The U.S. President commented on the stunning upset he triggered. Donald Trump knows very well that he triggered a political earthquake in Canada — just ask him.
On the day of Canada’s election, the U.S. President mentioned in an interview that he had detailed knowledge of the historic upset he caused.
“You know, until I showed up, remember that the Conservatives were ahead by 25 points,” Trump said to The Atlantic last week in an interview published on Monday.
“Then I became disliked by enough Canadians that I threw the election into chaos, right?”
Statistically, he was entirely honest, literally within the margin of error. In a rare example of Trump not taking liberties with numbers, Canada’s Liberals were indeed down exactly 24 percentage points at their nadir on CBC’s Poll Tracker, on January 6, 2025.
Then some things happened. That day, Justin Trudeau announced his resignation as Prime Minister. A day later, Trump suggested he could use economic power to annex Canada, escalating a smear campaign that made him the centerpiece of the country’s politics.
The phenomenon that followed is now political history.
It’s reflected in the striking trend line of public opinion. The graph of support for the Conservatives and the Liberals looks like a pair of garden shears — wide open at first, then quickly snapping shut, finally shattering with one blade crashing over the other.
How it's playing out in U.S. politics
To the extent that Canada’s election makes headlines in the U.S., it will be framed as a story about Donald Trump — as a personal rebuke on the eve of his 100th day in office.
An early example was Monday night’s headline from The Daily Beast: “Trump’s big mouth pushes Canadian Liberals to victory.”
The New York Times offered a less dramatic variation on the theme: “Mark Carney wins full term as Canada’s prime minister on anti-Trump platform.”
Politico ran a feature during the final days of the campaign, closely examining several other subtle dynamics of Canadian politics — including the collapse of NDP support and the retreat of Quebec nationalism — but the headline was simple: “Canada vs. Trump.”
In reaction to Canada’s results, U.S. political actors consistently referenced Trump. His domestic rivals, in particular, relished the perceived rejection.
Anthony Scaramucci, who briefly served as Trump’s communications director and is now a critic, called Mark Carney’s victory the best thing Trump has done in 100 days. A Democratic pollster called it an unprecedented shift — an early example of Trump’s toxicity rewriting global politics.
A Democratic Congressman who attended university with Carney expressed disbelief at the turn of life events that led to Monday.
Jim Himes of Connecticut studied at Harvard and later at Oxford during the same time period as Carney in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
“If I had told him, ‘Mark, one day Donald Trump will be President of the United States and will singlehandedly make you Prime Minister of Canada,’ he would’ve called campus security to escort me home,” Himes posted on X, formerly Twitter.
A conservative in Washington warned months ago that this could happen — writing that Trump’s actions risked re-electing a Liberal government in Canada.
Colin Dueck, a foreign policy scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, had read the dynamics earlier than most here: While he has lived in the U.S. for decades, he grew up in Canada.
“Obviously, Trump’s intervention was critical. No doubt about it,” said Dueck, who has advised various Republican presidential campaigns.
“I think there’s going to be a widespread sense and awareness that Trump had a lot to do with this result — even though, of course, he’ll deny it, and you know, his most enthusiastic supporters will deny it.”
What about the impact on Trump’s Washington?
What Dueck means is that some Americans will be happy to cite Canada’s reaction against Trump: liberals and some conservatives disillusioned with his foreign policy approach.
As for whether this result has any impact in Washington, Dueck doesn’t expect much.
He doesn’t see it politically harming Trump. It might prompt some people around him to push for a less confrontational foreign policy. But even there, he says: Don’t hold your breath.
“To be honest… we know most Americans don’t care much about the results of Canadian elections,” Dueck said in an interview Monday.
“What it could do — and what I hope it does — is change how the administration approaches negotiations with some of its allies, including Canada. In other words, you can’t just go around insulting everyone and then expect them to meet you halfway. I mean, you have to show at least some minimal respect to your allies.”
“But you know, again, Trump does what he wants. And anyone who tries to make him do otherwise will just bang their head against the wall.”
In any case, Trump had a hunch this would happen and never course-corrected.
In February, a right-wing journalist told Trump his comments about Canada were helping the Liberals' campaign.
Trump’s response: Pierre Poilievre “is not a MAGA guy.” Trump said he didn’t like how the Canadian Conservative leader had criticized him.
Did Trump care? Doesn’t seem like it. For several weeks, he avoided talking publicly about making Canada a U.S. state, but he resumed and then capped it off with a striking Election Day post on social media seemingly suggesting that Canadians should elect… him.
He will not be Canada’s leader.
But he will negotiate new trade and security deals with Carney, the leader of the party he helped revive from political death.
In his victory speech, the Prime Minister referred to the U.S. President as a persistent existential threat to the entire nation. He said Trump wants to break up Canada so he can own it.
That will never happen, Carney added. But what will happen — what has already happened, he said — is a changed world, with U.S. commitment no longer a given, and the U.S. betraying the global trade system it helped build.
The solution? To build new infrastructure within Canada and new trade partnerships domestically and abroad.
“These are tragedies,” Carney said. “But they are also our new reality. We’ve moved past the shock of American betrayal — but we must never forget the lessons.”
