Tag Archives: Donald Trump

Roundup: Countdown to a trade deal?

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Even before the G7 summit officially got underway, prime minister Mark Carney had his bilateral meeting with Trump, and it was this somewhat awkward situation where Trump defended having a “tariff concept” and said that Carney had a “more complicated” plan (how could “free trade” be more complicated?”) but there was word that talks were “accelerating,” and later in the day, we got a readout from that conversation that said that they were aiming to get a trade deal within 30 days, so no pressure there (not that you could really accept such a deal for the paper it’s written on because this is Trump and he doesn’t honour his agreements). Trump also claimed to have signed a trade deal with the UK (which he called the EU at the time), and held up a blank page with his signature on it. So that…happened.

Holy crap. The US-UK trade deal is a blank sheet of paper and only Trump signed it. (Genuine screen grab).

— Justin Wolfers (@justinwolfers.bsky.social) 2025-06-17T00:13:56.113Z

The rest of the summit took place, and then suddenly Trump decided he needed to leave early, right after the Heads of Government dinner, citing important business in Washington, with allusions to the Israel-Iran conflict, but he did wind up signing a joint communiqué that calls for de-escalation in said conflict, so we’ll see how that holds up. Trump leaving early does mean that he won’t be around the arrival of either Volodymyr Zelenskyy or Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum, who had hoped to have bilateral meetings with Trump on the sidelines of the summit, so that does blow a hole in what they expected to come for, particularly for Sheinbaum who rarely travels.

Meanwhile, here are some of the highlights of the day. Tsuut’ina Nation council member Steven Crowchild spoke about his meeting with Trump during his arrival in Calgary. EU officials confirmed that Carney is likely to sign a defence procurement agreement with them during his visit to Brussels in two weeks.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2025-06-16T22:08:16.537Z

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian drone and missile attack struck Kyiv in the early morning hours, wounding at least twenty. Ukraine received another 1,245 bodies, ending this repatriation agreement, bringing the total to over 6000 war dead.

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Roundup: The price of going around consultations

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As prime minister Mark Carney gets set to ram his major project legislation through Parliament—Henry VIII clause and all—a couple of philosophical questions are popping up about the nature of what it is they’re doing to speed through these approvals. Doug Ford is trying to do it by essentially creating lawless zones, whereas Carney is giving himself the power to override other laws through regulation alone, which is ripe for abuse and which the Liberals would be screaming bloody murder about if they were in opposition. (The Conservatives, incidentally, are not up in arms about this use of a Henry VIII clause). The thing is, though, these laws and regulations exist for a reason—they’re not there just to thwart investment or development (in spite of what the Conservatives might tell themselves), and you’re asking for trouble if you go around it.

Part of that trouble is Indigenous consultation, and what they seem to believe it entails. It’s not just a meeting where you sit down and go “Here’s what we want to do on your lands.” It’s way more complicated, especially as you have some particular First Nations that have been burned in the past by other developers who promised them all kinds of benefits for that development and then reneged on their agreements (often leaving an environmental catastrophe in their wakes that they won’t pay for, leaving these First Nations off even worse). And they are already talking about litigation if their rights are violated, and those rights include free, prior and informed consent. This is a big deal, and we’re not sure that either Carney or Ford have actually thought this through. Things take time—especially within First Nations. Carney may be in for an unpleasant surprise about his timelines.

[Mallory Archer voice]: Do you want litigation? Because that's how you get litigation.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-06-10T04:18:21.071Z

Meanwhile, oil prices have crashed to rock-bottom prices, meaning it will be even more unlikely that we’ll see companies willing to invest in new pipeline infrastructure, even if the Carney government thinks they can ram projects through in a two-year window (which, again, I remain dubious about). Danielle Smith is trying to entice a proponent for some sort of pipeline, but again, money talks. Those rock-bottom prices are also going to hit Alberta’s government hard, because they budgeted for much higher royalties, and that in turn will make Smith panicky and try to pick even more fights, all because she refuses to implement a sales tax that would avoid being dependent on oil revenues above a certain level to balance the books.

