Some Liberal MPs issued a deadline to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Wednesday: decide in the next few days if you want to stay on as leader or face some unspecified consequences.
For weeks, anti-Trudeau MPs have been meeting in secret to convince caucus members to band together and push Trudeau out of the top job to save the party from electoral ruin.
After nine years in government, Trudeau’s popularity has plummeted. The CBC Poll Tracker shows the Conservatives have a 19-point lead over the governing Liberals, a margin that suggests dozens of Liberal MPs could be out of a job after the next vote.
In that context, some 24 Liberal MPs have signed a document calling on Trudeau to go.
Sources said that document, laying out the argument for Trudeau’s resignation, was read out in the party’s caucus meeting on Parliament Hill today.
The document included a demand: Trudeau should make a choice about his future before Oct. 28.
About 20 MPs — none of them cabinet ministers — also stood up in the Liberal caucus meeting today to urge Trudeau to rethink his pledge to stay on as leader into the next election, sources told CBC News.
“I didn’t think they would put an ultimatum on the table. That shows they have a great deal of resolve here that was unanticipated,” one MP told CBC News.
Sources said Trudeau looked uncomfortable at times as MPs questioned his leadership.
The prime minister also got emotional at one point as he told MPs about the toll his long political career has taken on his three children, sources said.
Sources said Trudeau told caucus he would take some time to reflect after hearing their concerns about his viability as leader.
Trudeau emerged from the meeting saying only to reporters that “the Liberal Party is strong and united.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says ‘the Liberal Party is strong and united’ as he emerges from a meeting of the Liberal caucus Wednesday, during which some MPs raised concerns about Trudeau’s leadership.
Trudeau could decide to press on as leader even if he’s dealing with significant discontent in his caucus.
It’s not clear what disgruntled Liberals will do if Trudeau simply ignores their demands to step aside by the specified deadline of Oct. 28.
Three MPs have come forward publicly to say they have signed the document: Newfoundland’s Ken McDonald, Prince Edward Island’s Sean Casey and New Brunswick’s Wayne Long.
McDonald, Casey and Long have all said that while they want Trudeau to go, they’re not yet willing to leave the party and sit as Independents.
Speaking briefly to reporters before the caucus meeting, Casey said he’d like to see a secret vote to decide Trudeau’s future: “I wish there was a mechanism for it, yes.”
McDonald told CBC’s Power & Politics Tuesday that he and other dissenters have also discussed voting against the government if there’s another non-confidence vote and they don’t see evidence that Trudeau and his team are taking their concerns seriously.
Asked by reporters Wednesday if he’s still considering such a move, McDonald said he was, “but, right now, it’s not something I would do.”
“The prime minister has to start listening to the people,” he added. “You have to try and get people back onside.”
Long told reporters he’s part of this movement to take on Trudeau because he thinks Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is a danger to the country — and can be beaten by a different Liberal leader.
“The Liberal Party is an institution in this country, it’s bigger than one person, one leader, and it’s incumbent on us as elected officials that we put our best foot forward,” he said.
Long, who isn’t running in the next election, said that while the party needs “a change in leadership … in the end caucus majority will rule” and he will respect whatever comes.
MPs emerged from the meeting saying it’s ultimately up to Trudeau to decide what to do about his future after hearing about the considerable discontent first-hand.
“It’s the decision of the leader of the party whether he stays on as leader. That is Mr. Trudeau’s decision,” said Liberal MP Yvan Baker.
“My sense is that Mr. Trudeau is still the leader,” said MP Joël Lightbound.
Other MPs expressed confidence in Trudeau’s ability to take on Poilievre in the next election.
“We’re 100 per cent behind Mr. Trudeau,” said MP Francis Drouin.
“We’re united to defeat Mr. Poilievre,” said MP Kevin Lamoureux.
“I’m proud of this team and we’ll fight Mr. Poilievre in the next election,” said National Revenue Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau.
“It was a great discussion and what really matters in the end is we come out of this caucus meeting united,” added Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne.
Immigration Minister Marc Miller says Prime Minister Justin Trudeau can ‘handle the truth.’ Miller described what happened during the national caucus meeting Wednesday, saying MPs were ‘telling the prime minister the truth, whether he likes to hear it or not.’
Immigration Minister Marc Miller said he doesn’t expect Trudeau will step down.
Miller, who is a close personal friend of Trudeau, said some tensions have been “simmering” in caucus and he “respects the hell out of my colleagues who were brave and stood up and said things to [Trudeau’s] face.”
“This isn’t a code red situation. The prime minister can sure as hell handle the truth,” Miller said.
Asked if Trudeau should rethink his plans to stay on, Miller said that’s up to him.
“He’s quite clear about his intentions and I don’t expect those to change,” he said.
Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, who is known for being a caucus maverick, told reporters as he left the caucus room that he thinks there’s a path forward for Trudeau — if he and his team are open to some meaningful changes.
“The prime minister has to listen to the frustrations and, in some cases, very valid frustrations of caucus colleagues and incorporate that into changes moving forward,” he said.
He said the Liberal Party’s decision to essentially stop advertising is a problem.
The Conservatives have spent millions of dollars on TV, radio and online ads, while the Liberals have spent only a few hundred thousand, essentially ceding the field to the opposition, he said.
But Erskine-Smith said he hopes wayward MPs “stop the palace intrigue,” although he conceded talk of Trudeau’s future likely won’t end today.
“I think we’re likely to have a few more conversations,” he said.
“My colleagues need to turn the knives outwards and not inwards and we need to focus on the most important thing, which is getting things done here in Parliament and taking the fight to Pierre Poilievre, because he’s a disaster for this country.”
While Trudeau considers his future, there’s also a petition circulating that calls on caucus to force a “confidence vote” so that Liberal MPs and the party’s national executive can have a chance to vote on the leadership question.
The petition says that if Trudeau fails to secure enough support in that vote, the party should pick an interim leader and launch a leadership race to be completed no later than June 1, 2025.
This initiative, called “Project Code Red,” was organized not by MPs but by some Young Liberal members and former staffers.
“Remember this … the very survival of the Canada we have built and, with the benefit of your sound judgment, will continue to build, is now at stake,” the unsigned petition says.