How Donald Trump’s tariffs handed Mark Carney and the Liberals an upper-hand in Canada polls

It has been nearly 100 days since Donald Trump returned to the White House as the 47th POTUS. Since his return, the MAGA chief has wielded the tariff hammer with reckless intensity, slapping levies on steel, aluminium and a slew of other imports that have brought global supply chains to a grinding halt. Yet even as these sweeping policies reshaped the global economy and discourse, the US President could hardly have anticipated the unintended fallout north of the border.
In Canada, what began as disquiet over looming trade barriers and fears of cheap land grabs has morphed into a potent electoral issue. Mark Carney’s image as a “steady hand” in economic turbulence contrasted sharply with Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s “Maple MAGA” caricature, has helped the Liberals overtake the Tories across multiple trackers.
Until early 2025, Pierre Poilievre appeared destined to break the Liberal Party’s decade-long grip on power, with polls in January showing the Conservatives leading by as much as 47 per cent to 20 per cent. But when President Trump imposed 25 per cent tariffs on Canadian imports and suggested annexation as the 51st state, Canadians recoiled at an unprecedented assault on their economy and sovereignty.

The Liberal Party elected former central banker Mark Carney as leader on March 9 and he promptly called a snap election for April 28, framing the vote as a choice between crisis-management competence and reckless populism. Carney leaned on his record steering two G7 central banks through turmoil, offering voters what he claimed was a “safe pair of hands” amid external uncertainty.
Addressing a rally Carney had warned, “We are facing the biggest crisis of our lifetimes. Donald Trump is trying to fundamentally change the world economy, the trading system, but really is he’s trying to break us so the U.S. can own us. They want our land, they want our resources, they our water, they want our country.”
Speaking on his experience, he added, “I am ready and I have managed crisis over the years … We will fight back with counter tariffs and we will protect our workers.”

‘Existential and visceral fear of Trump’s agenda’

In the closing days before Canada’s 28 April election, three leading academics speaking exclusively to TimesofIndia.com agreed that the US President Donald Trump’s trade threats and annexation rhetoric—and the subsequent shift in Liberal leadership—have been the defining forces in an otherwise predictable contest
Professor Laura Stephenson of Western Ontario notes that a race once dominated by domestic affordability concerns has been upended by geopolitical anxieties. “This is the most I have ever seen an election influenced by non-domestic issues. The focus on leadership is overwhelming right now, due to concerns about managing the Canada-US relationship,” she said while speaking to TimesofIndia.com.
Stephenson argues that Mark Carney’s emergence as Liberal leader on March 9 offered Canadians an alternative to Pierre Poilievre. “If the race was Trudeau vs. Poilievre with the same external threat I think the race would be a lot different.”

University of Guelph historian Matthew Hayday emphasises how that threat has mobilised voters across the spectrum. “There is, in my opinion, an almost existential and visceral fear of Trump’s agenda among centrist and left-wing voters in Canada, and that may prove to be very motivating.”
Hayday points to record early voting—nearly two million ballots cast on the first day of advance polls—as evidence that fears of US overreach have become a unifying force. In previous elections, Conservative voters tended to outpace their Liberal counterparts at the polls; this time, external pressures appear to have galvanized Liberal-leaning and centrist Canadians to turn out in force.

Julie M. Simmons, also at Guelph, highlights the limitations of those voting patterns under Canada’s first-past-the-post system. “For people who normally vote Conservative, this portrayal has not put them off. For undecided voters, he seems alarmingly similar to Trump.”
Simmons cautions that entrenched Conservative support in Alberta and Saskatchewan may mute national swings. Even as polls narrow—or tilt slightly towards the Liberals—the geographic concentration of Tory votes could mean smaller gains in seats than in raw popular-vote percentages.

Polls show dramatic turnaround

Since campaigning began late March, Nanos tracking shows the Liberal share moving between 41.9 per cent and 45.9 per cent, while the Conservatives fluctuated from 34.9 per cent to 38.6 per cent, with the Liberals consistently ahead in late April. On 23 April, Nanos recorded 44.1 per cent for the Liberals versus 38.5 per cent for the Conservatives, a five-point gap not seen since before Trudeau’s resignation.

Ipsos polling since December 2024 paints an even starker reversal: Conservatives dropped from 45 per cent to 38 per cent, while Liberals surged from 20 per cent to 41 per cent by April 19.
The NDP remained around 9–12 per cent throughout, indicating that centrist voters moved decisively to the Liberals.
The latest polls point to a narrow Liberal win on April 28, as Canadians weigh their choice in what has become a referendum on leadership amid external pressure. President Trump’s hefty tariffs and veiled annexation threats have only boosted Mark Carney’s image as a crisis manager, contrasting sharply with Pierre Poilievre’s hardline stand on immigration, tax cuts and his populist zeal.
What began as a US policy has become a central fault line in Canada’s election, showing how outside forces can alter domestic politics.