Ukraine Dispatch

It was another night of heavy drone attacks, with the hardest-hit area being Kharkiv, killing three people and a total of 64 wounded across the country. Ukraine says that they struck a large gunpower factory in Russia. Another prisoner swap was held yesterday, but it was less prisoners than 1212 bodies.

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Roundup: Sore from moving those goalposts

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I have to wonder if the Conservatives and their proxies are exhausted from shifting goal posts over the past couple of days, and whether they remembered to lift from the knees and not from their backs, because hoo boy, the commentary coming out of the Carney meeting at the Oval Office has been something to behold. The common cry is that Carney promised on the campaign trail that he would be tough with Trump, and yet in the meeting, he engaged in flattery and didn’t object to things Trump said that were objectively wrong or offensive to Canadians. “He said the relationship was over and now he’s saying this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship!” has been a common refrain. Give me a break.

Can you imagine what they would have said if Carney went to the meeting and was combative with Trump, and put himself in a position for JD Vance to start piling on and creating the conditions for another Zelenskyy moment? Those same Conservatives would have howled that Carney was endangering the relationship with our closes trading partner. And the thing about the relationship is being mischaracterised (mendaciously)—Carney said that the old relationship of deeper ties and close cooperation was over. And that is objectively true. He also said this is the start of a new relationship with the US, which is also true—we can’t carry on like the old relationship is still there, and he has to start somewhere with the new one, and he’s managed to do so in a way that has placated Trump for the time being, which is an incredibly hard thing to do given his mercurial nature, and it may not last. But he had to sit there and say things that Trump thought was flattering (but really weren’t if you actually listened), and he did correct a number of Trump’s insane rants (like saying they don’t do much business with Canada when we’re their top export destination). But “getting tough” with Trump has to be done carefully given his volatile nature, and doing performance art isn’t the way to do it. Trying to insist that Carney was somehow misrepresenting himself or the task at hand in an election need to go give their heads a shake.

Meanwhile, Pierre Poilievre says he’s going to spend the summer “listening and learning,” but well, this is someone who has spent his entire adult life confirming his priors, so I don’t expect much in the way of introspection as to the reasons the campaign failed—particularly as Andrew Scheer was on Power & Politics saying they need to make “refinements” on their strategy, which sounds an awful lot like they plan on fighting the last war rather than actually learning  a single lesson. This being said, it sounds like Poilievre has reached out to Doug Ford’s office to try and mend some fences, so maybe they learned something? Maybe? We’ll see.

Unfortunately…

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-05-07T13:28:07.303Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russia’s “three-day ceasefire” went into effect this morning, but there are reports that guided bombs were still launched against Sumy in the early hours of the morning (but we all know how well Russia lives by its agreements). Ukrainian drones kept interfering with airports around Moscow for a third straight day as foreign leaders were arriving for Victory Day festivities in Red Square.

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Roundup: Greetings, Exalted One

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In a very real sense, the day was pretty anticlimactic given the build-up. Prime minister Mark Carney arrived at the White House, didn’t succumb to an intimidation handshake, and when they got to the Oval Office, Trump rambled and dissembled, and Carney got in a word or two edgewise that was both obsequious flattery, but also deep shade, saying that Trump was a “transformational” leader and got the world re-engaged in defence issues. (Yes, he has, but for reasons other than those Trump believes. When the topic of annexation came up, Carney phrased it in the language of real estate in that some things are not for sale—the White House, Buckingham Palace, and Canada—and while Trump said “never say never,” Carney kept mouthing “never.” But that was about it. There was no pile-on by JD Vance, no attempt at humiliation, though Trump gratuitously insulted both Justin Trudeau and Chrystia Freeland (who is still in Carney’s Cabinet).

https://bsky.app/profile/lsaffs.bsky.social/post/3lojcqx6ptk24

One of the things that was notable was that Trump insisted that the New NAFTA isn’t dead, which is funny since he’s stomped all over it and broken it so many times that it’s not worth the paper it’s written on, but there you have it. Carney says this is the first step of many, and he’s keeping expectations super low, talking about controlling the things we can control (which obviously excludes Trump himself). He also insists that he pushed back on the annexation talk in private, not that I’m sure it’ll have any effect. The Canadian Press fact-checks some of Trump’s nonsense here. Some more reaction quotes from the day here.

