The rules are still being set for the race to replace Justin Trudeau, but one rumoured contender has taken his name out of the running.
Dominic LeBlanc, named finance minister last month following Chrystia Freeland’s abrupt resignation, announced Wednesday morning that he will not be a candidate in the impending Liberal Party of Canada race.
“While I am extremely grateful for the encouragement and the expressions of support I have received from caucus colleagues and Liberals across the country, I have decided not to be a candidate in the Liberal Party of Canada’s upcoming leadership race,” LeBlanc said on X.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced Monday that he would be resigning as Liberal leader and prime minister following a Liberal leadership race. He also had the Governor General prorogue Parliament until Mar. 24 to allow the Liberals time to run a contest.
Trudeau announced his resignation after facing an increasing number of Liberal caucus members who said they had no faith in him to win another election.
Before replacing Freeland as finance minister, LeBlanc had been the minister of public safety since July 2023.
LeBlanc said as U.S.-Canada relations reach a crossroads – with Canada staring down the barrel of 25% tariffs on all imported goods and President-elect Donald Trump threatening “economic force” against Canada in a bid to annex it – he will focus his energy on his current cabinet roles.
“The threat these tariffs pose to our nation’s economic well-being and to the livelihood of a countless number of Canadian families cannot be understated – and as such, it requires nothing less than my full attention,” LeBlanc.
Though he won’t be a candidate in the Liberal leadership race, LeBlanc announced that he will be a candidate in his New Brunswick riding of Beauséjour in the next federal election.
Frank Baylis, a former MP for Pierrefonds—Dollard, is the first and only candidate to announce his candidacy for the Liberal leadership officially. Baylis served as a member of Parliament from 2015 to 2019.
The Ontario government has already requested that Ottawa address the province’s economic and security concerns by matching U.S. tariffs on China, banning Chinese software in cars, delaying the digital services tax, and finally meeting NATO’s 2% of GDP defence spending requirements.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford said it was time to put words into action.
“In the meantime, Ontario is stepping up with Operation Deterrence to crack down on illegal border crossings and illegal guns and drugs,” said Ford. “A more coordinated, Team Canada approach that includes more boots on the ground is the only way to detect, deter and disrupt illegal activity and ensure the safety and security of Canadian and American communities.”
Ford spoke of Trudeau’s resignation the day before the border plan was announced.
He said that despite the turmoil within the Liberal Party of Canada, Trudeau had to shift his focus to deal with the pending tariff threat.
“We need all hands on deck. We need the Prime Minister to continue doing his job. Prorogation doesn’t mean vacation. It means continuing moving forward as the Prime Minister as long as he holds that title,” said Ford.
While President-elect Donald Trump has suggested making Canada the 51st state, Ford made him a counteroffer – that Canada would buy Alaska, Minnesota, and Minneapolis, albeit an unlikely possibility considering Canada’s over $1.2 trillion of debt.
Ford said that amid Trudeau’s announcement that he would soon step down, it was time for premiers to step up. As leader of the Council of the Federation, informally known as Canada’s Premiers, he said that’s exactly what they’ll do, and he expects the same of municipal leaders.
The Ontario Provincial Police will deploy 200 frontline and specialty officers to help with Operation Deterrence. Since Dec. 6, 2024, the provincial police have spent 6,000 hours patrolling the border for illegal border activity using aircraft, helicopters, boats, off-road vehicles, and foot patrol.
The Operation Deterrence team will partner with the RCMP, using specialized resources like canine units, commercial vehicle inspections, and criminal investigators. The team will focus on the border crossings outside of the 14 already staffed by the Canada Border Services Agency.
The Ontario government said that if it were a standalone country, it would be the U.S.’s third-largest trading partner, with two-way trade totalling $493 billion in 2023, supporting millions of jobs on both sides of the border.
Ontario implementing border enhancements follows quickly behind the Alberta government implementing similar policies to monitor its nearly 300-kilometre border with the United States.
Quebec has similarly announced that it will deploy provincial police at the U.S. border.
The announcements follow various premiers demanding improved border security after a meeting with Trudeau.
Facebook and Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg has signalled an end to censorious policies and a move toward pushing for free speech abroad.
In a five-minute video released on social media, Zuckerberg announced an end to fact-checkers and a shift toward X-style community notes. He said the plan is to change the way content is restricted and promoted to defend free expression.
He also committed to working with the incoming Trump administration to defend free speech on Meta platforms internationally.
