member. I suspect he was chosen for the name recognition, and while I don’t like the idea or existence of political dynasties, I didn’t care because I wanted Harper out.
The Proportional Representation Bait-and-Switch
One of the LPC’s central campaign promises in 2015 was the end of First-Past-the-Post. He reneged on that promise as soon as the committee he’d empanelled recommended a referendum between FPTP and PR, but did not include his preference (ranked ballot). He took his ball and went home. This was deeply impactful on me. I had no great trust in politicians as a rule, but this was the final nail in the coffin for my faith in my country’s electoral system.
A few months ago he went on MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith’s podcast, and this was one of the topics they discussed. As one of the “FairVote” people the party was all but explicitly trying to bait into voting Liberal, I find his arguments to be insulting and patrician, though unsurprising. My most generous interpretation of what he says there is that he and I have a values mismatch when it comes to what we think democracy can and should be.
Strike Breaking
Early on in his PMship in 2016, the Trudeau government threatened to follow Harper’s 2011 precedent and table back-to-work legislation against legally striking Canada Post workers. In December 2024, after saying they wouldn’t force striking postal workers back to work, they did. By my count, this marks the third time in 15 years that our Posties have been prevented from improving their pay and working conditions, twice by Trudeau’s government.
“Affordable” Housing
About a year ago, his deputy PM came under fire for touting an “affordable housing” development for low- and middle-income people where the rents started at $1700/month for 330sqft, and $3315/month for 816sqft.
Again, deeply personal for me, as I live in the metro area with the worst rents in the country and have suffered 7 years of housing instability as a result.
This was a completely headassed publicity stunt from a woman who is not low- or middle-income, and definitely does not struggle to afford rent; it is archetypal of the “arrogant and out-of-touch” Liberal, from a woman who had previously been lionized by legacy media (most of which, incidentally, are majority US-owned - see PostMedia).
I have not seen any indications from the party that it sees the financialization of our housing market to be a concern for them, which I don’t find surprising for any liberal party, but is nonetheless concerning to me as a renter who would like not to have to spend the rest of my life at the whim of a landlord for my use of what my country officially considers to be a human right, my housing.
Truth and Reconciliation Weaselry
His government’s stated commitment to truth and reconciliation has repeatedly been shown to be all hat, no cattle. The have repeatedly fought court battles to get out of making any actual material reparations, most recently to mind was this absolutely galling stance from government lawyers that Canada has no legal obligation to provide First Nations with clean water. They’ve also wasted millions fighting residential school survivors in court.
Influence Peddling for a Criminal Business Conglomerate
SNC-Lavalin. The PMO tried to influence the Attorney General/Minister of Justice to decline to prosecute SNC-Lavalin on charges of bribery. The initial story by the Globe & Mail (which I cannot find, sorry) claimed that she objected, and was then “shuffled” from Minister of Justice to Minister of Veterans’ Affairs. The ethics commission report did find that the Trudeau had contravened the Conflict of Interest Act, and found that Trudeau had “continued to engage both with SNC-Lavalin’s legal counsel and, separately, with [then-AG and Justice Minister] Ms. Wilson-Raybould and her ministerial staff to influence her decision”, after she met with him and expressed her concerns that the PMO was inappropriately trying to interfere politically with the AG in a criminal matter.
Means-Tested Pandemic Relief
The Liberal government tried to claw back CERB, the emergency benefit they rolled out for COVID-19. They also demanded that claimants deemed to be invalid recipients pay back the disbursements, but were (unsurprisingly) overzealous, and $246M worth of outstanding CERB “debt” has been canceled because the claims were found to be justified. I wasn’t eligible for this, but someone in my family was, and got extremely stressed when the initial talk of clawbacks started, because their work venue had no plans to reopen at that time. Stuff like that leaves a bad taste in people’s mouths.
Failure to Shore Up Healthcare
And lastly, the doctor shortage. I’m honestly (mercifully) pretty out of gas, but uh… family doctor shortages everywhere, private for-profits making incursions (more than the ~30% they already have) into our system, fucking… telecoms?! somehow also doing this (although I’d have pretty much no problem with this if we nationalized them.)