— Effin' Birds (@effinbirds.com) 2025-05-06T21:22:13.862Z

Conservative caucus

The other news was that the Conservatives held a day-long caucus retreat, and they voted to once again abide by the (garbage) Reform Act provisions that claim to let them topple a leader (even though they don’t actually need the Act’s provisions to do so, and the Act merely reinforces a pattern of learned helplessness among MPs who have surrendered their power), and they decided that Andrew Scheer will be the parliamentary leader in Poilievre’s absence until he can get himself a seat. Why Scheer? Because he’s a) loyal to Poilievre, b) is in no danger of trying to keep the leadership himself as a former failed leader, and c) the party doesn’t have to worry about a Rona Ambrose-kind of leader who proves popular and sane, and whom the public would demand to be made leader permanently. Yes, that’s a sad reflection of where the party is at, as is the fact that they don’t really seem to want to learn the right lessons from their election loss. (More reaction from caucus here.) Oh, and Poilievre did finally call Bruce Fanjoy to congratulate him on winning in Carleton, so that only took a week.

*Sigh* No, the (garbage) Reform Act doesn't give MPs or caucus more powers. They have all the power they need to depose a leader if they really wanted to. The Act's provisions actually constrain MPs' powers. #PnPCBC

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-05-06T21:53:41.456Z

https://twitter.com/TabathaSouthey/status/1919898954335916144

Ukraine Dispatch

Russians launched drones overnight at Kyiv, killing two people. This after a missile attack on the city of Sumy killed three people. Drones from Ukraine shut down Moscow’s airports in advance of their Victory Day in WWII celebrations, and Russia’s unilateral 72-hour “ceasefire.” Ukraine’s army chief says that they have stalled Russia’s attack on Pokrovsk, which is a logistics hub in Donetsk region. Russia and Ukraine have exchanged 205 prisoners of war each.

https://twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1919779056641265687

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1919672711413973378

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Roundup: Holding confederation hostage

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Mid-afternoon Alberta time, premier Danielle Smith gave a live address which had all of the appearances of some kind of hostage video, where she is promising to kill confederation if her demands aren’t met. Those demands are largely outrageous in and of themselves—guaranteed pipeline access, killing all federal environmental protection laws that would affect Alberta, perverting equalisation to give them a “per capita share” (it doesn’t operate on a per capita basis), and taking any kind of export tax off the table that could be used as leverage against Trump if we needed it. It was grievance porn, and largely just riling up her base of lunatics—whom she also defended—as they gear up to force some kind of separatism referendum, even though that wouldn’t actually mean what they think it does.

Would like to hear more from the Alberta Premier about how the industrial carbon price is "crippling" in Alberta.A year ago, it was "working."www.theglobeandmail.com/business/art…

— Aaron Wherry (@aaronwherry.bsky.social) 2025-05-05T21:30:03.882Z

https://bsky.app/profile/emmettmacfarlane.com/post/3lohiwnqoyk2y

The whole issue of the separatism referendum is also predicated on her being too-clever-by-half, saying she doesn’t believe in separation and believes in “sovereignty within a united Canada” (which is mostly horseshit), but she’s still going to game the rules to make it easier for the loons to force a referendum. “Oh, there’s no blood on my hands!” she insists, while she bought the knife and handed it to the loons. Politicians who use referendums as diversions or as a clever way of trying to defuse a situation have often seen that situation blow up in their faces, whether it was the capital flight from Quebec in 1980 and again in 1995, or Brexit. And like Brexit, she is willing to tell a bunch of lies to support it, Naheed Nenshi is denouncing this move and correctly pointing out that she is taking Albertans for fools, but Smith is slippery, and that’s going to be a problem the longer this is allowed to continue.

David Cameron thought he was being clever too.