“It’s time to get back to our roots around free expression on Facebook and Instagram,” Zuckerberg said. “I gave a speech at Georgetown five years ago about the importance of protecting free expression, and I still believe this today, but a lot has happened over the last several years.”
He said things like the proliferation of drugs, terrorism and child exploitation are still a high priority to be removed from the platform but that Meta will be stepping back from censoring public discourse.
“We built a lot of complex systems to moderate content, but the problem with complex systems is they make mistakes,” he said. “Even if they accidentally censor just 1% of posts, that’s millions of people, and we’ve reached a point where it’s just too many mistakes and too much censorship.”
He said the recent election of Donald Trump is a “cultural tipping point” towards prioritizing free discourse.
“So we’re going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms,” he said.
Zuckerberg said Meta will replace fact checkers with community notes in the style of his social media competitor Elon Musk’s community notes on X.
“After Trump first got elected in 2016, the legacy media wrote nonstop about how misinformation was a threat to democracy. We tried, in good faith, to address those concerns without becoming the arbiters of truth,” he said. “But the fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they’ve created, especially in the US.”
Meta will also be removing restrictions on topics such as immigration and gender, as Zuckerberg said they have become out of touch with mainstream discourse.
“What started as a movement to be more inclusive has increasingly been used to shut down opinions and shut out people with different ideas, and it’s gone too far,” he said. “So I want to make sure that people can share their beliefs and experiences on our platforms.”
He said Meta will change how they filter content, too, to limit mistakes and “dramatically reduce the amount of censorship” on Meta platforms. He said the filters would be focused on illegal and “high severity violations” while relying on individual reporting for “lower severity” ones and require much “higher confidence” before taking posts down.
“The reality is that this is a trade-off. It means we’re going to catch less bad stuff, but we’ll also reduce the number of innocent people’s posts and accounts that we accidentally take down,” he said.
He also noted that they would reverse a previous decision not to recommend political content to users initially because it was “making people stressed.”
He announced he would partner with President-elect Donald Trump’s future government to push back against governments worldwide, such as European and Latin American countries who aim to censor free discourse on his platforms.
E-law professor and expert Michael Geist told True North that this partnership could potentially impact Trudeau government censorship bills such as the Online News Act and the Online Streaming Act.
“I think we will see increased pressure to change those bills. For example, Bill C-18 (Online News Act) has already led to the blocking of news links in Canada on the Meta platforms,” he said. “Meta will no doubt continue to fight against that law.”
The Online News Act makes social media giants such as Meta have to pay certain Canadian media outlets to have their news available on their websites. Zuckerberg pushed back against the law by banning news on Instagram and Facebook in Canada. The ban is still in place.
Geist said the US government under Trump could accelerate the fight against such bills, though reforms may be inevitable if there is a change in government in Canada.
“The language used by Zuckerberg is certainly consistent with the kind of concerns voiced by Pierre Poilievre over the past couple of years,” Geist said.
Meta did not respond to True North’s requests for comment.
Instead of introducing a non-confidence motion in an attempt to force the Liberal government into an election, the Conservatives delivered a scathing indictment of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for proroguing Parliament, effectively shutting the House of Commons until the end of March.
Trudeau’s decision to announce his intention to step down has foiled the Conservatives’ original plan to trigger another non-confidence vote on Tuesday in a House of Commons public accounts committee meeting. That meeting will no longer take place, as prorogation also extends to committee work.
In a press conference, Conservative House Leader Andrew Scheer and Deputy House Leader Luc Berthold bashed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for putting his personal needs and party interests above those of Canadians by proroguing Parliament.
“Rather than allow that to happen, Justin Trudeau has selfishly shut down Parliament to avoid accountability,” said Scheer. “Justin Trudeau has run and hid from accountability and cowardly announced his resignation rather than give Canadians the choice, putting (an election) off until sometime in March.”
The prorogation comes despite unprecedented misery, Scheer explained. Misery that has resulted in families with two incomes being forced to visit food banks for the first time, Canadians turning down their thermostats to avoid paying more in carbon tax, and homeless encampments taking over the country.
“Once again, Justin Trudeau and the Liberals have proven that they put themselves ahead of the Canadian people,” said Scheer.
Although the Liberals will have to select a new leader, Scheer said this will change nothing because the speculative candidates are all ministers who have “been vocal cheerleaders of Justin Trudeau and his policies.”
He called out Mark Carney, Chrystia Freeland, and Christy Clark, citing their past failures.