On the day of Canada’s election, the U.S. President mentioned in an interview that he had detailed knowledge of the historic upset he caused.
“You know, until I showed up, remember that the Conservatives were ahead by 25 points,” Trump said to The Atlantic last week in an interview published on Monday.
“Then I became disliked by enough Canadians that I threw the election into chaos, right?”
Statistically, he was entirely honest, literally within the margin of error. In a rare example of Trump not taking liberties with numbers, Canada’s Liberals were indeed down exactly 24 percentage points at their nadir on CBC’s Poll Tracker, on January 6, 2025.
Then some things happened. That day, Justin Trudeau announced his resignation as Prime Minister. A day later, Trump suggested he could use economic power to annex Canada, escalating a smear campaign that made him the centerpiece of the country’s politics.
The phenomenon that followed is now political history.
It’s reflected in the striking trend line of public opinion. The graph of support for the Conservatives and the Liberals looks like a pair of garden shears — wide open at first, then quickly snapping shut, finally shattering with one blade crashing over the other.
How it's playing out in U.S. politics
To the extent that Canada’s election makes headlines in the U.S., it will be framed as a story about Donald Trump — as a personal rebuke on the eve of his 100th day in office.
An early example was Monday night’s headline from The Daily Beast: “Trump’s big mouth pushes Canadian Liberals to victory.”
The New York Times offered a less dramatic variation on the theme: “Mark Carney wins full term as Canada’s prime minister on anti-Trump platform.”
Politico ran a feature during the final days of the campaign, closely examining several other subtle dynamics of Canadian politics — including the collapse of NDP support and the retreat of Quebec nationalism — but the headline was simple: “Canada vs. Trump.”
In reaction to Canada’s results, U.S. political actors consistently referenced Trump. His domestic rivals, in particular, relished the perceived rejection.
Anthony Scaramucci, who briefly served as Trump’s communications director and is now a critic, called Mark Carney’s victory the best thing Trump has done in 100 days. A Democratic pollster called it an unprecedented shift — an early example of Trump’s toxicity rewriting global politics.
A Democratic Congressman who attended university with Carney expressed disbelief at the turn of life events that led to Monday.
Jim Himes of Connecticut studied at Harvard and later at Oxford during the same time period as Carney in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
“If I had told him, ‘Mark, one day Donald Trump will be President of the United States and will singlehandedly make you Prime Minister of Canada,’ he would’ve called campus security to escort me home,” Himes posted on X, formerly Twitter.
A conservative in Washington warned months ago that this could happen — writing that Trump’s actions risked re-electing a Liberal government in Canada.
Colin Dueck, a foreign policy scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, had read the dynamics earlier than most here: While he has lived in the U.S. for decades, he grew up in Canada.
“Obviously, Trump’s intervention was critical. No doubt about it,” said Dueck, who has advised various Republican presidential campaigns.
“I think there’s going to be a widespread sense and awareness that Trump had a lot to do with this result — even though, of course, he’ll deny it, and you know, his most enthusiastic supporters will deny it.”
What about the impact on Trump’s Washington?
What Dueck means is that some Americans will be happy to cite Canada’s reaction against Trump: liberals and some conservatives disillusioned with his foreign policy approach.
As for whether this result has any impact in Washington, Dueck doesn’t expect much.
He doesn’t see it politically harming Trump. It might prompt some people around him to push for a less confrontational foreign policy. But even there, he says: Don’t hold your breath.
“To be honest… we know most Americans don’t care much about the results of Canadian elections,” Dueck said in an interview Monday.
“What it could do — and what I hope it does — is change how the administration approaches negotiations with some of its allies, including Canada. In other words, you can’t just go around insulting everyone and then expect them to meet you halfway. I mean, you have to show at least some minimal respect to your allies.”
“But you know, again, Trump does what he wants. And anyone who tries to make him do otherwise will just bang their head against the wall.”
In any case, Trump had a hunch this would happen and never course-corrected.
In February, a right-wing journalist told Trump his comments about Canada were helping the Liberals' campaign.
Trump’s response: Pierre Poilievre “is not a MAGA guy.” Trump said he didn’t like how the Canadian Conservative leader had criticized him.
Did Trump care? Doesn’t seem like it. For several weeks, he avoided talking publicly about making Canada a U.S. state, but he resumed and then capped it off with a striking Election Day post on social media seemingly suggesting that Canadians should elect… him.
He will not be Canada’s leader.
But he will negotiate new trade and security deals with Carney, the leader of the party he helped revive from political death.
In his victory speech, the Prime Minister referred to the U.S. President as a persistent existential threat to the entire nation. He said Trump wants to break up Canada so he can own it.
That will never happen, Carney added. But what will happen — what has already happened, he said — is a changed world, with U.S. commitment no longer a given, and the U.S. betraying the global trade system it helped build.
The solution? To build new infrastructure within Canada and new trade partnerships domestically and abroad.
“These are tragedies,” Carney said. “But they are also our new reality. We’ve moved past the shock of American betrayal — but we must never forget the lessons.”
Source: CBC (EN)
* The above text is a translation by the Institute for Policy and Democracy Studies team (March 14, 2024)
* See the original article “Trump knows exactly what he just triggered in Canada”, 29 April 2025, CBC