— Stephanie Carvin (@stephaniecarvin.bsky.social) 2025-05-05T22:23:27.486Z

Without popular support for separation, she has seriously limited options. But Moscrop is exactly right: this is live ammo-stuff now, the way Brexit was, the way Trump as a candidate was. She is reckless, and part of a political movement of delusion and dishonesty. Very dangerous

— Bruce Arthur (@brucearthur.bsky.social) 2025-05-05T22:19:08.305Z

Meanwhile, Alberta’s acting Chief Medical Officer of Health spent yesterday morning passive-voicing the decline in vaccination rates as he called for people to step up and get measles vaccinations. If only Danielle Smith and her hand of swivel-eyed loons didn’t boost vaccine hesitancy in order to “own the Libs.” Honestly…

Ukraine Dispatch

Russia launched 116 drones overnight, targeting mostly Sumy and Donetsk regions. President Zelenskyy visited the Czech Republic to get commitments on more artillery shells, and pilot training.

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Roundup: The changing votes of the 905

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There was an interesting piece in the Star over the weekend, where a bunch of their reporters went out into the 905 belt around Toronto, in order to talk to newcomer communities who have been increasingly switching their votes from the Liberals to the Conservatives, and managed to capture a few of those ridings this time around (and costing the Liberals their majority). But while we shouldn’t always assume that immigrant and newcomer communities will be Liberals, even though there has been this particular trope that they have been told to vote Liberal because Pierre Trudeau really opened up immigration into this country back in the seventies, I do think that trope is overused and misses some of the other points, like the fact that they often pick up on dog-whistling by Conservatives, or that their ways of trying to engage with newcomer communities can be ham-fisted (such as the famous example of Jason Kenney going to every ethno-cultural buffet event and saying things like “I hear you guys hate the gays too. You should vote for us!” And no, that didn’t wind up being successful, even though a mythology was built up around it that doesn’t reflect voter turnout).

What I found instead in this Star piece was that in many of these communities, they were blaming the federal Liberals and Justin Trudeau for things that are squarely within provincial jurisdiction—like housing, or the uptick in crime that that has been hammered away at in those areas. No, none of the reporters made this distinction in the story, and we find ourselves back in the place where nobody in this country wants to hold the premiers to account for their failures. (For their corruption, yes, to an extent, but not their failures to do their jobs). Pierre Poilievre has successfully weaponised the incompetence of the premiers against the federal Liberals and Trudeau in particular, which Trudeau let him get away with time and again because he refused to call the premiers out. But the even bigger irony is that these are regions that have increasingly been voting for Doug Ford, who has been the cause of, or done nothing about, the very problems they are raising as to why they switched their votes.

I would also note that there are some other fairly disturbing undertones in some of the responses from these voters—far-right talking points like “mass immigration,” for example, or the fact that they appear to be pulling up the ladder behind them. They immigrated this country and bought houses in these suburbs, but immigrants who came in behind them and can’t find affordable housing are the problem? Do you see the issue here? I think this is a warning sign we should be paying more attention to, but again, if the premiers did their fucking jobs, we wouldn’t be seeing some of these issues able to take root within these newcomer communities.

Ukraine Dispatch

An overnight drone attack on Kyiv has injured at least 11, as Russia is calling for a ceasefire in advance of celebrations to mark the anniversary of VE Day. The mayor of the Russian port city of Novorossiisk has called a state of emergency after an alleged Ukrainian drone attack. Ukraine says that they shot down a Russian Su-30 fighter jet with a missile fired from one of their maritime drones.

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Roundup: The King is coming!

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Mark Carney gave his first post-election news conference yesterday, and he ensured that it was something of a news tsunami, but also that the tone and tenor of his government is vastly different from that of his predecessor. (Well, his predecessor post-2017ish. For the first couple of years, Trudeau was still trying pretty hard to hold to the things he campaigned on in a promise to be a generational change). This included some timelines for the next few weeks, and it’s a lot. So with that in mind, Carney goes to Washington on Tuesday to meet with Trump, the new Cabinet will be sworn in on the week of the 12th, Parliament will be recalled on the 26th for the election of a new Speaker, and then the 27th will be the Speech From the Throne, and it will be delivered by the King, for the first time since 1977 (and the first time a monarch has opened our parliament since 1957). In addition, he says we have the biggest reorientation of our economy to accomplish since the Second World War, and he’s going to balance the operating budget within three years with no cuts to services (indeed, the rollout of full dental care is continuing on schedule), and he’s not going to enter into any kind of formal arrangement with the NDP as there is no point in doing so. Here are five of the priorities outlined by Carney.

