With the resignation this week of Justin Trudeau, all eyes are on the leadership race in the Liberal Party of Canada, which promises to be a major milestone in Canadian political history. If the party finds a replacement with enough popular appeal that it can avoid being completely eclipsed in the upcoming election, it will be in a strong position to compete in the future; the Canadian electorate is, despite its present dissatisfaction with Trudeau, not very conservative. On the other hand, if the party continues on its present course, it may be reduced to a permanent minority. Voters can always turn to the Canadian New Democrats instead, the social democratic party that has already threatened to eclipse the LPC once this century.

The major beneficiary looks to be Justin Trudeau’s former deputy prime minister, Chrystia Freeland, who resigned in a pointedly public fashion last month. Freeland, who had served in the position since 2019, apparently took issue with Trudeau’s approach to Donald Trump’s threats to use major tariffs on Canadian goods. Despite being responsible for U.S.–Canada relations during Trump’s first term—including the negotiation of the USMCA free trade agreement that replaced NAFTA in 2020—and serving as Canadian finance minister, Freeland was notably absent when Trudeau flew to Mar-a-Lago after Trump’s reelection in November 2024 to discuss future relations between the North American countries, including trade and tariffs.

The conflict between Freeland, who advocated for a more confrontational approach to Trump’s belligerent stance, and Trudeau, who seems to have decided on a more conciliatory tone, escalated until the prime minister decided that the rift had become too wide. On December 13, Trudeau asked Freeland to resign as finance minister and offered her another position in the cabinet, something that would have been a considerable demotion for the deputy prime minister.

That was when Freeland decided to wield the knife. In a very unusual move for Canadian politics, Freeland published a scathing letter on 𝕏 denouncing Trudeau’s approach to the economy and announcing her resignation.