Mark Carney leads Liberals to unlikely election victory

2025 was an election year in Canada, but this year’s federal election was unlike any other in recent memory. Someday, books will be written about the April 28 federal election. In fact, one already has — Canada Versus Donald Trump: The 51st State Votes. While the U.S. president wasn’t on the ballot, his trade war was very much on the minds of Canadians.

“The existential threat coming from this reactionary president who was promising to annex us and maybe Panama and Greenland while he was at it, I think really lit a fire under people,” said author Justin Ling.

“President Trump is trying to break us so America can own us,” said Carney.

It’s a sentiment Carney would base the entire Liberal campaign on…with the help of Mike Myers. The two appeared in a campaign ad together, dressed as beer-league hockey players. And the “Elbows Up!” campaign was born.

Elsewhere, Pierre Poilievre and the Conservatives stuck to their initial game plan, focusing on affordability and the record of the previous Trudeau government.

“They designed a campaign two years ago and they were loath to get rid of it. They designed a campaign to run against Justin Trudeau, and even when they weren’t running against Justin Trudeau, they ran the same campaign anyway. They crossed out his name and wrote in Mark Carney. And it was a huge mistake,” Ling said.

Carney’s “elbows up” strategy worked. The Liberals ended up with 169 seats — 171 when you add in two Conservative floor-crossers, one seat shy of a majority government. Not bad for a party that had trailed the Tories by 20 points in late 2024.

“Carney’s own personal dynamism saved the Liberals from ruin,” said Ling.

The election ended up being a two-way race between the Liberals and the Conservatives for the first time in decades. Ling points out nearly 70 per cent of eligible voters cast a ballot. And of them, 85 per cent voted Liberal or Conservative. He says you would have to go back to the 1958 election to find a vote that fell so squarely to two candidates.

However, campaigning is one thing, governing is another, as Carney is already finding out.

“He bought himself a tremendous amount of goodwill over the year 2025,” said Ling.

“And now that we’re heading into some really choppy waters, he risks losing that trust really quickly and really severely unless he can figure out a way to really bring people along and to instill that same kind of confidence that he did during the campaign.”

Canada Versus Donald Trump: The 51st State Votes is published by Sutherland House.