POLITICO
OTTAWA — Justin Trudeau is running out of time.
He has trailed in polls by double digits for nearly a year, and the outlook for the once popular prime minister is so grim that some old guard Liberals have been grumbling that maybe he should just step down and give someone else a shot.
To turn it around and win a fourth term, Trudeau has less than 17 months before he must hold an election and face off against an ascendant Conservative Party and its firebrand populist leader, Pierre Poilievre.
Trouble is, nothing he’s tried so far to improve his standing has worked.
“The Liberals have tried to basically throw the political kitchen sink at the Conservatives to find a way to narrow the gap,” said Nik Nanos, one of the country’s leading pollsters.
Trudeau’s difficulties, to some extent, mirror those of President Joe Biden and some Western European leaders facing populist rage in a world still struggling to shake off the inflation and lingering anger over pandemic lockdowns.
The longest-serving leader in the G7 also has some unique problems, including fatigue with the Liberal party after three terms and a series of scandals that have damaged Trudeau’s image. Many Canadians have simply tuned out the prime minister, said Quito Maggi, a pollster with Mainstreet Research.
“It’s a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t scenario for Trudeau because it almost doesn’t matter what he does or says right now,” Maggi said. “No one’s listening. It’s not the message: It’s the messenger.”
Trudeau’s efforts have included arranging visits to Canada by Biden as well as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who received a standing ovation in Parliament. “None of these things have changed the trend,” Nanos said.
The speculation over whether Trudeau might step down, at this point, remains just that — with neither the prime minister nor any of his aides or allies saying he has any intention of throwing in the towel.
But the moment he says he’s going, he becomes a lame duck and the leadership race breaks out — so it’s in his interest to wait as long as possible before saying otherwise.
Some think the window is closing on that option — with just a month or two left. Otherwise, a new leader would not have enough time to be ready for the looming election, which could be triggered any time before fall of 2025.
At every turn, interviewers press Trudeau on whether he really plans to remain at the helm with the ship sinking. Yet at every opportunity, he insists he plans to stick it out.
“The stakes are so high, and the moment is so real,” Trudeau told the “Freakonomics Radio” podcast.