But Liberals weren’t the only ones at fault, according to Scheer. He said that all of this could have been avoided if NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh ripping up the supply and confidence agreement was not directly followed by him continuing to prop up the Liberals in the House of Commons.
Berthold echoed the comments in French, saying that the Bloc Québecois and NDP are ready to vote non-confidence against the government.
“There’s no doubt that if Jagmeet Singh had done so earlier this fall, if he had backed up his words with action, we wouldn’t be where we are today,” said Berthold. “But unfortunately, he wanted to wait until February for his pension. He’s got it now. He was ready to vote for our (non-) confidence. Justin Trudeau has found a way out, and unfortunately, it’s Canadians who are going to pay the price.”
“Life wasn’t like this in Canada before the Liberals took office, and it won’t be like this in Canada after Canadians vote them out,” said Scheer.
He warned that the country remains very volatile, especially concerning President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs, as Canada has no leader with a public mandate to negotiate on its behalf.
However, during his party’s leadership election, Trudeau will remain Canada’s prime minister and negotiator. Scheer criticized his past failures as the country’s lead negotiator.
He said that Trudeau capitulated to Trump during his first presidency and then backed down to President Joe Biden by failing to get an exemption on softwood lumber or new energy exports to the United States.
“He’s effectively moved the inevitable date where he will face a non-confidence vote from the end of January to the end of March,” said Scheer. “Those are two extra months of uncertainty and chaos and misery that Canadians will have to live through, and it’s put our country in an incredibly dangerous position when dealing with the United States.”
On The Faulkner Show to break down the news of Justin Trudeau’s resignation announcement is pollster and former Conservative National Campaign Manager Hamish Marshall. On the show, Marshall discusses the implications of a prorogued parliament, the future of the Liberal party and what this means for the Liberals heading into a federal election.
Many breathed a sigh of relief when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced his plans to resign but a few political allies spoke highly about his time in office.
On Monday, Trudeau announced in front of Rideau Hall that he will be stepping down as the Liberal party leader and prime minister once a new leader is selected to replace him. The news of the event quickly prompted reactions from some well-known commentators and political figures on social media.
American author and journalist Michael Shellenberger responded with a scathing review of Trudeau’s legacy, calling the Canadian prime minister an advocate of censorship.
“Justin Trudeau has resigned. He framed himself as an honest, caring, and compassionate leader. He was not. He falsely smeared his critics as Nazis. He justified freezing bank accounts using faked intelligence. And he spread disinformation while demanding censorship,” said author and journalist Micheal Shellenberger in a post to X.
Justin Trudeau has resigned. He framed himself as an honest, caring, and compassionate leader. He was not. He falsely smeared his critics as Nazis. He justified freezing bank accounts using faked intelligence. And he spread disinformation while demanding censorship. Let's dig in: pic.twitter.com/0wZKIGuHzi
In contrast, Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow shared her gratitude for the prime minister in a post to X, saying, “I want to thank Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for over a decade of public service to Canadians.”
I want to thank Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for over a decade of public service to Canadians.
As leadership changes occur in Ottawa, I will stay focused on building more homes, feeding more kids and getting Toronto moving.
Youtuber and political pundit J.J. McCullough reacted with a sardonic post to X, writing, “Breaking news! Justin Trudeau to continue process of verrrry slowly going away!”
Breaking news! Justin Trudeau to continue process of verrrry slowly going away!
Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations and former Ontario NDP premier Bob Rae said that he admired his former colleague in Parliament for his “commitment to Canada, his respect for Canada’s international obligations, and his love of human rights.”
Prime Minister Trudeau was a colleague in Parliament , successor as Leader of the Liberal Party, and is my boss as Prime Minister in my work at the United Nations. I admire his commitment to Canada, his respect for Canada’s international obligations, and his love of human rights. pic.twitter.com/oKTBsgjp8r
However, among the general public, the overwhelming majority of Canadians seemed to be, while happy with the news of Trudeau’s resignation, also quite angry at his decision to prorogue Parliament at such an unstable time for the country.
“The vast majority of Canadians do not want prorogue. Why should we give the failed Liberal party a chance to regroup while the country continues to flounder and fail under the liberal/NDP coalition,” wrote one X user. “We want the election now. You do not have the right to hold us at bay like this. You do not represent us. You have represented Justin. Call the election. Enough of this foolishness.”
As the deadline for U.S. President-elect Donal Trump’s inauguration nears, the threat of his proposed 25% tariff on all Canadian imports looms heavy as well.