https://twitter.com/RoyalFamily/status/1918325678144884794

There will, of course, be a bunch of grumbling about the King arriving to deliver the Speech, but the thing we need to get out of the way is that he’s the King of Canada, not the King of the UK (or England, which hasn’t had a separate Crown since 1707) as far as we’re concerned, and so he’s not a “foreign monarch.” Canada has had a separate Crown from the UK since the Statute of Westminster in 1931, and even before that, the Crown in Canada manifested in very different ways from the UK since Princess Louise was the Chatelaine of Rideau Hall. (I have more on this in the Crown chapter of my book). The fact that we are bringing out the King to play a bigger role as our sovereignty is threatened is a reflection of just how different we are from the US, and why we will never be part of them, and because Trump idolises the royals, this becomes a thumb in his eye. We cannot forget that.

The other major development yesterday was that Conservative MP Damien Kurek has offered up his seat to Pierre Poilievre, so that he can return to the House of Commons, and surprising nobody, it’s one of the most conservative (and indeed, whitest) ridings in the country, where he got 81.8 percent of the vote in Monday’s election. While Carney said he would call the by-election at the earliest opportunity, Kurek can’t actually resign until a certain point because of rules in place, after which it’s a five-week campaign, and so that means it probably won’t happen until early July, so Poilievre will be out of the Chamber for the entire spring sitting (which is only slated to be about four weeks long). Kurek was six months away from qualifying for an MP pension, so one imagines that the party will work to compensate him in some way.

Ukraine Dispatch

A mass drone attack late Friday hit an apartment block in Kharkiv, injuring 46 people. The US State Department has approved the sale of $310 worth of training and sustainment for Ukraine’s F-16 fighter jets.

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Roundup: 611 votes short

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In more election fallout, it looks like the Liberals were just 611 votes, between two Ontario ridings and Nunavut, from getting a majority Parliament. That’s an incredibly close number for this race, and once again goes to show how every vote really does count, particularly in smaller ridings. There is also some pretty good analysis from the numbers to show that all those southwestern Ontario seats that went Conservative was not because of progressive vote-splitting, but because they were quite clearly turned off of the NDP. That clarity is going to matter if the party wants to start rethinking their path forward. Oh, and the vast majority of NDP candidates didn’t make their ten percent vote threshold for Elections Canada rebates, so the party is going to really be hurting financially for the next couple of years.

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1917541319209046324

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1917541365925253229

https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt/status/1917678086385959124

Elsewhere, every legacy media journalist is trying to get a story about NDP MPs crossing the floor to the Liberals (they won’t), or about Elizabeth May either becoming Speaker or getting into Cabinet, neither of which is going to happen. Ever. Especially Speaker because, as much as I respect May, nobody in the House of Commons is going to vote to put her in the Big Chair because they don’t want a sanctimonious scold in the position. There’s a reason they have voted in incredibly weak chairs for the past couple of Parliaments, and why they didn’t vote for Geoff Regan a second time when he was being a firmer hand. Stop indulging in these stupid fantasies. It’s not going to happen. Oh, and no, official party status isn’t something that is going to be negotiated, much as Don Davies likes to claim that the magic number of 12 MPs is “arbitrary,” but it’s not. You need that many MPs to fit onto committees, and that’s already doubling up. You physically cannot have enough MPs to be in all places when there are six+ committees meeting at the same time outside of QP.

