OTTAWA — Only this campaign could have produced Prime Minister Mark Carney.
The former banker with the sober demeanor of a natural technocrat persuaded millions of Canadians he was the guy to lead the nation amid an unprecedented onslaught of threats and ridicule from the brash President Donald Trump.
The Rise to Power
Since returning to the White House, Trump has poked and prodded Canadians, enraging them with tariffs and annexation talk while whipping up patriotic sentiment.
When Justin Trudeau announced his resignation in January amid deep unpopularity, Carney was not yet a politician. By March, he’d been chosen by the Liberals to take over as leader and prime minister — and on Monday, millions of Canadians elected the seasoned banker as the antidote to Trump.
“My message to every Canadian is this,” Carney said early Tuesday morning with results still being counted. “No matter where you live, no matter what language you speak, no matter how you voted, I will always do my best to represent everyone who calls Canada.”
Strategic Leadership
Carney doesn’t ooze charisma. But that is exactly the point, says the first Liberal lawmaker to back Carney’s party leadership bid following Trudeau’s stunning exit announcement.
Most political observers did not predict that a numbers guy who lacked political experience could turn around his party’s fortunes. When Trudeau finally announced his resignation, the Liberals had reached a depressing nadir in the polls.
“Bankers are very cautious personalities,” Ehsassi says. “But despite the challenges that were quite obvious to everyone … he had the backbone to take the plunge.”
Political Maneuvers
By the time he boarded his campaign bus, the Liberals had their first polling lead since 2023. He’d barely had time to measure the drapes, let alone hire a staff.
Everything, all at once, seemed to be breaking his way.
“There were all sorts of opportunities where he could have and he didn’t, and he’s proven himself to be a lot more adept at retail politics and strategy than a lot of people were giving him credit for at the beginning.”
The Path to Victory
Carney’s emergence as a leadership candidate was enough to convince Anita Anand, a Cabinet minister who was on her way out of politics in January, to return for a second act.
“Six months ago, eight months ago, we did not have the Canada-U.S. situation that we have had, and have right now, and people thought, ‘the Liberals have had their chance, and now it’s time for change,’” she said.
What changed? “It’s the threat. The existential economic threat.”
Leadership Legacy
For years, the banker with heaps of experience in both the private and public sectors had privately confided his interest in the Prime Minister’s Office.
When he returned from a seven-year stint atop the Bank of England, Carney’s tip-toeing into politics commenced in earnest.
“And when the opportunity came, he went for it, and none of that’s easy.”