“Let me get this straight. Donald Trump will likely impose a 25% tariff on Canada as soon as he becomes President. And Trudeau’s response is to prorogue Parliament just to hold onto power for a few more months. We can always count on the Liberals to do the worst thing for Canada,” wrote one X user.
Let me get this straight. Donald Trump will likely impose a 25% tariff on Canada as soon as he becomes President
And Trudeau's response is to prorogue Parliament just to hold onto power for a few more months.
We can always count on the Liberals to do the worst thing for Canada.
“Under the current circumstances it was inappropriate for the Governor General to prorogue Parliament. She failed to reconvene the house immediately. Our system is broken. The Governor General needs to resign,” wrote another.
Under the current circumstances it was inappropriate for the Governor General to prorogue Parliament. She failed to reconvene the house immediately. Our system is broken. The Governor General needs to resign.
The last time Parliament was prorogued was also at the hands of Trudeau in 2020 when he shut down the House of Commons during an ongoing ethics committee investigation into his involvement in the WE Charity scandal.
During this same period, there was also a special committee investigation into China’s treatment of Uyghurs and human rights abuses, which had to be abruptly halted.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre vows a “Canada First” approach in the face of President-elect Donald Trump’s threats to use “economic force” to annex Canada, making it the 51st US state.
Poilievre released a statement shortly after Trump’s comments were reported by the media strongly countering the incoming U.S. president’s rhetoric.
“Canada will never be the 51st state. Period. We are a great and independent country,” Poilievre said in a statement posted to his social media Tuesday.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took a similar stance, saying there wasn’t a “snowball’s chance in hell” for Trump to annex Canada and merge it into the United States.
In a press conference on Tuesday, Trump said he was considering “economic force” against Canada to turn it into the 51st US state. He raised concerns about a $200 billion trade deficit with Canada and US spending on “subsidies” and the military to “protect Canada.”
President-elect Donald Trump dismisses the idea of annexing Canada by military force, but does not rule out “economic force” as a means to more closely integrate the two nations.
He states that the U.S. does not need Canadian products and questions why the U.S. subsidizes… pic.twitter.com/jl4oKKl8UW
Trump also cited national security concerns with Canada’s ability to defend against naval threats from China and Russia without US involvement.
Canada’s foreign affairs minister, Melanie Joly, said Canada would “never back down in the face of threats.”
Poilievre took a different approach, highlighting Canada’s mutual contributions to the US-Canada partnership and vowing to build a strong military, which could ease Trump’s national security concerns.
“We are the best friend to the U.S. We spent billions of dollars and hundreds of lives helping Americans retaliate against Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attacks. We supply the U.S. with billions of dollars of high-quality and totally reliable energy well below market prices,” he said. “We buy hundreds of billions of dollars of American goods.”
Canada will never be the 51st state. Period.
We are a great and independent country.
We are the best friend to the U.S. We spent billions of dollars and hundreds of lives helping Americans retaliate against Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attacks. We supply the U.S. with billions of dollars of…
He took shots at the government’s response to Trump’s threats of economic coercion and proposed stripping of Canada’s sovereignty.
“Our weak and pathetic NDP-Liberal government has failed to make these obvious points,” he said. “I will fight for Canada.”
Poilievre vowed to rebuild Canada’s military and “take back control of the border to secure both Canada and the U.S.”
“We will take back control of our Arctic to keep Russia and China out,” he said. “We will axe taxes, slash red tape, and rapidly green-light massive resource projects to bring home paycheques and production to our country.”
Donald Trump has threatened to annex Canada by economic force today at a press conference at Mar-A-Lago after weeks of taunting Canada’s outgoing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “Governor of the 51st state”. This is an escalation in rhetoric from Donald Trump and one of the first open threats of annexation in perhaps over 100 years by an incoming US President. All of this comes at a time when Canada has a prorogued parliament with a lame duck prime minister and essentially no cabinet.
This is not a joke anymore and it should not be laughed at. Canada needs a leader right now and a parliament in session. Enough is enough.
Alberta is bucking the global push against fossil fuels with an ambitious plan to double its oil production with the goal of increasing exports to the U.S.
The Government of Alberta is working to expand its pipeline capacity and double crude oil production while boosting exports to the United States, according to a Monday press release.
The province has signed a letter of intent with Enbridge, the energy behemoth headquartered in Calgary, which transports nearly 20% of the natural gas consumed in the United States and accounts for 30% of North America’s crude oil production.