Meanwhile, taking advantage of Carney’s win for her own ends is Danielle Smith, who introduced a very Trump-like package of electoral law amendments which brings back big corporate money into Alberta politics, feeds conspiracy theories, and lowers the threshold for citizen-initiated referendums, and while she didn’t outright say she would bring a separation referendum, essentially encouraged someone else to, and they already started gathering signatures. You might ask whose interest this serves, and the answer is hers, in part because she is facing a major growing scandal about health services procurement that is getting bigger by the day, and the former Cabinet minister she has since expelled from caucus, who tried speaking up about the issue, tabled a bunch more documents about what he knew, and it’s pretty damning stuff. So, what is Smith’s best weapon of mass-distraction? Stoking separatist sentiment, pretending she’s not behind it, and watching it take over the news cycle. It’s terrible, and nobody should take their eye off the ball while she pulls the fire alarm.

"If you or any other Canadians are not happy living on Treaty lands, they are free to apply for citizenship elsewhere."Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation issues a scathing rebuke of Danielle Smith's talks on a national unity crisis.

— Courtney Theriault (@ctheriault.bsky.social) 2025-05-01T03:29:35.719Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian drones attacked Odesa early morning, killing two and injuring at least five. A Ukrainian drone strike hit a weapons factory in Russia. South Korean intelligence says that some 600 North Korean troops have been killed out of a deployment of 15,000 soldiers.

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Roundup: Leaders on the final push

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Day thirty-four, and leaders are all in the final push, making last-minute stops in key ridings that they either hope to keep, or win outright. Mark Carney was in Sault Ste. Marie to visit Algoma Steel, where he gave the Ontario-centric and, more importantly, steel-focused, version of his pitch to voters. He did say, in response to a question, that he was open to electoral reform but didn’t think that a prime minister should champion it because it politicises it. (I swear to Zeus, if this turns into another round of “citizen assembly” nonsense, I will lose my mind). He also said he’s open to reviewing the Access to Information regime (which every leader says), and called on Israel to end the blockade on food aid to Gaza. The then made stops in Georgetown, Cambridge, and London, Ontario. He also made his appearance at the virtual AFN forum, where he committed to implementation of UNDRIP. Carney is sticking in Ontario today with events in King City, Newmarket, Aurora, Markham, Mississauga, and then Windsor.

Pierre Poilievre was in Saskatoon, where he laid out his plans for his first 100 days in office (which is another imported Americanism), and it involved promising to sit through the summer in order to pass three massive omnibus bills that dealt with large swaths of his agenda. Part of his hundred days, however, was a promise to get a deal with Trump, which is not only ridiculous because nobody is getting an actual deal with Trump, but he’s been saying that Carney thinks he can control Trump but nobody can, and yet he’s simultaneously insisting that only he can control Trump enough to get a deal. It’s laughable that he thinks this is at all serious. Poilievre then stopped in Calgary for a rally, where he called for bigger voter turnout, before heading to Nanoose Bay, BC. Poilievre will be in Delta, BC, today for one of his finally rallies.

Poilievre is still peddling the fantasy that *he* can make a deal with Trump that will stick, after he says Carney is delusional for thinking he can control Trump.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-25T15:44:59.656Z

Jagmeet Singh was in Toronto, where he just invented the threat that the Liberals will cut healthcare if there aren’t enough NDP MPs elected, which is outrageous bullshit. For one, the problem is with the provinces, and they have long-term funding agreements with the federal government, and two, the threats of cutting healthcare are at the provincial level. This is just outright mendacity from an increasingly desperate Singh. His campaign then stopped in Hamilton and London, Ontario. Singh starts the day in London, then heads to Windsor before flying to Vancouver and Burnaby.

Singh is just literally making shit up at this point.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-25T15:02:12.089Z

On a side note, Yves-François Blanchet made the statement today that Canada is an “artificial country with very little meaning,” in response to questions about previous remarks about sitting in a “foreign parliament.” While this is probably self-defeating at a time of heightened patriotism, what Blanchet is really trying to do is appeal to ethnic nationalism in Quebec. All countries are artificial, but a good many around the world are bound together by a common ethnicity and language, and Canada is not. Certain elements of Quebec would like to think that they have a common ethnicity and language, but this is the kind of ethnic nationalism that fuels racism and xenophobia. It’s what François Legault has been appealing to as he attacks the rights of religious minorities. And Blanchet is trying to appeal to it to say that Liberals can’t represent Quebec because only the Bloc can truly represent “ethnic” Quebeckers. But he’s also been hoping that he’ll get a bump in the polls like he did last time after Shachi Kurl raised (badly formed) questions about Law 21, which Blanchet was able to spin into “She’s calling us racists!” and that gave him the boost in the polls he needed. It looks like he won’t get that this time around.

