Early results in Canada's general election indicated Prime Minister Mark Carney is set to form a government, the culmination of a stunning reversal in his Liberal Party's political prospects after a grim end to the reign of once-popular Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Canadian broadcasters CBC and CTV have projected Carney to remain in his post, pulling off a dramatic victory after he inherited a Liberal Party trailing the opposition Conservative Party by double digits after former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's popularity nosedived.
In a victory speech, Carney called on Canadians to unite despite their political differences in the face of the threats levelled against their country by US President Donald Trump.
"I've been warning for months: America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country," he told supporters as the results came in. "These are not idle threats. President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us."
"That will never, ever happen."
While the Liberals are now projected to win more seats (or in Canadian parlance, ridings) than the Conservatives in the country's 343-seat parliament. What still remains unclear is whether Carney, a seasoned economist-turned-politician, will win the 172 seats needed to form a majority government.
As things stand, the Liberals have won or are leading in 168 seats, with Poilievre's Conservatives on 154. In third place is the Bloc Québecois, on 23.
Trudeau's former confidence-and-supply partners, the centre-left New Democratic Party, appear to have lost almost two-thirds of their 24 seats, a catastrophic result that has spurred leader Jagmeet Singh to resign.
Most of all though, the election is a galling defeat for Canada's Conservatives, who under the leadership of Pierre Poilievre had expected to be returned to power until a diplomatic and trade crisis caused by the re-inauguration of Donald Trump dramatically undercut the appeal of a populist swing to the right.
Trudeau's popularity had cratered in the last years of his prime ministership, and a wave of by-election losses and high-profile cabinet resignations ultimately drove him to announce his resignation in January this year — two weeks before Trump was sworn in for his second term.
However, Trudeau responded to Trump's intense threats against Canada in the early phase of his presidency with unexpectedly tough and patriotic rhetoric that immediately recaptured support that he had lost.
Carney, a former governor of the Bank of Canada and Bank of England, won a thumping victory in the race to succeed Trudeau as Liberal leader, and was able to ride the wave the dramatic surge in Liberal support.
The Trump factor
Since he came to power at the end of January, Trump has put Canada firmly in his sights. He and other figures in his administration have taken to referring to it as the US' potential 51st state and mocked Carney's predecessor as "Governor Trudeau".
Trump has also threatened to impose aggressive tariffs on various Canadian goods entering the US. Some of those tariffs have been enacted, while others have been paused or retracted just before coming into force.
This combined with Trump's vague but threatening remarks about a potential annexation led Carney to declare that the two allied countries' relationship had fundamentally changed.
“The old relationship we had with the United States based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military cooperation is over,” he said in a speech on 28 March.
"It’s clear the US is no longer a reliable partner. It is possible that with comprehensive negotiations, we could reestablish an element of confidence but there will be no going backwards."