Enbridge transported nearly 4.4 billion barrels of oil and liquids in 2023. Over the last decade, Enbridge has transported almost 37 billion barrels of oil. The organization delivers around 5.8 million barrels of crude oil and liquids daily in its cross-continent pipeline network.
Enbridge and the Alberta Petroleum Marketing Commission will form a working group to evaluate future egress, transport, storage, terminaling, and market opportunities across Enbridge’s 29,000 kilometres of operation.
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said that doubling oil production will align with Enbridge’s plan to enhance its existing pipeline system and cross-border transport.
“The world needs more Alberta oil and gas, and we need to make sure Alberta is meeting those needs,” said Smith. “This will also allow us to play a role in supporting the United States in its energy security and affordability goals.”
Smith is making good on a promise she made while speaking at a Tucker Carlson event a year ago when she vowed to double the province’s oil and gas production.
Smith has gone toe-to-toe with the federal government on many occasions regarding how much oil should be produced in the province and country. She previously called Trudeau’s oil and gas cap “a deranged vendetta” targeting Alberta.
She had also launched a nationwide advertising campaign warning Canadians about the consequences of a federal cap on the oil and gas sector.
The province accounts for 56% of oil imports into the United States, double the amount Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq collectively provide.
While some province’s premiers, like Ontario’s Doug Ford, have threatened to cut off energy production to the United States as a retaliatory measure to President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs, Smith has taken the opposite approach.
“Under no circumstances will Alberta agree to cut off oil and gas exports,” she said previously. “Our approach is one of diplomacy, not threats.”
Similarly, the Canadian Association of Energy Contractors have predicted the highest oil and gas drilling in 2025 since 2015.
Alberta’s Energy Minister Brian Jean previously discussed how Alberta plans to partner with Trump’s more pro-energy government in 2025 and going forward on the Alberta Roundup.
“If we’re going to get this product to market that is the best product in the world, that is the most environmentally friendly and best for human rights and jobs, then we need to get more of it out of the ground and into pipes that go south and go east and go west and north,” said Jean.
President-elect Donald Trump and President Joe Biden have publicly commented on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s resignation plans, but their reactions couldn’t be more different.
Trump, who has in recent weeks taunted Trudeau and Canada by referring to him as “Governor Trudeau” of the “State of Canada,” reacted to the resignation announcement by claiming Canadians backed his merger proposal.
“Many people in Canada LOVE being the 51st State. The United States can no longer suffer the massive Trade Deficits and Subsidies that Canada needs to stay afloat,” said Trump on his website Truth Social.
“Justin Trudeau knew this, and resigned. If Canada merged with the U.S., there would be no Tariffs, taxes would go way down, and they would be TOTALLY SECURE from the threat of the Russian and Chinese Ships that are constantly surrounding them. Together, what a great Nation it would be!!!”
Many people in Canada LOVE being the 51st State. The United States can no longer suffer the massive Trade Deficits and Subsidies that Canada needs to stay afloat. Justin Trudeau knew this, and resigned. If Canada merged with the U.S., there would be no Tariffs, taxes would go way…
— Donald J. Trump Posts From His Truth Social (@TrumpDailyPosts) January 6, 2025
In reality, a majority of Canadians are opposed to Canada becoming a U.S. state. A recent public opinion poll from Leger showed that only 13% of Canadians would be interested in Canada becoming America’s 51st state.
The latest comment is a continuation of Trump’s attitude towards Trudeau since the prime minister visited the President-elect at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida shortly after the 2024 presidential election.
Upon Chrystia Freeland’s recent resignation as finance minister, Trump called her toxic while he suggested that Wayne Gretzky replace Trudeau as the “governor of Canada.”
On the other hand, President Biden issued a statement thanking Trudeau for partnering on shared policies such as the COVID-19 pandemic response, climate change and attempting to stop fentanyl distribution.
“We’ve stood together with the people of Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression to defend our nations’ most sacred value: freedom,” Biden said. “We have made generational investments to strengthen our supply chains and rebuild our economies from the bottom up and middle out—establishing North America as the most economically competitive region in the world.”
He lauded the exiting prime minister’s “commitment, optimism and strategic vision” and said that the American and Canadian people were “safer because of him.”
Tech CEO Elon Musk, who is slated to play a role in the incoming administration, posted that 2025 was going to be a good year following the news of Trudeau’s departure.
Musk has sparked the ire of the governments of France and the U.K. with his outspoken remarks. In Canada, politicians like NDP MP Peter Julian have called for X to be boycotted until it is owned by the government as a public company.
