UPDATE: 10:43 a.m. – Justin Trudeau will resign after weeks of tumult.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is expected to address Canadians outside his residence in Ottawa on Monday at 10:45 a.m. Eastern time, amid a growing chorus of calls for his resignation.
The Globe and Mail reported Sunday that Trudeau is expected to announce his resignation as leader of the Liberal Party as early as Monday.
Trudeau has faced growing calls for his resignation from members of his caucus, as public opinion polls continue to put the ruling Liberals far behind the Conservatives.
The Globe report said three sources, who were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter, did not know a specific timeline, but they expected Trudeau to announce his plans before a national caucus meeting scheduled for Wednesday.
Neither the Canadian Press nor Global News have independently confirmed the Globe’s report.
Over the weekend, Peter Fragiskatos became the latest Liberal MP to join the voices calling for Trudeau’s departure. He told the London Free Press that his voters were now overwhelmingly in favor of Trudeau resigning.
On December 29, a letter from the Atlantic Liberal caucus calling on Trudeau to resign as party leader was shared publicly by New Brunswick MP Wayne Long, who has been saying since the fall that Trudeau should resign.
The prime minister is expected to face Liberal MPs at a caucus meeting on Wednesday.
On Sunday, returning to Ottawa after a vacation in British Columbia, Trudeau suggested he was sticking to his status quo.
This is despite Liberal MPs calling for his resignation and the three main opposition parties all saying they plan to oust the government at the first opportunity, which could happen before the end of the month.
In an article on X, Trudeau said the Liberal government had reduced child care costs for nearly a million Canadians. “In 2025, we will continue to reduce these costs. Let’s go,” he said Sunday afternoon. A message from his office says Trudeau will participate in a virtual Cabinet meeting on Monday to discuss Canada-U.S. relations.
MPs are not expected to return to Ottawa until the House of Commons returns on Jan. 27, but they have been encouraged to attend Wednesday’s meeting in person, according to a letter from national caucus chair Brenda Shanahan.
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In the letter, published online by CBC News, Shanahan said that given the short notice of the meeting, MPs will be allowed to attend virtually, but should “be alone in a closed confidential space with their faces visible to all moment on screen.” »
Pressure on Trudeau to resign intensified after the surprise resignation of Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland on December 16.
Before the vacation, Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson told the Canadian Press that Trudeau was taking time to think about his future, but Trudeau himself has remained silent on the subject since Freeland’s resignation.
That means the coming weeks in Ottawa could go several ways.
If Trudeau resigns, a provision in the Constitution states that the Liberal caucus can be consulted on the choice of interim leader.
Mike Crawley, who served a term as Liberal Party president from 2012, said the first decision to make would be whether to appoint an interim leader. Crawley stressed he was not speaking for the Liberal Party.
He said the decision would be up to the party’s board, but “as a practical matter, the board would certainly strongly consider a recommendation coming from the caucus.”
The party executive must call a meeting within 27 days to establish the rules and infrastructure for a leadership contest. Crawley predicted the meeting would likely be “much quicker than that.”
There are no rules in the Constitution dictating the length of a leadership contest, although candidates must gather the necessary signatures and submit a written nomination letter to the party president at least 90 days before the vote.
Crawley said the current situation, in which the minority Liberal government could fall at any time, adds to the complexity of a potential leadership race.
“I don’t envy the current party president or the board and I shouldn’t consider those options because it’s difficult,” he said.
While it’s not up to the party to decide whether the government falls, it has to decide “what’s best for the party in terms of the leadership contest, but at the same time I think it also has to look at the emergency measures he is putting in place to ensure that if the government falls, there will be a leader who can lead the government through this election campaign.
There is no mechanism within the Liberal Party for the caucus to remove Trudeau as leader in such circumstances.
This means that if Trudeau chooses to stay, he could lead the party in the next election, which must take place by October.
But given opposition parties’ promise to call early elections, Canadians could go to the polls much sooner than that.
Next week, the Conservatives plan to present a motion of no confidence to the public accounts committee, and it could be voted on in the House of Commons as early as January 30.
In an emailed statement, Opposition House Leader Andrew Scheer accused Trudeau of “desperately clinging to power.”
He said Trudeau should call an election “now that he has lost the confidence of the majority of MPs in the House of Commons.” Dozens of Justin Trudeau’s MPs, including his former deputy prime minister and finance minister, no longer have confidence in him.”
Whether or not Trudeau resigns as Liberal leader, the government could seek a prorogation to end all business in the House of Commons.
In 2008, Stephen Harper, then prime minister, notably prorogued Parliament shortly before a vote of no confidence that could have seen his minority Conservative government defeated and replaced by an NDP-Liberal coalition supported by the Bloc Québécois.
— With files from David Baxter of The Canadian Press and Craig Lord of Global News