https://twitter.com/acoyne/status/1916013202388721995

In other campaign news, Equal Voice’s tally shows that the Liberals, Conservatives, and Bloc are all running fewer women as candidates in this election. Elections Canada says that Poilievre’s riding of Carleton had the highest advance turnout in the country. None of the parties have been clear about how they plan to meet existing climate commitments. Singh is trying to convince George Stroumboulopoulos that their poll numbers are rebounding (really!) so they’ll come out of the election with “lots” of re-elected MPs. (Aside from the quarter of his caucus that’s not running again?)

For Canadians being inundated by riding-level polls right now:The data is crap if it has no dates, small samples (<800), high margins of error.The people showing them to you are trying to persuade you to vote for their own preferred party. It's sales pitch, not an evidence-based argument.

— Jared Wesley (@jaredwesley.ca) 2025-04-26T01:02:15.747Z

https://bsky.app/profile/emmettmacfarlane.com/post/3lnnrnrygrs2r

Yes. Yes I do.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-25T13:35:18.917Z

Ukraine Dispatch

A drone attack on Pavlohrad killed five and injured at least eleven. A Russian general was killed by a car bomb, and Russia is blaming Ukraine (who have not yet claimed responsibility).

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1915669752787149047

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Roundup: A more comprehensive justice package

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Day nineteen, and the weird pace of this campaign was back again as there wasn’t a fresh Trump eruption to steal the spotlight. Mark Carney was in Brampton, and delivered his party’s big justice plan, which was pretty comprehensive, and contained a lot of different parts—doubling down on gun buybacks and classifications, training more RCMP and CBSA officers, and hiring more Crown prosecutors, tougher sentencing guidelines (not mandatory minimums), claims for tougher bail conditions (which is where they start getting into trouble), and more on online luring and even criminal prohibitions around deepfake nudes. Carney will be back in Ottawa with his prime minister hat on today to meet with the Canada-US Cabinet Committee (while Michael Chong howls that this is abusing the Caretaker Convention, which is not how that works).

Nobody wants to believe that the problem with bail is a provincial issue (underfunding, primarily), because everyone is absolutely allergic to holding premiers to account in this country.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-04-10T15:57:20.675Z

https://bsky.app/profile/emmettmacfarlane.com/post/3lmhuivcd522k

Pierre Poilievre was in Milton, Ontario, and proposed a scheme where municipalities lower development charges or other taxes on new homes, and a Conservative government would reimburse 50 percent of those cuts up to a maximum threshold. Poilievre was also asked about the “I Don’t Believe The Polls” crowd that has been at his rallies (and whom he has sought out to take photos with), and sort of distanced himself from them saying he would respect the election outcome, but also didn’t say whether he trusts those polls. Poilievre opens his day in St. Catharines, Ontario, and ends it in Windsor.

Jagmeet Singh was in Saskatoon, and he warned that Mark Carney was planning major cuts over the next three years, and produced a document to show the cost of those cuts—based entirely on speculation. He also made a big deal about releasing a new campaign video that called for as many NDP MPs to be elected as possible to ensure the Liberals don’t cut everything, which is achingly desperate. Singh is also in Ottawa today to address the Broadbent Institute’s Progress Summit, rallying the troops.

In other campaign news, both Carney and Singh have had interviews with Nardwuar in Vancouver, and done the hip flip.

Ukraine Dispatch

A Russian drone hit an apartment building in Zhytomyr region, killing one person. There was a missile strike in Dnipro that killed one, and drone attacks on Kyiv and Mykolaiv, injuring at least twelve. Russia claims to have captured a village in Sumy region. The Chinese foreign ministry accused president Zelenskyy of being “irresponsible” by pointing out that over 150 Chinese nationals are fighting for Russia on Ukrainian soil.

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